Toy Organization

As much as I LOVE the Holidays part of me was dreading it some.  As we have a very large family with lots of grand & great-grand parents still around that I was not looking forward to everything the girls' would be getting.  Our house is old and has zilch-o storage! So, I am always trying to find space saving ideas.  My Gramma gave each person some money this year - I knew exactly what ours was going towards.  I'd been searching around and had decided in my mind on the Expedit from Ikea. Like this below, except I planned on laying it on it's side: 

I shared my plan with the Hubs and needless to say he wasn't too keen on the idea.  His first argument being that he could build it for much cheaper and his second being that between the two Ikea's around us, both are a little over an hour away - he didn't want to waste gas.  He argued that I just wanted to go to Ikea - well HELLO, why YES, of course I do!  It's been years since I've been to one.  

So, back to the drawing board so to speak and I started searching big chain stores that are local like Target and Walmart.  I came across this shelving unit on WM's site and fell in love! 

My awesome Hubby looked at it and told me that he could easily make that.  We pulled out the tape measure and figured out how long I'd want two shelves side by side to be in the space and headed to Lowe's.  He picked up some mdf to build these out of and within the week they were made and painted. Brought them up to the living room this morning and got the toys organized - needless to say, I'm in LOVE with them!

Just to get an idea - here's a before of the space these new beauties will be staying in.  Baskets with overflowing baby toys = a crazy mama!

Please ignore the surroundings, it's our overcrowded basement.  Here are the shelves after they were primed. 

Here's a close-up shot of them painted - glossy black.

Here's how they look from the other side of the room.