Books books books...

We have a book problem.
We have too many books
It's a good problem to have...
and we certainly 100% intend to continue to grow our children's book collection.
G loves to Read...
John and I have had a strict parenting policy of always reading G a minimum of 3 books per day since the day he was born.  I'm pretty sure this is why he loves, loves, LOVES his books...
He loves to be read to, he loves to read to himself, he loves to bring books in the car and read books while he practices potty...Books are a big part of our life here...
the problem is...
managing them all.

This is  more or less what we've become accustom to in the last few months...

which is just...unacceptable. No rhyme or reason, no respect, no concept of where anything is...no knowledge of what we've read recently...just chaos.

So I decided to change a few things about my organizing and then decided to come up with a new book reading system. 

First I took out all the books and laid them in a pile on the floor and then I proceeded to place them into categories. 

• Book collections by the same Author (Dr.Seuss, Leo Lionni, Sandra Boynton, Eric Carle, Maurice Sendak, etc)
• Spiritual/Religious books
• Sesame Street themed books
• Board Books
• Baby books (word learning books)
• Hardcover Picture books
• non-fiction science books (i.e.: animals, dinosaurs, etc.)
• transportation/vehicle books (i.e.: construction vehicles, trains, planes, cars, etc)
• Popular Character books (i.e.: Disney, Clifford, Curious George, Arthur, etc)

Once I had these separated into categories I used each shelf for a different category (with the exception of the Baby books which I took downstairs to storage...no need for those anymore). Which looked like this:

The next KEY strategy was moving the large bookcase away from Gunnar's crib. This was a big cause for the mess as Gunnar would take all the books out while he was in his crib and then throw them on the floor when he was done.  

So then I decided to come up with a new system called "Books of the Week" 

So I took an unused basket and placed it on the nightstand (which is now next to G's bed) this basket would now house the "books of the week" which Gunnar and I will select each week at the beginning of the week. We'll choose one or two books from each shelf to be in the basket and then ONLY read from that basket through out the week. This makes putting books away much easier for G because he knows he can ONLY read from this basket and he knows to put them back in the basket when he's done.  Each week the books will get changed out and hopefully we'll put an end to this scattered book problem! 

Once the room was organized I brought John and Gunnar in to explain the new system. Gunnar latched on to it immediately and has been very excited about the "books of the week basket"....and when he's finished reading his books he puts them straight back in the basket while chanting "books of the week!"

So far...I'd say this has been a HUGE success!!! 

This week we will also re-introduce library books as we'll be taking more walks to the library now that the weather is warming up. I think we'll probably keep the same system we've always had with library books which is to keep them in his Owl library bag next to the rocking chair. 

This mommy is thrilled with the clean room!