I haven’t posted in awhile, so I decided to put my summer project into several posts.

In this situation, I actually begged the homeowner to let me help her with her basement, so we started there.

Most of us start with some sort of organization in our storage areas, but between sicknesses, letting the kids put stuff away, visitors that need a room fixed quick, etc….they usually end up wrecked. So I’ll give you a few tricks that work for me.

 

1. Start with your pathway:

You’re going to be carrying stuff from one end to the other to put items away into your original systems. I started on this pathway before I took a picture so the “before” is more of an “in between”

BEFORE:

AFTER:

 

2. Dress it up:

Most spaces are going to be storage spaces, but I’ve always maintained that if you don’t designate a purpose to an item of furniture, then it will turn into a junk holder.  Sometimes we have extra furniture and it lives in the basement. My tip is to turn that furniture into a seating area, or craft area, etc…so that it becomes a functional space instead of a stacking space.

BEFORE:

        

 

AFTER:

                   

 

3. Label and coordinate:

Most holiday décor  gets put away quickly in the same boxes we got them out of, and with no thought about the convenience of setting it back up the next year. We even buy new cute containers most years and just put our “new” stuff in them. It will save a lot of hassle during the holidays to go through your décor just once and take them by areas they will be put in, what kind of décor they are, etc. THEN, put the different décor in coordinating boxes for each location/use and LABEL. My homeowner really showed me how convenient a label maker can be! Here’s our “for instance”. The homeowner had a Christmas village collection that was displayed some years and stayed stored some years. We put all of these into matching containers and labeled them “village”. We also had matching and labeled containers for the mantel décor, the tree ornaments, Christmas books etc.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

        

 

4. Rubber bands and baggies are your friend:

Over the years, I’ve accumulated some different tactics for household items. For cords: I love to use rubber bands. You don’t have to coil them too tightly and you don’t have to try and make a twist tie fit. Another useful tool is the baggie. When you have a lot of small pieces and it would be easier to have them on hand than to sort through a big tub of them, baggies of all sizes come to the rescue. In this instance, her spouse works with a lot of computer items and had a lot of cords of all different kinds. Separating them became a big game and a running joke…and the silly labels are just to keep it a fun experience.

 

BEFORE:

fun with baggies and rubber bands:

  

                    

AFTER:

            

I recently got a Costco membership which led to: buying in bulk

                                                                           which led to: pantry needing to be reorganized

                                                                           which led to: wondering why my floor cleaners were on the floor of my pantry

                                                                           which led to: organizing all of my cleaning supplies.

 

VOILA:

Basically, all of the sinks now have a tub (ideally it would be a caddy) with all of the cleaning supplies needed for cleaning that room, and an inventory on the door so I know what I run out of.

 

This should help with my overbuying of cleaning supplies.

 

There was a time (just before medication) when going to the store and strolling through the cleaning supply aisle was very calming to me.

Because of this, I have bought many supplies over the years and have found a few that really do what they say they do.

 

Here are a few of my favorites:
Lemi-shine: you add it to your dishwasher detergent and it gets rid of hard-water spots (even better than vinegar will!)

Quickie glass and mirror microfiber cloth: I’m still a fan of Windex, but with this cloth, you just wet one corner and use it to clean the mirror and use the dry part of the cloth to dry it off and it looks fabulous!

409: My very favorite counter cleaner. It has a strong smell, but it gets off ink (like when someone puts a printed item on a wet counter and it sticks there) and juice stains, and pretty much any stain I’ve ever tried to get off of a counter.

Scrubbing Bubbles shower cleaner: those little bubbles work hard!!

CLR: In the same category as scrubbing bubbles, but I have white tile and white grout in my shower and have tried pretty much everything to get the hard water and rust stains off, and CLR actually works! It also took out a stain in my kids’ bathtub where the water had been dripping from the faucet for 8 years (yes, it took me that long to get the shower fixed)

Woolite Carpet Cleaner:  I was a big fan of a brand called “Folex” for a number of years, but it got too hard to find. Then I became enamored with “Spot Shot”. It definitely gets the stain out, but Spot Shot also has big time fumes and once bleached a spot on my carpet. My new fave is Woolite Carpet Cleaner…been using it for a couple of years now and it is fabulous!!

And for efficiency and convenience, I’m a fan of: Swiffer wet jet, Clorox disinfecting wipes, and the Clorox toilet wand.

 

Just my opinions, but thought I’d share in case you’re looking for a new cleaner and don’t want to try all the different ones available.