Legos Am I Getting a Little Nutty?

I am actually laughing as I read this! I am not laughing at you, but laughing that I am not the only Mom with Lego issues :-) While my house is tidy and clean, I am not a neat freak, but I have issues with Legos. Here is my latest solution, which seems to be working. At Walmart, they sell small clear storage boxes with attached lids ($1.80 each, I think, and would hold the old 3 x 5 cards). I cut a photo of the Lego box and tape it to the inside of the cover. All of the pieces go inside that box. I also have one box just for "guys" and their "accessories" b/c half the time, he likes playing with just the guys and their gear. My 5 year old son can recognize better than me, which pieces go with which set and he keeps them pretty darn straight. I then put all of the small boxes inside one larger flat container so you can see all of the lids and it holds some bigger ships,etc. that don't fit in small boxes. Now, mind you, I have a feeling that after a month or so, I am going to have to reorganize. But I have two thoughts. First, mixing the pieces a bit also helps him be creative and use ingenuity. Second, at least it doesn't look as crazy disorganized as it used to. Good luck fighting the Lego challenge!! You're definitely not alone. :-)

Our daughter was obsessed with Barbie.. Not playing with them but dressing them in as many crazy ways as possible and then photographing them,.. I still find the shoes, , socks, pieces of Barbie clothing in strange places.. Our daughter hasen't played with them in 10 years! Finally gave them to my niece..

To help her keep all of that stuff organized, I purchased a 5 drawer roll around cart and a wall mounted box with 60 drawers in it.. She organized it and could tell you exactly what drawer to find Barbie sandals, platform wedges, handbags, jewelry.. or Kens, socks, vs, his sports equipment and Barbies.sports things. I was amazed at how good her memory was.. You could point to a little drawer and she would tell you what was in each..

I let her be in charge of organizing it so SHE could find it.. I also told her she needed to make sure this stuff was not left around the house, or I was going to throw it in the trash.. (I usually just placed it on top of the rolling cart.)

It is good to teach your son to be organized and to keep up with his toys. Put him in charge of it and he will do a great job. Al you have to do when he asks you for a Lego piece ask him, "I don't know where that is, where did you put it?"

have your son build the items as he gets them. when he has built it it will be up to him to either A keep it whole and in one piece or B let it get put into the big lego bucket. don't take this on as your chore. Its his. if he wants them separate he can keep them that way. we bought our son one of those plastic storage things with drawers. he keeps legos in one drawer and bionicles in the other. and some days they all end up together. he is 15 now and i had forgotten about the thing to be honest. just had him clean out his closet and he gave the legos to the grandkids but kept the bionicles for himself lol so they do keep them for a long time

Haha, we love the Legos, too. And I am a little obsessive over not losing the pieces. Here's what we do: I put the different Lego projects in separate tupperware containers/boxes with lids. Then, I ziploc bag the pieces by color/shape/size. Instructions fit right on top of the bags, and then it's sealed until we use it. Same with Thomas trains and everything else. I like everything to have its place. Good luck!!

I would get the clear shoe boxes from Container Store and keep each set in a clear box and maybe the picture of the item taped to the side of the box. This way it is stackable and you don't have to keep replacing bags as they get worn out from use.

no solution really until he gets alittle older.( don't know how old he is) but fir that exact reason and stepping on them all over the damn house.... umm sometimes they just disappear , i don't know why. if he is keeping them in his room in bin you are already 10 steps ahead of alot of mothers. lol good luck.

Ziplocs aren't off the wall! If your son wants to build the specific models in the kits he receives, he really does need to keep the kits separate.

I know there are two-gallon ziplocs - are there any bigger ones out there? Make sure you buy the ones that really stay closed. So... the kits and the pictures that go with them (cut out of the boxes?) go in the ziplocs, and then... where? Figure out where he can put the bags. Overall, a great idea, I think!

Of course, you'll all have to have a marathon Lego sorting party first, with pizza and cookies and maybe a movie afterwards....

P.S. Ziplocs can also be useful for puzzle addicts.

No, don't do it, unless you want to drive yourself crazy. Just keep the instructions for each set, and let your son find the pieces himself, or you can help him sometimes.

Those 6 drawer tall plastic bin things are good, I suppose they could be sort of organized, maybe, that way. But I guarantee you your son won't do it, and you don't need to be spending your life organizing Legos.

Plastic bins or tupperware type containers. Label them and place the instructions against the clear side of the container and teach him to keep them separate.

Yep, big baggies to keep each set separate. That is a must in our house.
R. :)

We haven't made it into Lego sets yet, but sounds like I should be planning the storage already! ha!

I think the ziploc bags are a great idea, especially for a young age. Separate them out (maybe have him work on building each thing for you?), then put the instructions & all pieces for one set in a bag. Then you could keep all of the bags in a plastic tote. After that, tell him he can only pull them out if he is going to build them, and they must go back in the bags when he takes them apart!

You are not crazy. Legos are a wonderful creative toy, and we Moms have to be as creative as the kids to keep up with the storage solutions for them. Zip locks are life savers! And the plastic bins help a lot, too. The playroom in our house has pretty much been taken over by Legos and we love them!

You are not crazy at all; those pieces are TINY! it's impossible to look through a whole bucket of legos and find the right one. I love legos and my daughter and I have built most of the lego city kits, but we do keep them separate, I can't imagine dumping all the pieces together in one place.
Ziplock bags are perfect to keep them organized; they're clear so you can easily see what you're looking for. just pick a day and choose one kit, look at the instructions and find the right pieces, you don't have to build it just look for them. the instructions have awesome illustrations so you can easily find the right piece.dump them in the ziplock and label it with a sharpie. pick another day and do another kit and so on until they're all organized.
Good luck!