Operation De-clutter Flat Surfaces

So in my attempt to gain control of our lives and become more organized, especially in the area of papers, I completed another mini project.  The first part of this was our family memo center which has been utilized (not as much as I would like) as shown below.

A good first step but I still found that the piles of papers, magazines, mail and other miscellaneous items ended up on the kitchen island, counter and table any flat surface.  This becomes very overwhelming and out of control especially when there is no room for the kids to eat.

Okay a very honest moment here - I did clean the piles up a bit before photographing them but you get the idea.

Let's be realistic - even the most organized anal person would have trouble filing things as soon as walking in the door with bags from shopping, backpacks, a baby in an infant carrier and three other kids running through the door.  The easy thing is just toss them down and attend to the immediate needs like the puppy needing to go potty, the baby screaming from hunger, the diaper that needs to be changed, the 3 year old screaming he is hungry yet again and must have a snack RIGHT NOW, and other countless items.  Problem is once all those immediate needs are met I often do not go back to the pile/stack of items tossed on the said flat surface (repeat above paragraph for about a week and you have the actual picture of my kitchen).

SO.....I was in need of a new flat surface that wasn't needed for cooking, eating or other daily activities and could handle a few stacks until I could sit down to sort and organize them.  Luckily our dining area has a large enough recess to hold a table or other storage item.  My very short term fix was of course a table tray and looked something like this.

That worked for oh about a week and then the stacks outgrew the tray and once again spilled into other areas.  My ultimate desire is to find a nice looking console table (possibly with a drawer) that will fit the space and allow me the flat surface I desire but also a place to pull up a chair and do the things I find I am using the kitchen table for - Scholastic orders, school forms, quick mail and other items that I do not want to go downstairs to the office for.  So I set out on an adventure with my girlfriend and 6 kids (we are crazy like that) to find the perfect table.  Well all that we found were either too big for the space or for my budget.  Needing immediate gratification and a place to put things NOW I improvised with a cheap bookshelf and some baskets and media boxes (thanks to my friend for the idea).  Now I have FOUR flat surfaces to stack stuff on and hopefully some places to hide those annoying yet necessary items (pencils, crayons, sight word flashcards, not yet filed coupons, etc).

What do you think?  Looks much  better than the tv tray and will hopefully do the job until I can locate the perfect table.