Nursery Organization Hacks You NEED to Know

THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON MOMAFTERBABY.COM

When you see photos of baby nurseries online, they’re usually minimalist and beautiful, with nothing but a couple of toys and books on display. However, back in the real world, babies need an absolute ton of stuff!

What if your nursery is the smallest room in the house? How do you make it look pretty and uncluttered while easily being able to find everything you need? Read on for clever storage ideas and genius ways to order your baby’s clothes and toys.

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Effortless Baby Nursery Organization Hacks To Save Space

1) Use a baby drawer organizer in your nursery dresser

A dresser is a key piece of nursery furniture as it can hide so many clothes, toys, diapers, and other bits of baby paraphernalia.

But teeny-tiny baby socks, hats, and bibs are sure to get muddled up if you leave them to float around inside a big drawer, so a baby drawer organizer is essential to divide a drawer into compartments and keep similar items together.

2) Label, label, label

There’s no point in having your drawers organized if you’re still not sure what goes where.

Even if you have a mental map, will your husband know what goes where when he comes to put the laundry or shopping away?

A set of drawer labels will ensure that everything stays in the right place.

3) Sort baby clothes by size

Your baby’s closet may contain clothes in all different sizes, from newborn to toddler and beyond.

Friends and family members often gift clothes in larger sizes for your baby to grow into. And if you like to shop for bargains, it’s always tempting to pick things up at the end of the season for your child to wear next year.

Without proper organization into sizes and seasons, it’s easy to miss clothes and find that your child has outgrown them before you’ve even had a chance to remove the tags.

4) Utilize closet dividers (there are some cute options out there too!)

A set of closet dividers is the perfect way to keep your baby’s clothes organized by size. These cute hanging dividers are labeled with ages, to make it easy to see how many things for each age range you have.

Having an organized closet will make it easy to plan ahead and stop yourself from buying even more 12-month sweaters when you already have more than enough to last the winter.

5) Only keep a few toys within reach

A curious baby can turn a tidy nursery into something resembling a bomb site in well under five minutes. That is why when you visit a daycare center, you’ll notice they have some toys at ground level for babies to help themselves to and everything else up on high shelves or hidden away in cupboards.

Copy this method by having an easy-to-reach storage and bookshelf unit and a small bin of toys at ground level, keeping everything else up and out of reach.

You can rotate the toys that are available for your baby to play with, which will prevent them from being overwhelmed by having access to everything at once.

6) Use an over-the-door organizer

Over-door organizers are usually made for shoes, but those see-through pockets are also the perfect size for bibs, burp cloths, blankets, comforters, and other small baby items.

For something a little sturdier, consider an over-the-door pantry organizer. These are made to hold spices, but they work great for baby toiletries, medicines, and bottle-feeding equipment.

7) Keep outfits together

Creating matching outfits takes time, which is something you might not have much of as you rush to get out of the house in the morning. This can cause dads, in particular, to earn themselves a bad reputation by selecting any old pants and top, even if they’re clashing floral prints!

Hanger clips are a genius way to keep whole outfits together, making it really quick and easy to pick out a matching outfit on a busy weekday morning.

8) Separate stock from back stock

You don’t need all your supplies to be accessible all of the time. If you open a drawer and have 3 tubes of diaper cream, you’ll always have to check which is the open one.

Instead, keep only one tube where you need it, and put everything that’s for future use in a separate place, like in an under-the-crib storage box.

Organizing a Baby Room With Limited Space

Organizing your baby’s nursery by having a place for everything and keeping everything in its place will make your life much more zen and can reduce the time you spend yelling ‘Where are all the onesies?’ to practically zero.

Still, if you have a small nursery, there are a few more things you should consider to make the most of the limited space!

1) Think ahead when arranging the furniture

Even in a small nursery, there will be a few different ways that you can arrange the furniture, so sketch out the various combinations on paper to see what works best.

There will be some safety considerations, such as not having the crib within reach of window blinds or power outlets. You’ll also want to think about the flow, meaning that if you’re at the changing station you can easily reach the diapers and the diaper pail.

Keep those things in mind when you try out different ways of arranging the room to discover the perfect layout to maximize the space.

2) Make use of every available space

Take every storage opportunity you can by storing things wherever there’s a space:

On top of the wardrobe – If there’s space between the wardrobe or armoire and ceiling, add a keepsake box where you can keep baby photos, childcare reports, and their first drawings.
Under the crib – Hide storage boxes filled with your future stash of diapers, wipes, and formula
On the walls – Make use of shelving, coat hooks, and rails to keep things handy when you need them

3) Hang multiple things on each hanger

Short on closet space? You can easily have three onesies on each hanger if you hang them upside-down by the snap fasteners. Use clip hangers for leggings and pants to clip three or four pairs together.

4) Choose smaller furniture

Oversized furniture can make a room seem much smaller than it actually is. Some baby cribs are four or five feet long, which is much more sleeping space than your baby will ever need.

Consider a mini crib! These have enough space for your baby to sleep and play without unnecessarily taking up floor space. Check out Rookie Moms’ top recommendations for mini cribs here!

5) Don’t hang on to things

Every few months, take stock of what’s in the room and remove anything that you don’t need. This means gathering up all the clothes that are too small, any diapers that are the wrong size, and toys that your baby no longer plays with.

You can either put them into storage for your next baby or donate them to a friend or charity shop.

6) Store things outside of the nursery

If you’re short on space, find somewhere else in the home where you can store things, leaving the nursery free for clothes and essentials.

Things to move might be:

Feeding items – If you prep bottles in the kitchen, keep everything in there
Back stock – Store all your extra diapers and toiletries in a box in another room
Old clothes and toys – Store in the loft or garage, or give them away
Toys – Keep a few toy baskets in the living room for easy access

Nursery Storage & Organization Hacks – Recap

To summarize, having an organized nursery will not only make the room look clean, calm, and cute, it will also free up your time as you won’t waste a minute hunting for things.

Make a place for everything and add a label so nobody forgets where things go.

If you’re short on space, be sure to keep only the items that you need at this present time in the nursery.

Get rid of anything you no longer need from when your baby was younger, and make sure that anything you have ready for when they’re older is in a separate place for when the time comes.

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