Thought Provoking Thursday

Thought Provoking Thursday

Thought Provoking Thursday's goal it to offer a new-ish perspective to saving on necessary items aside from our grocery and household needs. Each week I will bring an idea to the table to share how I personally tackle areas of my own family's spending. I am hopeful that my faithful readers will feel the freedom to offer more advice through comments below each post.

Ah, the blessings and the curses of in-home storage.

I love to feel organized! I crave knowing that everything has a place to belong- and I was very organized when I was a single girl, but nowadays with a husband and a son to take care of, three times the clothing, toys-toys-toys and a home that is undergoing renovations- sheesh if I can just find my keys when I need them I'm happy!!!

Do you ever stand in the giant Tupperware aisle at Target and just gaze upon all of the pretty colors and size choices for storage containers? Do you cringe at the cost for a single box+lid? Do you write your first and last name in Sharpie... because you intend to keep your pricey plastic boxes FOREVER? I used to be that way... (OK, not to the Sharpie writing extent, I just needed to have all of my boxes matching!)

Then my son was born and he grew and grew and grew. Every three months (or less) I exchanged a too tight wardrobe for something a little less snug. If I continued my one box per size of clothing purchasing, I'd not only be shelling out money for unattractive storage, but our storage areas would be over run by boxes!

*Storing out of season or grown out of shoes, clothing and toys is just par for the parenting course, but donating or passing items along before our family is complete seems to be an unwise choice, what is a family to do?

At the end of 2008 (at the end of my first year of motherhood, and the beginning of my life battling "stuff overload!") I discovered Ziploc's BIG bags- and I'm in storage heaven!

BIG Ziploc's have two size boxes, the 4 count 10 gallon size bags, and the 3 count 20 gallon size bags. (I guess that I should mention that at the end of '08 Ziploc offered $3 Internet printable coupons for these bags, and so I stocked up then!)

I'm keeping my eyes open for more coupons this year! I have narrowed down Target as having the best pricing at $5.24/box. Even without a coupon (YIKES) I can have more storage capacity and I can narrow the scope of what gets packed together since 3-4 bags are the same price as one storage container box.

Our family uses these bags for storing clothing, sleeping bags, sheets and towels when we travel up north. We leave one in our suitcase to separate dirty/wet clothes or towels from our clean clothes when we travel. And just this week I pulled our Halloween bag out of storage to find my son's costume and treat bag!

But one of my all time favorite uses for BIG Ziploc's are in storing baby items like our bouncy seat. Clean, dustless and dry... perfect!