Art organization.

If you are like me, you cherish your children's artwork but struggle with the sheer quantity that accumulates.  At the end of the year we try to file away special pieces--each child has his own flat storage box that keeps things sorted and safe until later.  And by later I mean until they are in their 30s and I'm pestering them to clear out their rooms because their dad and I are downsizing in our retirement.  And we're buying a fabo townhouse in the city!  Where we'll walk to everything!!  And we won't need much space because we'll be out and about traveling and visiting our kid's kids!!!  And we'll.....oh, wait.   

Back to a mountain of art, bless their little creative hearts.  Before the purge, this is where a lot of the artwork lives.

 

I'm sure you've seen it before.  It's a couple of affordable curtain rods (mine are from Ikea) and curtain clips, hung on a wall in our basement play room.  And just so you know, I fought every fiber of my perfectionist-being to not sort that rod and instead shoot a picture of its jumbled reality.  As you can see, you can fit a ton on there and there are some favorites that the boys have deemed evergreen, or appropriate for any season, that they will not let me take down.

Recently, I've seen some blog posts on additional art storage/display ideas, which have sparked some thoughts of my own.  But first I need to hit up some thrift stores, so my grand plans will have to sit until the smallest two munchkins start preschool and pre-K.  Which, in case you're counting, is in 7 days and 17 hours.  And yes, I'm a little freaked about baby Will starting preschool.