We decided it would be best to put the toys downstairs where they all end up anyway, and keep them all in one place- in an armoire. I considered a downstairs closet- but I knew that it would end up being a "play house" and would never stay clean, the armoir was the best idea. Also- even though the guest room had that nice big closet for toys- it is a guest bedroom. Who wants kids running into their room while they are napping, still sleeping, or not wanting to be interrupted! Not to mention toys left behind randomly in the room through the whole process. The toys needed to be down stairs in one destination. The other nice thing about having it downstairs is: whenever the kids got the toys out- they would stay left out because nobody wanted to go upstairs to put them away, having the armoire RIGHT THERE- will make it much more motivational to get up and put the toys away. So VIOLA:
The basket at the top holds all the barbie stuff, the garbage looking can holds all the baby/house stuff, and the rest are organized into their categories, since then my mom has labeled everything. There wasn't room enough for one more item though: dress up clothes. So my mom has since purchased (don't have a pic though) of a cute tall basket with the lid, that will also go downstairs near the armoire. Now everything has a spot, it's downstairs- nobody has to run the Olympics to go get their child a toy! And nobody knows that there are toys in those baskets or armoire.
