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JennGM
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CrunchyMom wrote:
Has anyone used one of the Lego mats that is a round sheet with the drawstring so that it can be pulled into a duffel to hang on a hook?
If my oldest and dh weren't natural sorters, it seems like such a nice solution. |
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I always liked that idea...my mom was going to make one, so they could sit and work on the mat and then pull it all up.
But you nailed it on the head -- my guys (and I) are natural sorters, so when it isn't sorted, most of the work is sorting before they start building...and then to gather it all up in the drawstring bag is EXTREMELY frustrating.
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Jennifer G. Miller
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Family in Feast and Feria
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organiclilac
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A friend recently shared the following idea for mini-figures:
She said you can get the white bricks for a few cents each at http://www.bricklink.com/, and glue them to a board. I think this is genius, and am trying to figure out if I have a good space for this!
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Tracy, wife to Shawn, mama to Samuel (4/01) and Joseph (11/11), and Thomas (2/15)
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Angi
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The same friend as Tracy's above made Lego mats for her boys. They can just pull the drawstring and hang it up on a hook 
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CatholicMommy
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It's not so much that I gave up on sorting - or keeping the sets maintained - as that a super-organized engineer friend of mine who calls his college degree experience "legos on steroids" and LOVES Legos told me to let my son do his own thing. Give him the organizational tools he wants, but as his non-Lego-loving mother do NOT dictate. I can dictate THAT they are cleaned up and not in my way, I can let him what tools are available, but the organization is up to him.
So he has one big box (18 gallons perhaps??) with 2 smaller plastic bins that sit sideways across the top. He sorts what he wants to keep out into those. He has recently asked for something like a tacklebox to hold particular small items he wants to keep out: people, weapons and the like.
I originally wanted to give him a shelf to hold completed creations, along with small bins to hold "all Kingdom sets loose pieces" to keep all those pieces separated.
Well, that didn't work. Nor did the color sorting (we tried it) - perhaps because these were "my" ideas - and perhaps combined with how tedious that got to sort out after every single build time. A few quick little pieces get separated out, everything else gets gathered up on the sheet (we do that too!) and dumped in the big box.
Half his fun is sitting INSIDE the box and digging through the Legos at the beginning to find what he wants. Go figure that is ok and sorting at the end is not!
We then have a binder with page protectors that holds all the instructions he's ever received so they are in one place. He does use these from time to time, so that was one mommy-idea that was a success ;)
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HS Elementary Montessori Training
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Kathryn
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CatholicMommy wrote:
We then have a binder with page protectors that holds all the instructions he's ever received so they are in one place. He does use these from time to time, so that was one mommy-idea that was a success ;)
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Ohhh...LOVE this idea!!
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Kathryn in TX
(dd 16, ds 15, dd 8, dd 5)
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JennGM
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Kathryn wrote:
CatholicMommy wrote:
We then have a binder with page protectors that holds all the instructions he's ever received so they are in one place. He does use these from time to time, so that was one mommy-idea that was a success ;)
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Ohhh...LOVE this idea!! |
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We did this, and it got out of control. Since the instructions are various sizes, it just didn't work well. I was thinking I'd need to create a binder for each theme...so now I'm thinking I'd prefer a file crate that has more flexibility.
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Jennifer G. Miller
Wife to & ds1 '03 & ds2 '07
Family in Feast and Feria
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CatholicMommy
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JennGM wrote:
Kathryn wrote:
CatholicMommy wrote:
We then have a binder with page protectors that holds all the instructions he's ever received so they are in one place. He does use these from time to time, so that was one mommy-idea that was a success ;)
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Ohhh...LOVE this idea!! |
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We did this, and it got out of control. Since the instructions are various sizes, it just didn't work well. I was thinking I'd need to create a binder for each theme...so now I'm thinking I'd prefer a file crate that has more flexibility. |
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We used pretty sturdy page protectors - so he can take them in and out as needed. Some things (whatever he can) are in there so you can just look through the page protector. Booklets (like from the Kingdom sets) are in there complete for the most part - he started to separate pages and try to tape them together in order, but it didn't work so well. That was HIS idea - and it was a good learning experience for him ;) I think few, if any, of the protectors actually have anything that is 8 1/2 x 11 in them - but again, he is using the really sturdy ones.
