Calming Morning Clothing Chaos

A few weeks ago through Amazon.com I got these amazing bins. Well, I call them bins. The actual name is "Kids Daily Activity Organizer - 6 Shelf Hanging Closet." (Yeah, it's easier to say "bins.")

So, anyway, as I was brainstorming ways to make the coming school year go smoother (i.e., no morning meltdowns over breakfast, clothes and watching TV before the bus), I found these online. I thought, what a great idea! Pick out each kids' entire week of clothing on Sunday so there are no cries of "I don't have any socks!" when I yell, "Get your shoes on, the bus is coming in 2 minutes!"

Of course, there's one slight problem with this system, at least for us. Unfortunatley, I don't live in a nice, new 5-bedroom home (ok, I was going to say mansion, but I didn't!) where each child has their own walk-in closet that has room for 4 seasons of clothing, coats, toys and a storage system like this. In fact, we live in an old 3-bedroom house built 100 years ago when a closet just had to be big enough to hold 5 hooks along the back wall. Seriously, that's what our closets had. So, now they have bars that are about 12" long-the length of the closet, but the closets are only about 15" deep; they're just barely deep enough for a hanger.

So, what to do? I love the system but lack the space.

My brainstorm, which I put into place today, makes the most of the space we have. About a year ago I had gotten myself a garmet rack. My intention was to put it up in the basement next to the washer/dryer to hang clothes. But, I never got around to it and it was still in the box sitting in the basement.

So, after helping my daughter clean her bedroom, she helped me put together the rack. (Then DH came and finshed the job because, man, those things are hard to snap together tight!)

The rack, which is now on wheels, holds 2 of the shelf organizers - one for my daughter and one for my son, who share a bedroom. The rack now blocks a spare door in their bedroom that isn't used (But the rack is on wheels and is very easy and lightweight to turn in case of an emergency that we'd need to use the door.)

It's a little high up for them to reach, so I might get some of those plastic chains you can put on hangers to lower them. But not only do both shelves fit, but my daughter's dresses can also hang between them instead of on a hook on the back of their door (freeing up that space for the future.)

Now my son's room will be a little more difficult. He doesn't have room in his tiny closet, and there's no real space for a rack. So I convinced my husband that if we put a hook in his ceiling, we can hang the shelves in an empty corner that's always been wasted space. For that I will need to get some of those plastic chains or he can't possibly reach it.

10 days til school starts, and we're getting organized for a good start to the new year!

Getting Ready for Back to School

The countdown has begun-four weeks left until school begins. Time for those 'back to school' preparations to begin in force!

We already got the backpacks I ordered through L.L. Bean and loaded them with school supplies on sale from WalMart. Getting this done early takes away some of the stress of getting ready.

I added the kids' art shirts from last year, so they're ready to go. We don't get our letter from school telling the kids their teacher or what they need until about a week before school starts. So I have to do the supply shopping on guesswork.

Organization can make a big difference when changing routines, like starting school brings. So I went supply shopping online. This year I ordered each of the kids a six-shelf canvas closet organizer labeled with the days of the week. The plan is each Sunday to sort the clothes and pick outfits for each day of the week. I'm going to add an index card to each day with the kids special that day. This will also help them prepare for their day mentally by knowing what's on the schedule (and hopefully prevent nice clothes from getting ruined in art class or my daughter wearing a dress on gym day!)

The one thing I want to order and haven't yet are battery-operated alarm clocks for each kid so they can wake themselves up on time.

The week before school starts I'll put the kids to bed 15 minutes earlier (8:45 instead of 9), and I'll wake them up earlier (8:45 instead of 9). I'll continue this each day until they're getting up (without too much effort) at 7 and to bed by 8. Generally over a period of 7 days has been enough time for the kids to adjust. They're little, so getting up earlier hasn't been too much of a problem. We just move up our entire nightly routine with baths right after dinner.

Our library's summer reading program ends Aug. 21, so we can probably skip reading books at night for one week. Each of the kids read at least 100 books. The other thing I must do is fill out their required reading forms and put them in their backpacks for the first day. (Their reading is due by June 2011, but we get it done over the summer.)

Clothes shopping is another back to school activity that we're almost finished. A trip to the Philadelphia Premium Outlets and some online ordering covered that. Each kid has new socks (my kids wear out socks very quickly) and new sneakers, and at least two new shirts to wear that first week.

Haircuts are another chore we try to do a few weeks before school starts. My oldest had his hair cut Saturday. I just have to take the other two to my hairdresser and that will be done.

I wish I could say I wake up early the first day of school and make the kids a giant homemade breakfast to start their day, but knowing my kids they wouldn't eat it anyway. They're not big on breakfast. So I'll just make them Eggos and give them juice, and they'll be perfectly happy.

The night before school I'll read "The Night Before Kindergarten" to my youngest (who's starting kindergarten), I'll tuck the other two in and remind them how exciting it will be to see their friends and meet their new teacher, and I'll share in their nervous chatter about what new experiences the year will bring.

Then once they're asleep I'll make sure my camera is charged and ready to go for those precious "first day of school" photos. I'll remind the husband he has to go into work late the next day so he can be there for that special walk to the bus stop, and I'll read a book and relax knowing that tomorrow, for a few hours at least, the house will finally be quiet!


“I wrote this blog post while participating in the TwitterMoms blogging program to be eligible to get a HarperCollins book set. For more information on how you can participate, click here.”