This post includes my approach to how to organize a boy's closet. My sons are almost 4 and 5.5 years old. They take care of themselves in many ways. They take pride in being independent and self-sufficient.
One area they particularly enjoy is dressing. They like to choose their own clothes. They would rather choose their own clothes than have me do it for them. I'll take it.
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“The first aim of the prepared environment is, as far as it is possible, to render the growing child independent of the adult.
Dr. Maria Montessori
How to Organize a Boy's Closet
What frustrates me is their method to locating clothes. It goes something like this:
- Run upstairs
- Enter closet
- Open dresser drawer
- Sift around trying to find the “right” shirt for that day (Star Wars? Wild Kratts? Stegosaurus?)
- Have trouble finding the “right” clothes so pull clothes out onto the closet floor
Most days I am not sure why we fold laundry. I can't give up though. What we need is a better system or a system at all. They share a dresser with three drawers. The top drawer they can hardly reach and definitely can't see into it. The second drawer is my oldest son's clothes, all together, no dividers or anything. The bottom drawer is my middle son's clothes, same organized approach (ha!).
So I took a step back and thought about the best way to create a system that would work for all of us. I thought about my sons. They need to keep it simple, which means everything has a place and they can easily identify and access that place. That last part speaks to their need to be independent. They want to be able to take care of themselves. So, I want to make our home “kid friendly” in that sense. No adult sized dressers in their closet.
How to Organize a Boy's Closet Approach
- Wait patiently for them to leave for school
- Place seven month old on boys' closet floor
- Empty drawers
- Make piles of too small, too ragged, etc
- Divide clothing type into underwear/socks, pajamas, pants, shorts, and shirts.
How to Organize a Boy's Closet Materials
- ClosetMaid 6-Cube Organizer
- Fabric Drawers
(Green for one son, Blue for the other)
- Chalkboard Labels with Chalk Marker
- Mini Blackboards with Clothespin
- Baskets
for clothes that are ready to be passed onto their younger brother or to donate placed within my sons' reach so they could add to it
- Hamper for dirty clothes
- Baskets
- Medium Sized Flexible Tote
(these are ridiculously marked down right now on Amazon) for off season clothing stored on top shelf
- Small Hook Rack
for sweatshirts at child height
- Mini Fabric Drawers
for lonely socks and my younger son's night time pull ups
- Stool in the event my sons needed to reach higher
I used both image and word labels to assist both of my sons in identifying their clothing drawers.
How to Organize a Boy's Closet
- Print out small clothing outlines to use as stencils on the chalkboard labels
Use scissors to create the mini stencil - Place stencil onto label and use chalk marker to color in
- Let dry and place onto fabric drawers
- Use the mini blackboards with clothespin to write the name of the clothing
- Clip onto handle of fabric drawers
- Anything hung up didn't need to be in their reach, I decided, because they rarely wear dress shirts
- Introduce to your child
This project may seem like a lot but trust me that it didn't take too much time. There was no fancy vinyl ironing, stencil die cutting, etc. Simple, reasonably priced approach.
Thanks for stopping by!
Marnie