5 Simple Solutions for Storing Toys in Living Spaces

 

“We’ll never allow toys to clutter up our living room,” says the newly married couple with no children. Fast forward a couple of years and you are more likely to hear from them, “where is the floor? There are too many toys!” I am only describing the situation of a friend though of course. Living in a two story house with all of the living space upstairs, including bonus room and spare bedroom, having toys downstairs is inevitable. My kids are young, I can’t trust them to safely play upstairs by themselves while I clean or prepare dinner downstairs, so there is no shortage of toys and “junk” in our living room.

This may not be a problem to some, but my husband and I like having a clean looking space when the kids aren’t playing or we are having guests over. Here are 5 simple tips that we use to help get our “kid clutter” out of sight.

1. Sturdy Storage Bench

When we only had to deal with one kids worth of toys, we purchased this storage shelf from IKEA. It can be stacked for more storage, can be on its side and double as a bench, or can stand up tall to fit into smaller spaces. We had it laying on its side as a bench before Christmas of last year, but we needed to make room for our tree so we decided to stand it up in the corner. We liked how the floor was clear so we kept it standing up. This cube shelf is much sturdier than the ones you find at other stores, and they are BIG. You can buy the inserts anywhere, but these particular ones are from IKEA as well.

2. Cabinet/Furniture

We have our TV components in a cabinet by our couch. It is big enough that it doubles as toy storage as well. This is where we keep the toys that don’t fit in the bins of the storage bench. Although my 3 year old can’t organize this cabinet quite like I can, he has no problem handing me toys when we clean up. The drawer on the right also holds some art supplies that I don’t like my kids getting out themselves.

3. Kitchen Cabinets

We used to have our games and cards in the cabinet in the living room, and those would end up EVERYWHERE. Once we got a china cabinet in our kitchen we transferred those to the cabinets there so we could keep games for game time. This is great solution for games, puzzles, and art supplies. We have bibs/placements in one drawer, and in the other drawer I keep my 3 year old's educational books/learning supplies.

4. Closet Space

We are lucky enough to have a HUGE closet space underneath our stairs. This is where I stash the bigger toys that don’t fit in cabinets, like those giant ride on toys that crush your toes while you are cooking dinner. Even if you don’t have a space like this where you can keep toys all of the time, it doesn’t hurt to hide them away just when guests are over so they aren’t cluttering the room.

5. Small Toy Tip

Small toy “kits” need to be kept together. Keeping organized and clutter free isn’t just about keeping things out of sight. If my son wants to play with his birthday cake set, I don’t want him dumping out the whole bin to find the missing candles. To avoid that, I use the most simple solution…..a gallon Ziploc bag. Yep, they aren’t just good for storage in the kitchen, they work great for keeping sets of toys together. We have a few of these in the bottom bin to keep things together. Of course, before doing this make sure your children are old enough to know better than to play WITH the bag, and keep an eye on them while playing with these toys.

I also am a hoarder of the small zipper bags that sheet sets come in and use those for small toys as well. Even the zipper bath toy bags make a perfect storage solution, we have two of these in our cabinet—one holds a big set of wooden letter blocks, the other holds some Disney character toys.

We are constantly finding new ways to store toys, especially with two young boys—one of which is overly obsessed with all things pirates. What are some of your toy storage solutions? Would any of these work for your family?