How to Organize your Children’s “treasures”
School’s out – and they’ve brought everything home!
Now that the school year has ended, what's your strategy for dealing with all your kids’ school stuff?
Having children immediately means a massive increase in the number of things in our homes. Along with the mess and clutter, comes so much love, laughter and millions of moments that turn into memories! After a year of school though, you may be looking at the joyful items (so, so, so many things) your children have brought home and wonder what to do with it all. It’s very hard to just toss these items away, but with multiple years of school and maybe multiple children, you’d need a huge amount of storage space to keep it.
From art projects, report cards and all the bits and pieces from their desk, you want to commemorate their accomplishments and preserve the memories of the year, but how can you manage it all? You could have multiple bins of their things in the basement but sadly, out of sight/out of mind isn’t the best way to honour the memories. On the flip side, it’s not always possible to display every last thing your child has created throughout your home. What’s an overwhelmed parent to do??
There are many ways that you and your child can celebrate their school year without just stashing away all their things or having to live with it all over your space. Here are a few ideas to find that happy medium.
Create a gallery wall
Get your kiddo involved in picking out a few of their favourite pieces from the year. You can get them framed if you’re fancy, or pick up a few frames from the thrift store or online sellers. Have your child sign and date their works of genius and hang them either in their bedroom or somewhere in your home. When my daughter was producing masterpieces at every turn, we had a full gallery on both sides of the staircase to the basement. We’d change up the artwork as she produced more and it didn’t matter what the frames looked like or if they matched. Your children will love seeing their art and it’s a gentle hint that they will have to make choices once the space is filled – they can’t keep everything!
Make a year-at-a-glance photo album
There are a variety of websites and apps that you can use to make a simple and affordable photo album that allow you to take photos of your child’s memorabilia and make one from your phone! You can also go old-school and make a scrapbook (but are you really going to do that?) Once the album is done and in your possession, it’s easy to keep on a bookshelf (or in your child’s room) and look at it whenever the mood strikes. Once it’s made though, you should discard all the original work, not just keep that too! A huge upside is that if you do this for each school year, your children will have an encyclopedia of school memories and they can take the set of albums when they move out and decide what to do with them for themselves!
Email it to them in the future
Create an email account for your child. (Use something generic like Gmail or Hotmail, not one with a service provider that you may not use in the future). Take photos of all the items and send it to the account. Once your child is old enough, give them the password and they’ll have everything from their early school days in one place! You can also use this account for other sentimental things like having family email your child letters on special occasions. If you choose to share this with your child on a milestone birthday, it would be fun to go through all the emails together! *Keep the password safe as it likely won’t be used often.
Make them into gifts
Are there other people in your child’s life that may like a memento? If so, have your child pick a special art work, write a little note and pass along as a gift. It’s good practice for children to learn how to be the gracious giver of a gift and the learn joy that comes from the act of giving. However, you will want to give the receiver the chance and grace to decide how to display it – that’s another great learning opportunity for your little one.
What about the other stuff?
Your child likely has clothing and other items that they may have outgrown or will no longer use. By prolonging the shelf life of our garments, we reduce the environmental impact associated with fashion and consumption. You can always find a donation centre that will willingly take items, but here’s another idea. A swap! Organize a group of friends and plan a gathering where you can share gently used items. From coats to sports equipment and uniforms to music books, our kids go through a LOT of stuff in a school year. Unless you have a younger child who will be the same size at the same time of year, you’ve likely got items your family won’t be using again. By planning a swap event, each participant can take items they will need, while leaving items that their child no longer requires. You will likely need to establish a few ground rules – Items must be clean and washed and in good repair; you can only take as many items as you bring, etc.
Pro tip – Consider other items that warrant a swap-fest. Swapping for housewares, small appliances or fancy clothes is a fun way to get together with friends, and keep as many items as possible in circulation and not going to landfill.
Want to work with me on an organizing project? Reach out! Happy Tidying!