Now that my oldest is almost 10, I've definitely tried my fair share of ways to organize toys. After almost 10 years of parenting (and many more of teaching), I've finally figured out the best way (in my opinion) to store the toys. I've also figured out which toys are ones to invest in and which are ones to skip, and I plan to share with you all in the post everything I've learned along the way.
Why Toys and Play are Important
First and foremost- a child's job is to play. Play is such an important part of development and should be a central part of your child's day. It helps with brain development, emotional development, physical and cognitive development and so much more.
Toys are the tools that a child uses to play, so having the best ones help set your child up for success.
The Best Toys to Invest In
So what are the best toys to invest in? In my opinion, open-ended toys are the best.
Open-ended toys are toys that don't have a specific goal and are toys that can be played with in many ways. These toys encourage creativity and imagination.
Examples of Open-Ended Toys:
- building blocks
- magnetic tiles
- animal and people figures
- dress-up and pretend play toys
I'm not saying that close-ended toys should be avoided at all costs, but I would say that the vast majority of toys in our home are open-ended.
Here's some of our favorite toys in our home!
How to Organize the Toys
Okay so now that you know what kinds of toys we like in our home, I want to show you the best way to organize them.
We use these wooden cube organizers. They come in lots of different sizes, but we like the ones that have six cubes in them. They can be used 2x3 or 3x2 and they can be stackable if you buy multiple of them. Above is a picture of two of the six cube organizers on top of each other. We have three of the six cube organizers in our playroom and an additional one that is smaller and only has two cubes. That's a total of 20 cubes in our playroom. Inside each cube, we place a clear acrylic bin that is sturdy and has handles. Here's a link to all the supplies we use to organize the toys!
What is in Each Clear Bin?
- Magna-Tiles (5 bins)
- LEGOS (2 bins)
- Trains and train tracks
- People figures
- Animal figures
- Dinosaur figures
- Character figures
- Barbies
- Barbie accessories
- Doll furniture
- Dolls
- Play food
- Pretend Play
- Cars and Vehicles (2 bins)
Here's a link to the most-used toys in our home.
We also have space in the playroom for books and arts and crafts.
Hope this is helpful!
~Brittany