Thinking about this more - in the back of this binder for quite a while and now separated to its own binder - he used those card protectors (have 9 slots) to hold a variety of holy cards, animal cards from the Little Kids National Geographic, and the like. He still has a couple of these pages in the Lego binder, with images he cut from the catalogs of ideas of things to build.
For him, it's useful. I guess that is one way of keeping things organized ;)
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pumpkinmom
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Loving this thread! Our house is being over run with legos and I know more will be coming at Christmas. I was really worrying where they were going to be stored. My boys spent weeks organizing them by sets. Seemed like a good idea (afterwards), but now we have 20+ clear plastic bins (with lids) that have to be stored. The closets are over flowing. My oldest read these threads with me and has decided to reorganize and put all city sets together in one bin, all star wars in another, all castle in one, etc., etc. This works for me because it will free up lots of closet space. They like to put sets together repeatedly so combining them all together wouldn't work for them.
Thanks everyone!
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Cassie
Homeschooling my little patch of Ds-14 and Ds-10
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Erin
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Not about lego organising but this popped into my reader and I thought of you Lego fans, 10 week Lego lesson plans.
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Erin
Faith Filled Days
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CatholicMommy
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This so great! I'm going to see if we can pull a group together for this!
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Sharyn
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stellamaris wrote:
I'm so impressed with those who organize Legos! Having had a gadzillion of the little pieces over the years, I have to admit I have surrender the Lego Wars  . Here's what I do now:
1. Never sort, organize, categorize, or otherwise attempted to maintain any sort of order with our Legos.
2. Keep them in large plastic buckets with lids.
3. Play with them on sheets spread out on the floor. When finished playing, dump all Legos back into buckets except those that are actually attached to some likely-looking space ship or other construction.
4. Collect all built Lego structures, which multiply like rabbits and take over all available horizontal space  , every so often at random times and return them to the bucket. Super big Lego structures like the Death Star get to remain on display.
I guess I believe the fun in Legos is building creatively with them and I really think my life is too short to be sorting them out.... |
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Yup, that's me too Caroline! My question when reading this post was "Lego! You can organise that!!?" 
On a serious note I'm going to read through this post very thoroughly to see if there is "another way"
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Sharyn
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Kathryn wrote:
CatholicMommy wrote:
We then have a binder with page protectors that holds all the instructions he's ever received so they are in one place. He does use these from time to time, so that was one mommy-idea that was a success ;)
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Ohhh...LOVE this idea!! |
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I tried this too, but they still ended up ruined. What I have done is let them keep them until they start to fall apart, at which point I throw them away and tell them to 'use all those bits to create something from your imagination'. They really have made some fantastic creations. But with more Lego on the way for Christmas I think I'm going to get back to putting them in folders and having some stricter expectations for keeping them nicely, one of which will be that I will keep them somewhere that they have to ask for them, and also I think I will only let them make the item once every now and then (which will suit them) and encourage their creativity. What can you make that's similar? What's something new that you can create from all the different pieces?
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Mum to dd (00), ds (03), dd (04), ds (06), one in God's care (08), dd (09), ds (11), one in God's care (13), and ds (13)
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Sharyn
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organiclilac wrote:
A friend recently shared the following idea for mini-figures:
She said you can get the white bricks for a few cents each at http://www.bricklink.com/, and glue them to a board. I think this is genius, and am trying to figure out if I have a good space for this! |
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Now this is a good idea, you've just given me another project to do
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Mum to dd (00), ds (03), dd (04), ds (06), one in God's care (08), dd (09), ds (11), one in God's care (13), and ds (13)
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CrunchyMom
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I usually end up throwing them away when they are a mess, too, but fwiw, I'm pretty sure you can get PDFs of the instructions for any of the kits if you know the number. If you really want to keep all your instructions, a PDF printed and put in page protectors in a binder (no getting the pages in and out) would probably be easier than trying to preserve the originals.
