How to Declutter Your Kid's Papers

INSIDE : SEE HOW TO DECLUTTER YOUR KID’S PAPERS WITHOUT CREATING TEARS (YOURS OR THEIRS)

School has started and that means a lot of papers come home every day. Meaning, the more kids you have, the more papers you have. Add that to your mail, bills, your work stuff, and the list could go on. BUT don’t FREAK out, try this first.

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Step 1: Start fresh

Obviously, you cannot keep these papers under control if you start with a million pieces of them! SO – PURGE!!!!! How do you decide what should be saved and what you can throw away?

Let the kids guide you. If it is important to them, it might be worth saving. HOWEVER, if you have 12 copies of the same LOL coloring page, ask them to pick one to save.
Offer to send some to grandparents. If it is important but you have lots of important drawings, ask the kids if grandma and grandpa can have it. That way it’s saved, but not in your clutter. And if grandma or grandpa throw it away, the kids will never know!!!
Don’t be distracted by lamination. It does not mean you have to keep it forever, but you can keep it for a season. Or until you get the next laminated piece. If it didn’t win an award…..toss it, lamination and all!

Step 2: Organize a daily command station

Once you have your freshly purged paper collection, you can organize it much easier.

A place for each child. Kids, especially ones that attend the same school, might have similar “important” papers. You need to make sure you send the right paper back with the right kid. (Trust me – I have mixed them up before….it makes for phone calls, emails, and lots of tears – just separate them!)
Hold them responsible too. They can add their papers to your “spot” because their teachers tell them what they need to have signed etc…..have the kids help you!!! It does not have to be you going through their backpacks and moving those papers.

Now that you understand you aren’t in this alone – decide where your daily command station is going to be. Not everyone has room for a whole command station. So keep it simple. Your command station can be a drawer, cabinet, or my personal favorite – a Thirty One Fold-n-File with hanging and file folders – on top of a counter and out of the way.

Step 3: Super proud papers

What to do with SUPER proud papers that they insist on hanging on the fridge?

Let them know you see and you are proud. Let them know you looked at their spelling test, you are so proud of their score but you don’t need to save it – that’s what report cards are for. You can save those! Leave it on the fridge for one week, replace it with next week’s.
Take a picture. When the school year is finished, you can make a collage of all of their work. Print that one page and save it in their file for the year.

Step 4: Create memory boxes

Ladies and gentlemen, let me say this – I don’t have a single spelling test, drawing, report card, or class picture from my childhood. When my parents moved from my childhood home to the new house “down south” they didn’t realize that crawl spaces in the south were not like basements in NY. So……all my stuff got ruined – including hundreds of vinyl records but I’m not bitter….at all.

So the next step to your memory keeping journey – keep the moisture, heat, sun, rain, snow, mice, rats, whatever else might be in your attic/basement/storage unit out! Plastic bins with hanging folders are perfect. Label them. Each kid can have ONE bin! ONE!!!! One hanging folder per school year. Store that in a place you can access at least at the end of the school year.

I have not started a memory box yet……..so let’s start this journey together. Here is our list of needed supplies:

Hanging file folders
File folders
File boxes
Gel pens
The papers in question, of course!

I found these awesome printables here and here. Since we are behind a few years, I had the kids catch up one morning. I’m sure it will be much more fun to watch them do these as the years go on. Their writing changes, their friends change, and even the ability to draw changes. I’m seriously excited about these boxes!!!

We added:

Report cards
Class photos
Important stories
Important drawings (think Mother’s day cards etc)

Step 5: Find a permanent place

You cannot just have these boxes hanging out in the middle of your life. You MUST find a place to keep them. A closet, under a bed, an office….think of a place that is out of the way, but not too far that you will forget to add things.