NOPE!, Just me and my family getting ready for the big seasonal clothes switch!! Welcome to 9ndhouse!! With 7 kids in the house we have a ton of clothes. Each kid's section by itself doesn't seem to be very many but multiply it over and over and it's a mess!! Right now it looks like a clothing store has bombed us, but the kids are soooo excited!!!
They were with me at the end of last winter when I went to the second hand store and bought several bags of "cool" clothes in the $3 bag sale. We put them away in their out of season boxes and switched them for the summer clothes. Now that the air is turning cooler the switch is upon us again. To them it's like Christmas, getting a ton of new clothes. Now, I love clothes and I love to shop. I must have given this joy to all my children because even the boys like to get new clothes and to shop.
So, for the next several days, in between school, meals, cleaning, canning and everything else that goes on around here, we will be sorting, matching, hanging, folding and putting away a mega load of laundry. It's a good thing they all enjoy doing this, their "help" helps a lot!!
There is a system to my madness, the community closet isn't the prettiest thing in the world but we built it in the laundry room. The idea was to wash, dry and put away the clothes all in the same room to make it easier and faster. The girls and the boys take turns getting dressed and for the most part all the laundry stays in one place. I usually match outfits and number them (shirt #1 goes with shorts #1) with the girl's initials and some things are by color, each girl has different colors of pajamas. This makes things simple enough even the younger children can put away clothes with no problem. AND!, no one is ever fussing over who is wearing whose clothes!! The boys of course have and assortment of jeans, pants and shirts and would never call them "outfits"!! We hang the "church" and "town" clothes and put "play" clothes and everything else in labeled baskets that act as drawers on the lower shelves. Town clothes are not as dressy as church clothes but not as plain as play clothes, by giving everything a label I can say..."We are leaving in 15 min. get clean town clothes on and get in the van!". Most of the time they will ask now, "where are we going, do we need clean play clothes or town clothes?"
NOW, the tricky part is staying motivated to keep the washers and dryers going so that all this mess stays clean!!!! Hopefully soon I can report a clean living room and laundry room again!!
photo: the kids were sorting their clothes into piles, after baby J had pulled down several piles they threw him in a box of his own!! btw- the floor is concrete and my paint didn't stick very well, we are still remodeling and maybe we can afford the tile later this fall!!
13 comments:
I admire your organizational abilities! I am one of seven so my mom was an amazing homemaker, but I don't really remember everything she did to make things run so smoothly, since I am the youngest.
-Economrs. from babycenter
One of seven, that's neat! I am the oldest of three and can only imagine life in a big family as a sibling. My kids seem to really enjoy our large family even begging for another brother!!
So, what do you remember about your Mom's skills, any tips?
That really is quite a system. We need to start sorting through clothes soon too.
I like your living room too.
Thanks, I figure lots of people are sorting piles of clothes right about now if they haven't already. Good luck with yours.
BTW- You can't really see them in the picture but your butterflies sit beneath the flowers on the center table. I'm surprised you can see the living room for all the clothes!! :-)
Wow, that is a pretty incredible system. I admire that you've put this together and that the focus then is off the clothes and on to more important things. Kudos!
You are so organized. I have such a hard time keeping up with 2 sets of clothes for my kids.
Kristina from MOMfo
Oh my. I am speechless. In complete awe of your organizational talents.
Kim from Momformation.
Thanks girls! You are so sweet to say I'm organized when you see my living room looks like that!! I'm about done though and soon everything will have a place and be in its place once again. I hope, I hope, I hope...;-)
Hey, I surfed over from Gina's blog, Spicy,savvy,& sane. 7 kids must make for a very crazy fun life. You gotta have a system I'm sure just to survive. The clothing system is great! We always did the seasonal switcheroo too and it is just like getting a bunch of new stuff. So fun!
Hi jada's gigi!, Yes we are full of crazy fun for sure! My kids love to switch their clothes, everything is "new" and different. Thanks for stopping by! :-)
Wow, I guess changing over would be a bit of a job. It looks like you have a wonderful family and a sweet blog.
I wish I had room for a family closet! It's on our list for "when we get a house."
For now, I have 3 kids' clothes to try to store in one bedroom... It does not work very well! After next tax season (bonus time) we're going to re-do the kids' room so there's more storage space!
Hi, Tori and Anne!
Yeah, clothes and laundry in general is a big job around here. Not too bad since everyone pitches in to help.
Before we had this large family closet, we too had several children's clothes in one bedroom. I used all kinds of dividers, shelves, bins and racks to seperate, organize and label everything. The time spent keeping it up was worth the time saved getting dressed for sure! Good luck on redoing your kids' room Anne, sounds like something great to look forward too :-)
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