One of the fun things you can do while you are preparing to become a new parent is to plan the nursery. You can decorate it in whatever style you choose and get it ready for your new arrival.
You will need a cot, a changing table, and a feeding chair. However, one thing that a lot of parents tend to overlook is clothes storage.
Babies have a lot of clothes – more than you might realize – and they can go through several outfits per day due to messy feeding times, baby sickness, and other accidents.
Keeping your baby’s clothes neat and organized will make it much easier for you to quickly change their clothes when you need to, and to get them dressed and undressed in the morning and at bedtime.
So what is the best way to organize baby clothes? How should you do it? Here are some great ideas for organizing baby clothes.
Hanging Vs Folding
One of the things you will need to decide is if you would prefer more hanging space or more folding space.
If you get a large wardrobe, there will be a lot of wasted space, as when baby clothes are hung up they don’t take up much space.
However, you can get wardrobes that are designed for nurseries and baby clothes with good storage solutions.
You will be able to fit a lot of baby clothes inside a chest of drawers, so these tend to make good options for nurseries.
They are particularly good if you are short on space, as the top of the chest of drawers can be used to keep other items on, like a baby monitor or a breast pump.
Clothes items like t-shirts, onesies, pajamas, leggings, and trousers can easily be folded and stored in a wardrobe.
Dresses, sweaters, rompers, jackets, and smarter clothes would be better hung up so that they don’t become too creased.
How To Organize The Dresser
It is best to decide on a system for where you are going to keep different types of clothes in the dresser, and how they will be folded.
This will help you to keep the dresser neat and organized so you can find things quickly.
Choose a particular space for each type of clothing and stick to it.
Make sure you use the top drawer for the items of clothing that get used the most and the bottom drawer for the items of clothing that get used the least and so on.
This will make it much easier for you when you are dressing your baby.
Additionally, the way that you fold the clothes will make a big difference to how you organize the dresser.
If you traditionally fold the clothes and lay them flat on top of each other then you will be able to fit more clothes in each drawer.
However, it will be difficult to see what is underneath and you might end up making a mess as you rifle through the drawer to find what you are looking for.
If you use file folding – folding and then rolling – you can line up all of the clothes and easily see what is what. This takes up more space but is a lot more efficient.
If you want to make sure that your dresser drawers stay as neat and tidy as possible, then you should consider using drawer dividers.
They will ensure that everything stays in the correct place and you know exactly where everything is.
It also means that you can keep different types of clothes in the same drawer without them getting muddled up.
How To Organize The Closet
Once you have sorted out all of the most frequently worn clothes in the dresser, you can move on to the closet.
This is where you should keep smarter items, bulky clothes, and things that don’t get worn as much.
You can use closet dividers to keep everything separated into categories. You can organize the clothes by type, or by size if you have clothes that the baby isn’t big enough to wear yet.
If you buy extendable hangers, then you can keep using them even as your child gets older.
Using baskets on top of the closet or at the bottom of the closet is a great way to make the most of the space.
You can keep awkwardly shaped items in there, or things that aren’t worn often. You could have a basket for hats, gloves, and scarves, a basket for socks, and a basket for other accessories.
Other Tips
There are a few other tips that are handy for keeping baby clothes well organized:
Keep a laundry basket close to the changing table in the nursery so you can easily put the dirty clothes ready to be washed.
Make sure that the dresser and the closet are close to the changing table so it is easy for you to grab the clothes when you most need them.
Keep a spare basket or plastic bag in the nursery for clothes that your baby has grown out of so that they don’t take up space in the closet or dresser. When the basket is full, you can donate the clothes to a friend or a charity store. (You might want to keep some items as a memento for when your child is older, so store these clothes somewhere else).
Keep certain items of clothing close together. If you know that you need to put leggings with certain tops, keep those two items stored close together so it is easier and faster for you to gather everything that you need.
Summary
You might think that because baby clothes are small that they don’t take up a lot of space or require much organizing.
This is not the case. You will be surprised how many clothes one baby will need, and how many outfits will be gifted to you that you need to find space to store.
But if you follow our advice, then you can keep all your baby clothes neat and organized.
