Help with kids clothes

[bird_verde]

How do you all organize and put away kids clothes? any good recommendations to make it easy and simple so that a six year old can put most things away herself (and find things on her own)? 

I have all of her sock and underwear in baskets on a shelf - that works - she can easily put them away and find things when she needs them. As summer is fairly short here and she doesn't have many shorts/summer clothes - I have them in a large basket at the bottom of her closet - that works. But the dresses, shirts, blouses, sweaters, hoodies, jeans, pants, skirts and accessories are overwhelming. I need a simple method that a six year old can use.  Hanging up clothes is fairly difficult for her still - I have tried to teach her how to hang things but it only messes up the rest of the closet. She can simply fold items but stacking them to fit in drawers neatly seems impossible as they only get shoved in and she can never find anything in them.  Are there any great systems out there or gadgets that help?  Perhaps some sort of bin/storage cube system?  Our maybe a better chest of drawers?  IDK I just need somethng that works instead of her sleeping on her bed amongst piles of folded clothes

[lucifugous]

Shelves are my favorite for babies/ for displaying many different types of pieces for layering. For a six year old you'd need some pretty deep shelves tho. Idono. DD is 3, we use a couple dressers for both of our clothes and linens. Her clothes are in the two drawers that are second from the bottom (low enough to be a bend for me, but perfect for her), things that need to be on hand but are used less frequently are in the bottom (including some of her stuff for layering on odd weather days, and the linens), and then I get the top drawers for all of my stuff! When she was younger and had even more clothes I filled the top with her stuff since I'd have to change her a few times a day. But I resented having to bend so far down (often while trying to carry or wear her) to get to my own things. Now that she gets her own clothes out, it's way better. I still fold them and have asked her to keep them relatively folded when she's picking out what she wants. I tidy it up when I'm putting away clean clothes, once a week usually works. I'm sure expectations might be different for a six year old, but hopefully that helps :)

[phroggies]

How lazy are you willing to be? I use a large bin for each of my kids as well, but they hold almost everything. Yes, there's some hunting, but hunting takes less time than sorting. So the bins hold shorts, t-shirts, sweaters, hoodies, jeans and casual pants, and underwear (for added laziness, I store them right next to the dryer. . . ). Dress clothes--which we really only use for church--I hang up myself (which means that I hang one outfit each once a week). Socks are stored in a bin by the door (I put all of them in together; there's a gender difference and a sizable age gap, so it doesn't really complicate things).

I think the reason this works--aside from the fact that I have completely made my peace with non-ironed clothing--is because I only keep out seasonal items and limit the number of items as much as possible. So, for example, they have roughly seven casual tops and seven casual bottoms (I try to make sure these can be mixed and matched), two church outfits apiece, and, in colder weather, maybe two or three hoody/fleece/sweater type items. Much more than that and the bins would be too ginormous and the hunting too involved.

Not sure about accessories. My daughter isn't yet two and so hasn't really discovered the allure of accessories, but I'm sure she will, so I'll be checking back here to see if anyone has good ideas!

[Logan]

I don't know how much room you have, but I have these white stackable mesh bins that sound perfect for what you are looking for. I'm not sure where you could find them in the US, I just got them from the hardware store here, and they were super cheap. They actually look quite nice too considering. You could stick a label on each so she knows what goes where and she can just shove it in or fold it neatly if she can hehe :).

They are pretty much like these ones here:

http://www.foams4sports.co.uk/images/products/large_106_1.jpg

[bird_verde]

Thanks for the ideas ladies.  I really like the stackable bins idea.  I am going to look for something like that around here.  I'll have to try and post and before and after pic if I can get this set up.

Shelves used to work for me with baby clothes and stuff but big kids clothes need something more especially since the big kids easily pull everything off of a shelf whiel trying to get to the bottom of a pile.

I was reading something the other day about organization of childrens items (books, toys, etc.) - the key is to make it easier to put away than to take it out.  I think with clothing it has to be equally easy to take out as put away

phroggies - just wait for all of the bows, beads and bobbles - they multiply themselves unless you stay on top of them

Any other ideas or systems recommendations are greatly appreciated!

[ZakareyasMama]

http://journeychic.com/2010/04/14/diy-closet-dividers/

You could change it read "dresses" "pants" etc. or the LO's names if they share a closet.

[HappyWoman]

We LOVE our mesh drawer units from the Container store. They come in different sizes, so you can customize to fit your space. The Elfa drawers aren't cheap, but they'll last a long time - a friend has had hers for 15 years and the are still in great shape.

http://www.containerstore.com/shop/elfa/bestSellingSolutions/drawerSystems?N=68564

Ikea makes similar drawer units but the quality isn't as good. If you are on a tight budget, Ikea might be the way to go:

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/S19876454

FYI, the Container store has their annual sales in September and January, (I believe the it's 30% off the Elfa products) so definitely plan to purchase during the sales.

The drawers are really easy to use - our toddler is able to open/close them and remove/put away clothes.