How I organised the Lego

I posted the other day about how I was sorting out my childhood Lego, and how I was trying to come up with the best way to organise it. Pinterest seems to suggest that Lego organisation by colour is the way to go, yet all of my commenters were of the opinion that it all had to be mixed up together. Organising by colour doesn't really work for me, as it's not like we have mountains of the stuff, and if you are looking for a brick of a particular size you don't want to have to hunt through a box of each colour. I'm also not sure that I'm quite ready to mix it all up together, as we have lots of small useful bits that I don't want to get lost.

This is what I've come up with:

The boxes are from the Pound Shop, and they are a good size, although I'm not sure how sturdy they will be over time. They are difficult to open and easy to shut, which I've heard is a good system for organising children's toys. I have four Lego categories - bricks, flats, houses (windows, doors, roof pieces, trees, flowers and general sloping bits) and other (car wheels, windscreens and steering wheels, people, and all the other small useful pieces). The Lego train is still out and being played with (constantly!) so I'll have to find a separate box for that and all the pieces of track.

They don't take up too much space, and there is plenty of room for growth. I have a separate folder for the instruction leaflets. Most of them are laminated and held together in order with a ring in the corner.

I also have a box the same size for technical Lego, which Harry is too young for at the moment, and one for Star Wars Lego freebies which we've collected with The Sun which are also a little bit fiddly for him.

So far I've found that it's worked really well. When I'm trying to build something from the instructions I can find the piece that I need quickly, and I'm really pleased to see that Harry is also expressing his creativity by making all sorts of things from the plain bricks - today he made a garden centre and a recycling centre!