If you have a child in school, YOU NEED THIS PROJECT. Everyone needs somewhere to store those mounds of adorable projects, papers, and awards.
I found various versions of this project on Pinterest. There is this one and this one.
I love this project and the options out there to make it unbelievable cute are plenty. Here’s the thing, the price tag can get up there quickly. I have four children and needed a super frugal option. I went with price tag and function over cute this time.
Did I JUST type that?
When I took the basics and added these cute labels, it suddenly turned frugal into a vintage chalkboard inspired theme.
The best of both worlds.
THE SUPPLIES
The plastic tubs are AWESOME. Boring perhaps? A little. However, they are just $13 for two at Costco and they are very, very, durable. This project needs to last for like at least eighty years, so I need me some durability. You need one box per child.
The green hanging folders were just $5 for a box of 25 at Staples. You need one for each year of school per child. There is hanging file folders of every color in the rainbow and they are C U T E. However, the price tag reflects that. I went with the cheapest ones I could get my hands on.
The tab folders are a recycled folder from Staples as well. 100 of them for just about $10. You need one for each year of school per child.
I purchased the labels for the front of the files at Staples as well, for about $10. You need one for each file folder.
I purchased the tab file folder labels on clearance at Target for $5.
The black photo corners I purchased at Target for just $3.
Overall total for this project for my four children is about $65. I bought it piece by piece over the last few months.
THE HOW TO
So, basically the goal of this project is that ALL school memorabilia gets saved in the box. ALL of it.
How do you decide what goes in the box?
1. ALL awards, certificates, and those types of things.
2. Report cards
3. A sample of work from the beginning of the year and from the end.
4. Anything that makes me smile.
Yes, that is my official process. I save up papers for the whole year. Then I sit down and look through them. If it is in category 1-3, it automatically gets saved. If it isn’t, it has to past the smile test. If it makes me smile, it gets saved. If it doesn’t, it goes.
The bottom line is this, YOU CAN’T SAVE EVERYTHING. Too much of anything is never a good thing. So, be ruthless and save the spectacular.
I have tried to do traditional scrapbooking of school projects. I had started a couple of albums for the older kids and let me tell you, it is a hot mess. It just wasn’t easy to look through. I love being able to pick up their crafts and handle them. When trying to shove them all into pocket style photo albums, it became a nightmare. Not too mention there are only so many hours in a day and I have plenty of other stuff I would rather scrapbook. So, I aborted and landed with these. They are MUCH quicker.
Amazing, right? Yay for brilliant ideas. Yay for SUPER EASY. Yay for ORGANIZED. I am dangerously close to breaking out the pom pons, so I will stop now.
One nice little box for each of my lovelies. Even my one year old. In the blink of an eye, he will be in school and well yes, the boxes all need to match, right?
Have a happy weekend!!!