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Lindsay
Five Boys(6/04) (6/06) (9/08)(3/11),(7/13), and 1 girl (5/16)
My Symphony
[URL=http://mysymphonygarden.blogspot.com/]Lost in the Cosmos[/UR
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CatholicMommy
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I should clarify:
the instructions are not in the binder to keep them nice - little boys using them, taking notes on them, stepping on them, piling Legos on them - they don't "stay" nice ;)
They are in the binder ONLY to have them in one place when not in use. And using them certainly does not stop the creativity around here ;) He just created a whole new Lego game, unlike any others he's ever seen or played.
Most of the time he gets out the instructions to remember how a particular spot was built, to give him a foundation for something else.
But that's just him ;)
Sharyn wrote:
Kathryn wrote:
CatholicMommy wrote:
We then have a binder with page protectors that holds all the instructions he's ever received so they are in one place. He does use these from time to time, so that was one mommy-idea that was a success ;)
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Ohhh...LOVE this idea!! |
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I tried this too, but they still ended up ruined. What I have done is let them keep them until they start to fall apart, at which point I throw them away and tell them to 'use all those bits to create something from your imagination'. They really have made some fantastic creations. But with more Lego on the way for Christmas I think I'm going to get back to putting them in folders and having some stricter expectations for keeping them nicely, one of which will be that I will keep them somewhere that they have to ask for them, and also I think I will only let them make the item once every now and then (which will suit them) and encourage their creativity. What can you make that's similar? What's something new that you can create from all the different pieces? |
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SeaStar
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CrunchyMom wrote:
| I usually end up throwing them away when they are a mess, too, but fwiw, I'm pretty sure you can get PDFs of the instructions for any of the kits if you know the number. If you really want to keep all your instructions, a PDF printed and put in page protectors in a binder (no getting the pages in and out) would probably be easier than trying to preserve the originals. |
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Yes, you can easily find the instructions on line for just about any Lego kit going back to 2002. Just did this yesterday after a catastrophic Lego fall...
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MelissaClaire
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LOVE the lego storage board. Do you think the bricks would stay attached well to the board? What would you use to adhere them?
I saw a similar style done with picture frames and adhering the brick to the glass, but commenters said hot glue pulled off and superglue didn't work. The creator of it used some adhesive that appears to only be sold in NZ.
Any ideas for a strong adhesive for either a board (like above) or on glass?
Melissa
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CatholicMommy
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MelissaClaire wrote:
LOVE the lego storage board. Do you think the bricks would stay attached well to the board? What would you use to adhere them?
I saw a similar style done with picture frames and adhering the brick to the glass, but commenters said hot glue pulled off and superglue didn't work. The creator of it used some adhesive that appears to only be sold in NZ.
Any ideas for a strong adhesive for either a board (like above) or on glass?
Melissa |
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See that is my concern too - I work with basic adhesives, and I know that nothing I typically use would work NOT work on Legos (ask me how I know ;) ). Thus, I would have to consider using stronger chemical-bases and I am personally not interested. Now, if someone knows of one that is not just too cancerous-toxic, I'd be willing to try it ;)
Now, my son saw this idea and built a small wall of Legos, with 2x4 bricks jutting out at various places to create the same affect and function. No glue needed ;)
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JennGM
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My sister glues the minifigures together so her little one won't keep losing all the pieces. The glue seems to work...I'll have to ask what she uses.
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Jennifer G. Miller
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MelissaClaire
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I asked around and someone suggested E-6000. I've never heard of it though. Any experience with it? Think if I sanded the brick a bit it would help?
Melissa
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4Real Forums : Tea and Conversation
Topic: Lego Organization
