Lego Storage boxes: how to organise your expanding collection

This week we have been debating; yes, debating; the conundrum that is 'how to store our increasing collection of Lego sets.'

I came to the conclusion; after working out that if I was to invest the £39.99 it would cost for a Lego Sort and Store head, which look amazing but seem horrifically over priced for what is essentially moulded plastic; that I would need to actually buy at least 3 storage heads. One for Princess Peppa's 'Friends' range, one for Little Miss George's Marvel Hero and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle ranges and three for my shop. Yes three. Apparently they only store 1000 pieces and if I ever do demolish the shop (which is unlikely) it had 2,182 pieces.

It seems a hugely extravagant solution to a basic storage problem.

So what about the Lego storage heads that just store, and don't sort?

For my money the space for storage is just too big. How do you rummage through and find the small pieces in such a deep container?

Why is it OK for little girls to love dinosaurs, but not OK for little boys to love Barbie?

Over the weekend I read an interesting article in the Times magazine by Lori Duron, author of Raising My Rainbow: adventures in raising my fabulous, gender creative son.

I'll be honest, I was confused. The article talked about how concerned Lori and her husband were when their son started expressing a love for all toys usually favoured by girls at a young age. From the moment he saw his mom's old barbie doll he was hooked. When he started dressing up in girls clothes they were concerned.

The article, and presumably the book it stems from, talks about how Lori eventually discovered online (where else?) that there was a label she could give her son: gender creative, or gender non-conforming. Somehow having this label made it easier for them. Her worries about whether or not he was homosexual were eased by the discovery of this label.

Her son is 7.

Confused?

Well I am.

You see, regular readers will know that my younger daughter, Little Miss George, loves dinosaurs, plays with cars, is obsessed with Spider-man, Batman, the Teenage Mutant Ninya Turtles, knights and battles and swords. She actively steers away from 'girls' toys, and only occasionally, when she sweetly feels that she'd like to wear an outfit in her wardrobe that she knows we like (she's incredibly thoughtful) she will wear a flowery dress. Otherwise it's leggings or jeans and Marvel comic or dinosaur t-shirts. She even has a shirt for parties.

Her best friends are all boys.

Am I worried that she's a lesbian?

How to drink more water?

It's taken me four months to write this blog post. I feel the need to apologise. My absence from the Internet lately can be explained by a few quick words; winter, cough, lack of sleep, 45 hour work weeks, my birthday, a fabulous new internet project (watch this space), the financial year-end (I'm an accountant by day) and a winter holiday. I could tell you more about all of those things, but I figure you probably don't care a long as I stop waffling and get to the point.

Far more interesting is the purpose of this post - to share my discovery this week of how I can drink more water.

It's on everyone's New Years resolution list every year; to drink more water. We all know we are supposed to drink around 10 glasses a day. We all generally fail miserably. 10 cups of coffee and/or tea maybe yes. But that's still a tall order.

Let's face it, water generally doesn't taste that good. Some of us are lucky enough to have water flowing from our taps that can be drunk straight from the tap and is fairly palatable. But many places of work in the UK won't have the same water supply, and many taps specifically have labels above them saying "not drinking water"; though in an emergency you probably would anyway.

Cordials are good at making water taste of something else, but they are full of sugar and E-numbers and don't really appeal to me. I actually like drinking bottled water, but 10 bottles of Evian a day would quickly bankrupt me. I'd be smooth skinned but incredibly poor.

Funny then, that this week I have gone from hardly drinking anything other than coffee, tea and the occasional fruit juice, to drinking 3 or 4 full bottles of water.

The bottles in this case are not bought bottles. I have discovered a refillable water bottle that works for me even though it's only filled with tap water.

Amazing things I've discovered this week

It's been a week of getting excited about silly things.

 

Shoe heaven - First up, these shoes. Discovered whilst casually walked through my local town and spotted out of the corner of my eye. I did the double-take that everyone who has seen me wearing them since has done. For at first these look like patterned yellow and blue shoes. Get closer and you realise they are minion shoes.

Yes. As in Despicable me.

The designer, Kirsty Needham can customise in whatever style you like. Find her on Facebook at Crystal Jane Customisations.

 

Power your Pivots - I've also had the unusual experience of sitting in a work training session... Yawn... And learning something that will absolutely revolutionise how I work. Good grief that doesn't happen often, so buckle up and prepare yourself for something special. And If you don't use Excel, skip this section now. You either know Vlookups or you don't.