Book Shelves Clean Out

I have spent the entire weekend buried in books; not the fun kind of buried like reading, but the work kind of sorting, organizing, moving and selling. The number of books we own is crazy, but 14 years of homeschooling and numerous children can do that. For example, my oldest four children just used Saxon math every year until we hit Algebra II, then their mother was really unable to be of much help so we switched to Teaching Textbooks. Then due to some learning struggles, I've also had to buy Teaching Textbooks for one child for the last several grades before Algebra II. Last year, Ben was struggling so badly with Saxon that I took him back two grades and we re-worked using Math U See first grade. So, now I own three math curriculums for many grades. The end result is a huge homeschooling bill most years and lots of books; this year has exceeded huge, so I have pulled tons of books off the last few days that I don't foresee using with my current little guys and I'm trying to re-coop some of my expense by selling them. 


I started by cleaning out the big cube. There were about four or five cubes there were overflowing reading books that I didn't have room for on my regular book cases. Removing them allowed me to have cubes designated to children. The up highs are my curriculum for them and lower is their corresponding books. The baskets are for math manipulatives, puzzles, etc; we even have a cube for Elijah's police Playmobiles that are "special school-time only toys." That cube may be the best $200 I've ever spent in the organizational realm. 

All those removed reading books then had to be accommodated on my already full shelves. My solution to that was to re-locate all the fiction down-stairs on the three bookcases that we bought from Border's. So my shelves went from this - 

to this -

 I've gone through tons of piles that look like this, but most of them are now safely tucked onto the shelf they belong. There are only a few areas in life that I really like perfection and my book organization is one of them. 

As for the new bookcases, they are downstairs lining the playroom wall. My original plan was to put them there for the time being and then move them to the family room when it becomes a family room instead of a construction zone. However,  I found out that JD majorly bolted them into the top, bottom and side walls to ensure they wouldn't flip on any disobedient monkeys, so they probably are now there to stay. It's ok, because the playroom has plenty of space. 


So, my plan down here is the first shelf is hardback picture books, the second one is children's chapter fiction in alphabetical order by author's name, (should I admit that?) and the last is adult fiction. As you can see, I haven't really moved the adult books down yet, my overflowing bookcase in my bedroom is yet to be cleaned out. I still think I'll have plenty of empty shelves, but I'm really happy to dust empty shelves; It is the first time in 20 years that I've had empty bookcases!

For those dying to know, the book shelves from Borders were all three for $100. Can't beat that!