Ode to Organization: June Goals

There are a few dark and scary spaces in my apartment where disorganized piles of 'stuff' lurk in the shadows, or hide behind doors, or hibernate in the bottom of boxes. The one that irks me the most is the ultra visible toy box. She sits majestically in the living room, adorned with books, games and of course toys. In all her crowning glory she inevitably gets messy and is a huge eye sore. Sometimes I feel I want to trash the whole thing, and proclaim that it is "fit for the pit." (anyone remember Street Cents?) But seeing as I LOVE my sweet boy, I could never do that to his toys.

My Goal in June is to eliminate the clutter and chaos from these sinister places and spaces that seem to so easily lure me and Tayson's paper, junk, stuff, and do-dad's. In order to effectively achieve this goal and maintain it, (I believe this is the bigger challenge) it is important to ask myself these 2 questions:

1. What am I using this space for? (what doesn't belong and should be relocated or tossed)
2. How can I affectively use this space? (hooks, baskets, magazine holders, hangers, peg board)

Clutter Areas

Area #1: The closet
1. Stores clothing, winter hats/mitts/scarves, purses, belts, box of cd's, wrapping paper, 'give away' bag, computer equipment. All in all it's the 'I-don't-know-where-else-to-put-you' closet.
2. Make the peg board for the back of my door, put up the hooks I bought from ikea for the side wall, get rid of 'give away bag', sort cd's.

Area #2: The toy box (her majesty)
1. Tayson's toys, books, craft boxes, puzzles
2. Pack away,Give away, Toss away unplayed with toys. Relocate the books and toys on the exposed surface areas into the newly emptied bins. Use baskets on top to keep a neat appearance. Repaint toy box to freshen it up.


Check out this link to see one mom's toy experiment @ the blog Overcoming Busy.

Organizing Your Way also has some fab tips on toy organization.

Area #3: Kitchen Pantry
1. Food
2. Toss away old, stale food that is simply taking up space. Group together common things, cans, cereal, pasta, baking, crackers/cookies, chips. Label shelves (?).
(I can't believe I'm sharing this picture, YICKS!)