Hand-me-down storage solutions
Since my first baby was born I have kept meticulous record of his closet. I put great care into curating a cute, gender neutral and (attempting to be) sustainable wardrobe in the hopes that these clothes would get a second life as hand-me-downs. We are now expecting Baby Number 2 - hooray!! - and I have two years worth of hand-me-downs to fill my new nursery drawers with. Life is busier than ever as a pregnant working parent who already has one toddler running around the house. I am so grateful to my past self for being as organized as I was! And I want to pass along some things I learned, and things I could’ve done better to new moms out there trying to get organized.
My original system was clear labeled boxes. I bought these 16qt Clear Storage Boxes with Lids in bulk from Target and kept them stacked in my baby’s nursery closet. I labeled each box with a different size range (0-3 months, 3-6 months, 6-9 months, 9-12 months, and 12-18 months). As he would outgrow items, I would toss them into the box of the corresponding size.
I give this system an 8/10 overall.
The good:
It was incredibly easy to set up - purchasing 5 boxes with lids and spending 2 minutes printing labels on my label maker. Doesn’t get much easier than that!
It was just as easy to maintain - those early sleepless nights, I couldn’t be bothered to keep up with some intricate system. Tossing too-small clothes into open boxes in a closet was effortless and saved space in our drawers for the clothes he still fit into.
It served as great storage for “too big” clothes too - we were gifted some 6 and 12 month outfits and shoes at my baby shower. I didn’t want these items in my newborn’s drawers quite yet, so I tossed them into the corresponding box and knew where to get them when Baby became those sizes.
The not so good:
I outgrew the original boxes pretty quickly - as we entered the winter season, 16 qt boxes filled up fast and I had to keep buying more. By his second birthday I was up to 10 boxes and had run out of closet space.
Each box is $3.50 at Target - not a ton when I thought I only needed 5, adds up when I hit 10 boxes and was looking at purchasing another 10. I liked that the boxes were multipurpose, and I knew once we no longer needed to store hand-me-downs I could use them as part of my toy rotation. But at a certain point having 20 of these things felt ridiculous.
My kids will be almost 3 years apart. If you plan on having a smaller age gap between kids, this could be the perfect system for you. I found myself outgrowing boxes as we entered 2T clothes (especially jackets). That’s when I knew I needed to look into another option.
Once I amassed a box collection and was and running out of room, I knew I had to change to a more space saving system. At first I pictured vacuum sealed compression bags, but after looking into it I couldn’t justify the price point for a short-term storage solution. The brilliance of my original system is that hand-me-downs were already organized by size, so I didn’t want ‘one big bag’ to toss everything in. I was looking for cost friendly mid-sized bags.
I saw someone giving away 5 gallon bags on Facebook Marketplace (you can buy them new on Amazon) and thought these would be perfect for the job!
During one of my toddler’s naps, I transferred all his boxes of hand-me-downs into bags. Each 5 gallon bag fit almost 2 boxes worth of clothes. I converted quarts to gallons and realized I was already saving space! You can stuff more into a bag than you can with rigid plastic containers. Since I didn’t splurge for compression bags, I acted as a human vacuum sealer and laid down across the bags before sealing them to take out as much excess air as I could. Maybe I didn’t get Ziplock levels of compression, but it did the job just fine.
I give this system a 9/10 overall.
The good:
It’s cheaper - I got my bags in a Free/For Sale group, but new they are still only $31 for 50 bags. Considering it fits almost twice as much at a fraction of the price, it’s the more affordable option by a mile.
There’s less “empty space” - I didn’t realize how much these clothes can really squish down in a baggie. On top of that, the boxes are tapered created large gaps between boxes when they are stacked. If you’re tight on space, these bags can fit under beds, couches, or tucked deep in a closet.
The not so good:
Empty bags lack structure, so the “just toss it in” method that worked so well with my boxes wouldn’t apply as well to these bags. This system might require you make piles, and then transfer piles to bags periodically.
So which system wins? If I had it to do all over again, I’d probably still purchase 5 boxes labeled by size as my “catch all” in the nursery closet, and then as those boxes filled up transfer them to the 5 gallon bags; blending the best of both solutions.
What was 10 boxes plus an overflow pile under my desk, is now 4 bags that can easily slide under my bed. I’m really happy to have cleared out so much space in my toddler’s closet and to still have all the hand-me-downs organized by size. During this exercise I got hold my toddler’s baby clothes and remember how tiny he used to be. Now that Baby Number 2 is on the way, I can picture a new little one wearing these same pajamas - and that just warms my heart.
With love,
