Storage for Settlers of Catan

Settlers and Cities & Knights	Seafarers

I've mentioned that our favorite family game is The Settlers of Catan. We have the main Settlers gamealong with the 5-6 player extension. We have found that our favorite way to play is with the Cities & Knights expansion and the 5-6 player extension for Cities & Knights. In addition, we also own (but use less frequently) the Seafarers expansionand the 5-6 player Seafarers extension.

Consequently, we have many little game pieces to keep track of. We found that setting up and putting away the games was rather time consuming. We'd rather spend our time playing the game than gathering and organizing parts. So we come up with a storage solution. We have two Sterilite large clip boxes from Target. They measure 3.25"X11"X14". Inside the boxes we placed small, round, plastic containers each 2" in diameter and 2.75" tall. The round containers also came from Target (in the craft section). Unfortunately, Target does not have the clip boxes or round, plastic containers on its website. You can see them in the pictures, though.

In the first box, we put all the pieces for Settlers and Cities & Knights together since that is how we play most often. Inside are nine round, plastic containers. One container holds the number chits for a 2-4 person game, another holds the number chits for a 5-6 person game, a third holds the dice, robber, merchant, etc. The remaining six containers hold each color's pieces. Filling the remainder of the box are the land and water hexes, water frame, calendars, and cards. The instruction book lays on top.

The second box has all the pieces from Seafarers. Similarly, the second box holds eight containers with Seafarers pieces. Here are some more pictures:


The solution, of course, is only as perfect as the operator. In our case, the kids frequently play without us. So the setup and clean up are less than perfect. But, they do pretty well getting things in the right places.

I have some ideas to improve the system. Ideally, the clip boxes would be just a half inch taller. I'd like to find some sort of round container that would just match the diameter of the number chits. That way, we could put them away in order, and they would come out already in order when setting up the next game. Finally, I'd love to find a perfect size outer box that would hold both of the clip boxes inside of it.

Interested in Settlers of Catan, Cities & Knights, and Seafarers of Catan? They are available at Amazon.com. Here are the 2-4 player sets:


Here are the 5-6 player extension sets:

Magazine Storage

The best storage for magazines is the trash can. But, if you must, must, must keep some magazines, you'll want to keep them tidy.

You can buy magazine boxes in the office supplies department of your local discount superstore. They come in cute colors and patterns now. That's what I would do if I needed only 1 or 2.

If you need more than that, you can make your own out of cereal boxes. Just start hacking away at an empty cereal box and cut it into a shape similar to the store-bought magazine boxes. If you're really ambitious, I suppose you could cover it with designer Contact Paper so it matches your decor. I just leave mine looking like cut up Cheerios boxes. They won't be quite as sturdy as purchased ones, but they are cheap and easy to replace.

These work great for my kids' Highlights magazines and coloring books. I use them for my to-be-read magazines and my file of homeschool catalogs.

Plastic Grocery Bags

Our WalMart hands out over 16,000 of those plastic grocery bags every day. That is a lot of bags.

I've seen all kinds of cute little tube thingies to store them in, but I like this solution best: stuff them into empty Kleenex boxes. Nothing to buy, very portable, easy to replace! I always put a box in the camper to use as trash bags, a box upstairs to line the trash cans, several boxes in the kitchen for whatever.