April 19, 2013

my love for cheap toy organization


i love organizing - like really, really love it. the container store isn't far from us, but i've never been because i'm just not sure i can trust myself in there :) after christmas, i had to figure out something to do with all covington's new toys. i looked everywhere for baskets the right size for the bottom of our shelves but couldn't find anything. i'd finally settled on some that were too small for the space and way overpriced when i realized that my trusty file boxes were almost the right size! i love using file boxes either covered in scrapbook paper or painted to organize. some of the ones in our closet are 5 years old, have been through 3 moves in 3 states, and are holding up great. when i was organizing covington's closet, office depot was having a sale so i got 3 packages of 10 boxes for $30. a dollar a box isn't a bad deal :)



so i drew a line where they were sticking out, cut it with a box cutter, stuck the back inside the front, making the bottoms overlap, and hot glued the mess out of them. i did all 7 boxes in less than a 2 hour nap time, so i'd say it wasn't a bad project! that night, i put 2 coats of white craft paint on the fronts while watching a movie and made labels out of scrapbook paper covered in masking tape. not bad for a completely free project.




see the rough edge on that second box? in hindsight i should have used that one as the back piece (not that i'm ever going to fix it or anything...)

       

now i'm not expecting these to last forever but covington has pulled them out and crawled on them daily for 4+ months, and they're still looking great. they hold a ton - all the cars and trucks and  instruments and balls and trains and puzzles and movies. i do so love a free project.

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avandia recall