Help! I have Lego all over the place, and all scattered in various bins, etc. I have tried to separate certain components in ziploc bags, but they always end up mixed into the bins again. Is there hope, or is this just the way of the world when you have kids playing with Lego?
Please share your Lego organization solutions with me.
Scott
There are many threads on this subject in the Storage newgroup on
Personally, I use three types of storage: Large rubbermaid boxes (these are still in the color stage of sorting) Medium clear rubbermaid: most of these have been converted to type (e.g., bricks, plates) Plano 37x0 boxes for anything small (e.g., plates 1x6 or smaller, bricks
1x1). These are subdivided by color.
Thanks for the link. It seems to me that the first step is to choose a "philosophy" of storage: do you want to separate out the sets, or not? Right now I HAVE to keep all the parts for a specific set together, or we would never be able to find all the tiny pieces to build it again. What I don't like about this is that it limits my kids creativity: they should be able to grab pieces from one set, and combine them with others to create their own hybrids. But once this happens, we have Lego chaos!
Ah, entropy... what are you gonna do?
Scott
I've been thinking of building a box system with a sieve a the bottom to help find the small bits
well its such a good idea someone (else) has already marketed it
We faced the same challenge. My wife started out really strick about building and keeping sets together. I was on the opposite end. After dealing with either Lego chaos or problems with the kids wanting to "kit bash" to often we came up with the following system that works rather well:
We sort/store the Lego by themes into various sized plastic bins with lids or in cabinets (4 drawered type). For really small pieces (lego coins come to mind) we have a few small plastic containers inside the larger ones. General lego goes into a large bin with a lid and wheels.
As it turns out, my oldest is great at remembering which lego goes with which theme (Fright Knights, City, Technic, etc.). Since the kids find that it is much easier getting a particular part they want from a sorted bin rather then a free for all bin they have taken to sorting it themselves as they dis-assemble things.
The other trick that we use is that we have two shelves dedicated as "display shelves" where only finished Lego models can go. This has given the kids a place to show off their creations while self limiting the amount of creations hanging about. Once the shelves start getting crowded they start to pick older peiced or non-used pieces and dis-assemble them.
M.
big green guy wrote:
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