How to Organize Kid's Art Supplies?

[root*children]

I stink at this. How do you guys do it? We live in a small house. Ideally when we move to a larger house, we'll have room for a small dresser just for art/craft supplies.

Right now, here's what we have. I have my sewing stuff, which often gets raided for art supplies (elastic, etc.). In our living room, there is a built-in bookshelf and one small shelf (about 1 sq. ft.) for construction & drawing paper, craft books, etc. The shelf above has play-doh in a big rubbermaid, box of stickers, rubber stamps, crayons. On the floor there is just a cardboard box with all the other random stuff (mostly ziplocks with pom-poms, feathers, pipe cleaners), but also loose things like glue sticks, pencil sharpeners, etc. All the messy things are stored out-of-toddler-reach (paints, glue bottles, markers, glitter).

It often happens that when DS is looking for one item, the whole box or shelf gets strewn all over the floor in the search. So frustrating! How do you do it?

[Mom4tot]

Julie, you might try a rolling cart from an office supply store. You can get one with 5 smaller drawers or with 2 big and 2 smaller. It has helped me to organize paper, coloring books, stickers. On top I have a basket with stencils. We use the bottem drawer to hold works in progress. All drawers are labelled. They are on sale in our area for 14.99 this week.

[pixie-n-hertwoboys]

I got a cool organizer for the little stuff that hangs on the back of a door (coat closet in our case) It looks like a shoe organizer but it has double mesh pockets totalling 42 pockets in all. Its awesome! The littlest guy can't open the door on his own so he can't destruct things and the big guy goes in whenever he wants for his stuff. For the big stuff I got a filing cabinet - its plastic (shame) and the kids can get in it when they want. Then I also use it to file the cool stuff away. Then they also have a desk where they can keep paper to write on.

[Breathless Wonder]

It looks like a shoe organizer but it has double mesh pockets totalling 42 pockets in all.

pixie-n-hertwoboys- Did you buy it online, and if so link?

[tboroson]

Ooh, the pocket idea inspires me. I think I'm going to take some old pants and rip off all the pockets and sew them to a piece of fabric, and make a wild one I can make it a wall hanging instead of a door-hanging one, since there is no door on our playroom/office. Kewl, thanks ya'll for inspiring me

[MaggiesMom]

I'm in the process of making an over-the-door pocket organizer right now for cards and wrapping paper/ ribbon etc. I have a very small pocket organizer I got at the dollar store for craft supplies.

I saw a really cute idea on the Carol Duvall show that I want to make for DD and my nieces and nephews. You buy a platic milk-type crate and cut a piece of wood to just fit over the opening at the top, so you have created a little table. Then you get fabric and create a slipcover for the crate, making pockets on each side for supplies. You can also put supplies inside the crate. The kids can use it for a table and put their paper and crayone etc inside.