7 Practical Storage Ideas That You Should Try for Your Kids’ Toys
Toys spark joy in our kids on top of the fact that they help encourage their creativity, improve their cognitive development and psychomotor skills. These are probably why we don’t hesitate to buy them as many toys as we can. The thing is, though, it can be overwhelming when we later realize that the toys of our kids start to pile up, and clean-up time can be extremely chaotic if we don’t take extra measures to tidy things up.
Some parents like to keep their kids’ toys only in their playroom or recreation room, but we know that this method might not work for everyone. Some might have many kids while others have kids who often play with their toys in different parts of the house. Maybe having toys in different rooms is not a problem for you but you’d like to know more creative ways to store them easily. Whichever the case, today we are listing down 7 different ideas that can help you store your kids’ toys. Are you ready? Here we go!
Plastic Outdoor Storage Benches for Outdoor Toys
Not all toys can be stored in our children’s bedroom. For example, your kids might have water guns, mini bicycles, gardening or beach toys for the sandbox, balls, among other toys that are only appropriate for the outdoors. Instead of leaving these toys lying around in your front yard or somewhere hidden in your garage, a plastic outdoor storage bench will do the trick!
This option right off the bat helps you optimize any outdoor space in your home since it doubles as a bench and as easy-access storage for your kids’ toys. Storage benches are incredibly stylish, durable, and spacious — so it doesn’t matter how many items you’d like to store in them. That also means you and your kids would know exactly where to find their outdoor toys whenever they need them.
Tension Rods: DIY Storage for Balls
If your children have been able to collect a good number of toy balls, randomly storing them along with other types of toys might not be a good idea since they tend to roll across the floor or make other toys difficult to access when placed in the same container. That said, you can store multiple balls in any cubby hole or cabinet by installing two tension rods at its opening. One at around 3 inches high and the other at about 7 inches. This can make any cubby hole or empty cabinet hold balls of practically any size for easy storage.
Bean Bags for Stuffed Animals
Struggling to contain a sea of stuffed animals? Try storing them in bean bags! On days when you want your kids’ bedroom or playroom to be extra neat, place the least-favorite stuffed animals in a bean bag so this can serve as both a storage container and as a bean bag chair for your kids. You can shop for empty bean bags that are sealable with a zipper. This helps your kids easily put away their stuffed animals when they are done playing with them, and to avoid such from lying scattered on the floor.
File Holders for Small Toys and Coloring Materials
You must have several extra file holders from your office or home office that you’re not using. Thankfully, they are not only useful for storing important documents since they can be used to store some of your kids’ toys. You can use these to store lego blocks, small cars, jigsaw pieces, markers, and crayons. In the process, teaching them to put away their toys according to type can even help your toddlers learn how to distinguish toy categories from one another.
Do keep in mind, however, that the ideal type of file holder to use for your kids is cardboard. Metal or plastic file holders might be too hard or have edges that may be sharp enough to cause hazards.
Shoe Organizers for Collections and Small Toys
Much like file holders, unused shoe organizers can be repurposed for storing small toys. A shoe organizer, ideally those with transparent pouches, is perfect for keeping nooks and crannies that are normally hard to find if they were merely put in a box. Not only do shoe organizers help you to reduce the clutter of toys in any room, but these can also help your kids easily find the small toys they want to play with.
Play-and-Store Bags to Carry Around Favorites
If one of your kids constantly likes to play with a certain group of toys, it would no doubt be a bit tiring to pick them up one by one. Play-and-store bags are here to the rescue for this kind of dilemma. A play-and-store bag functions as a playmat and as a bag that can pack a bunch of toys with an easy pull of its drawstring. This is super convenient if your child has a dozen favorite action figures or dolls that they’d like to always carry around. This bag will help your child put away or dispense their favorite toys with ease! Making clean-up time extra easy.
Categorized Toy Boxes
If you are shopping for storage containers for your kids’ playroom or bedroom, the classic choice is no other than a set of toy boxes. Toy boxes help you and your child categorize the different toy types in the playroom. Among other ways to do this, each of your kids can have a toy box of their own — segregating their own toys, their favorites, and the toys that are for sharing. Toys boxes are also excellent for keeping any toy from becoming dusty, which likely happens if they are merely placed on a shelf.
Before getting toy boxes, make sure to consider see-through ones. You might think it would be better to get ones that are none-transparent to hide the clutter. However, when the boxes are see-through, you save extra since you can already tell which box you are accessing.
