My babes are only 13 months old and already I am starting to collect things that remind me of the good old days and we’ve barely passed the first year mark!

It’s true. I am already having a hard time getting rid of things and with limited storage the challenge is finding a way to adequately honor the memories and continue to keep our sanity.

As the junk creeps in, the nerves tend to fray so what are some tips for knowing what to keep and how to keep it?

According to experts, the number one culprit for moms is children’s artwork. I found a few ingenious ways to give the art the love it deserves without having to keep it on the fridge for years.

Just take a photo! Not only are you saving the memory, you are preserving the memory for much longer than the life of a piece of water color soaked craft paper. If your kids argue, tell them you are creating a catalogue raisonné – a digital catalogue of their precious creations. You can even make these photos into books with many online services such as blurb.com, shutterfly.com and snapfish.com.

Loose photos, photo albums, videos and scrapbooks are the second biggest culprit. These can also easily be converted to digital media, saving space and conserving the images for more than a lifetime. These can similarly be converted into photo books and voila once again, you have just condensed!

Souvenirs are another item of clutter that we often grapple with but here is a great idea and fun project you can do with your kids. Make a shadow box of your trip! You can add tickets, photos and souvenirs and once again you have lightened your load and more importantly, your time spent dusting.

Here is a wonderful shadow box of architectural items before a home renovation. Another great way to pay homage to a memory without creating sentimental clutter.

Books can take up a lot of space and be really difficult to move, but there is something special about the books from childhood and therefore it is important to selectively keep ones you think might be important to your own kids. One great idea for commemorating books that are sentimental but will likely never be read again is to create artwork with book jackets. You could create a series of shadow boxes or a triptych for your walls.

I am no where near this one yet but once the kids have left home what do you do with all the stuff they leave behind? To be fair, I am still dealing with things I left behind at my own parent’s house so I am certainly no authority on this one but here is one ingenious idea from AZCentral.com.  Fill one appliance box (yes maybe that means actually upgrading an appliance whoo hoo!) with the trophies, ribbons, toys and such. It is likely that within a few months these items will not seem nearly as important. Eventually you will whittle it down to a few manageable items.

Tips From Mom of Ten

Because I am so green at this mommy gig, I decided to solicit the help of a seasoned mom friend. Libby Neas has reared ten children and has experienced dealing with sentimental clutter first hand. I asked Libby to share her top three tips:

Scan important documents and recycle the paper!

This is a great one. Libby’s advice is to create a ‘temporary’ and a ‘keep’ folder or bin for each family member. At the end of each week go through the temporary folder and scan anything that can not be dealt with on the spot and you consider ‘a keeper’. She also recommends a yearly purge of the box of ‘keepers’ especially for children’s artwork and school projects. Try to limit the ‘keepers’ to 10 per year.

For souvenirs and family heirlooms, if you really love the item – show it off!

If it is sitting in a box under the bed and you have not seen it in years, consider cataloging it and offering the item up to extended family members or donating to a good cause such as Good Will or Salvation Army.

This one is my favorite. If you are like me you just can not bear to throw away beautiful cards and letters. Libby pointed us to Simple Mom who has some wonderful ideas for making flip books, re-purposing cards and even giving  letters back to original senders! I know I would love to read some of the letters I wrote so many years ago.

So many great ideas. What are your top tips for reducing sentimental clutter?

One of my favorite things about the Christmas holidays (besides opening gifts), is counting down the days till Christmas.

When I was growing up, we always had an Advent Calender.  It was so fun, when it was my turn (3 brothers and sisters) , to put one more felt ornament on the tree.  Our advent calender was simple.  A felt wall hanging of a tree with ornaments in squares below it.  Each day one of us would get to take an ornament out of that days square and put it on the tree.

December 1 is  on Wednesday, do you have your Advent Calender ready?  Here are some links to some calenders that you can make…

• Split Coast Stampers
• Better Homes and Gardens
• Thrifty Fun (this article has several links of on line advent calenders you can use or ones to make.

Another fun and very easy advent calender is the paper chain calender.  (I think this is the one we will do).  The kids really loved it last year!

Have fun!

Let me know which one you are going to do!

There, I’ve admitted it, it’s out in the open now, no taking it back!

I wanted to share with you today, my most favorite craft site that I go to first when I need an idea for anything.   Dollar Store Crafts. This is the BEST site ever because it’s all crafts made from items you can buy at the Dollar Store!  And let me just say, I LOVE the Dollar Store!  It’s such a fun place to either waste a few minutes of your time, or a few dollars buying something you never know you needed ( HA HA)

There are many different categories of crafts on this website for Kids, Home Decor, Parties and the list goes on…  Since the holiday season is fast approaching, look there for different decorating ideas for you home and tree, and gifts on a budget.

This is a craft I am DEFINITELY putting on my TO-DO List!  Twig and Button Snowflakes.  Isn’t it just amazing?  Such a good idea, and you can do this by yourself, with a group of moms, or as a family.

Have fun crafting!

Competing with mother nature when the children are on Summer vacation can be challenging.  It may be raining or pouring outdoors but you can keep the little ones busy by recreating fair or festival activities indoors!

Face Painting  is easy to do by using this recipe.

Ingredients:

• Cornstarch
• Cold Cream
• Food coloring
• Small Jars with lids
• Small Paintbrush

Simply mix 1 tablespoon of cornstarch with 1/2 teaspoon of cold cream blend well in a jar.   Add water and mix.   Add a few drops of food coloring until you achieve the color desired.   Repeat process for each color of paint that you want to use.

After you have all the paints ready, make sure that the child has a clean face and use a small paintbrush to apply a design.  There are a number of places on the Internet to find downloadable stencils.  Just a suggestion if  you feel you need the extra help.  What’s neat is that the paint washes off with soap and water.

Some brave mom’s might allow the kids to practice on one another.  Let the fun begin!