Sunday, May 6, 2012

Bundles of organization

Last year before we moved, or maybe even in 2010, I probably did the most Martha Stewart-est thing of my life. I organized the boys clothes. But not just any sort of organizational way. I believe I was inspired by a Martha Stewart organizational segment I saw On Demand two years ago. But I can't be sure. But it was working for me.

We don't have that much room for the boys clothing, which we don't have that much of since we only see them two weekends a month during the fall, winter, and spring. It is during the summer that we need a lot more clothes. Joe is growing every month it seems while Jaime is starting to grow, but at 11 he is still wearing size 8. I had been organizing their clothes by each boy and then by season. I have found this to be troublesome when trying to understand what we had for each boy in terms of clothes. We would buy clothing that we didn't need. And the clothes that were to small for Joe but to big for Jaime were mixed in with all the clothes. Well, I believe I have found a system that will hopefully save time and money! At first, I just took my left over Christmas wrapping supplies, a pen, scissors, and a couple of bins.



Instead of dividing the clothing by boy, I divided it by size. All "large" long sleeve shirts went to a pile. All "10" shorts went into another pile. Then using curly ribbon I wrapped them up like a bundle of clothes of yore. I tied the ribbon and left a little room so the bundle could be picked up from the top. I labeled each bundle by using a gift tag writing the size in the "To" space and then type of clothing in the "From" space. I punched a hole through the tag (I always like the self adhesive kind which would just fall off the clothing eventually) and slipped a end of the ribbon through the hole taking the tag all the way to the knot and then tying the ribbon in a bow. Viola! A organized bundle of clothing! Then I divided the clothing into bins labeled either "summer" or "winter." Now when I need larger clothing for Jaime I can easily find them by sorting through the bundles! A couple of snips with scissors and the bundle will be released. And when Joe outgrow his 16's (yes, the soon to be 13 year old is wearing small men's clothing) I can bundle them up and store them until Jaime is wearing 16's (if that every happens!).



Several of months ago I purchased twine and pre-strung shipping tags to make the effort even more organized. With the warm weather here a couple of weeks ago I was able to reorganize and update the bins. I was much more impressed with what I came up with:


Sometimes I scare James with my organizational fits. But it always pays off in the end.....

No comments:

Post a Comment