Getting organized

So for those who know me in real life, neat and organized are not the two words that come to mind when describing me. I kind of live off the philosophy of organized chaos. I know where everything sorta is but in no way could my home be mistaken for a clutter-free zone. Except when it comes to my board games.

Every box has a designated space up on the Expedit bookcases. I’m still bummed that IKEA decided to discontinue these awesome giants. But as my board-game collection has grown, every inch of shelf space has grown vital. I flip these games on their side, so that you can easily read their names. Plus, when they’re on their side, it puts less stress on the games, versus stacking them up horizontally where the bottom game bears the brunt of the weight of those on top of it.

Sometimes though, this poses a problem. I’ve mentioned how awesomely put together Francis Drake is in terms of compartments, even having a plastic cover so that pieces don’t shuffle around. For other games that have a million components, everything inside the box doesn’t always stay put. Case in point, Five Tribes. Sure, the meeples are all sitting in a little bag, but all the cards, coins and player pieces shuffle around way too easily. If you remove this box from the shelf and put it into your game bag, more often than not, the pieces move around out of their designated spots and then you can’t close the box all the way. And then it doesn’t fit back onto your shelf until you reorganize the pieces again.

So on recent trips to California, I’ve visited Daiso, which is a Japanese $1.50 store that carries just about anything you can think of. This place is amaze-balls. You didn’t know you needed a single banana holder, did ya? I’ve purchased some awesome organizational stuff there, for cheaper than what it would cost at Michael’s or another craft store. I bought these little plastic boxes with lids (3 for $1.50) for Le Havre, another game with a million cardboard components. What’s doubly great is that you don’t have to remove the resources from the box; the box itself fits onto the square on the game board.

I also purchased a $1.50 pill container for Scoville, which has a bunch of coins and pepper wooden pieces. This makes setup and cleanup so much easier. You just take the plastic container out of the box, and voila! Plus, everything doesn’t shuffle around in the box, making it difficult to put the lid on your game. Even though all the peppers were in individual bags, then you have the game sitting up on its side, the bags tend to gather at the bottom of the box.

Back here in Arizona, I purchased two scrapbook organizers from Michaels for $3 each. They weren’t as cheap as Daiso, but they were on sale for 40% off, so not too shabby. I used one container for Five Tribes (the problem above has been solved!) and the other for Domaine, which I just bought at Strategicon in LA. I don’t plan on buying organizers for every single game, as that would start to get expensive (Daiso trips can totally add up), but I’ll keep an eye out for those games whose components shuffle around a lot.

Lastly, I have yet to set up my Broken Token organizer for Caverna. Broken Token does have the best organizers, but they’re all super duper fancy. I’m so fortunate that I was gifted mine! So for now, those are the games that I’ve been organizing. It’s good to have everything fit so nicely on my shelves, which is probably the one area of my place that looks really organized. Which makes it easy to pick out a game for next game night!

Anyway, do you guys organize your board-game components? Where do you buy your organizers, and which are the best ones?