Awesome Notebook

Go to Staples right now.

Run, don't walk...and check out their "m" line. Clearly they made it for me. Customizable and perfect. I bought a notebook in February and I just love it.

Lunches - saving time by planning ahead

We don't have a lot of time in the mornings to make lunches and we are never quite organized enough to make lunches the night before.  As an alternative, we've come up with some shortcuts...

This bin sits in our pantry and is filled with school safe (no nuts) snacks.

This bin sits in our fridge and holds all sorts of things depending on the week.  In this picture we have jello, yogurt, sausage, cheese, apples and plums.

This is the last bin.  It also sits in the pantry and holds fruit, fruit sauce and pudding.

Organize it

We switched contents from our front closet to the back door closet yesterday.  I need to remember to print some labels...but here is where we keep the kid's craft supplies.  Wax crayons, markers, pencils, notepads, stickers, pipe cleaners, scissors, glue, glitter...    The hanging shelves are from Ikea and the plastic containers are from Rona.

And yes, we are exactly the type of people who change closet contents because we are bored.  :)

On to the Kitchen...

Once again for Mrs. Smith who wants pictures of everyone's house to help her decide what to do with hers...

Half of my kitchen...

 Here you will find my cookbooks and cooking magazines.  The little shelves to the right hold wine bottles well but since we aren't big wine drinkers we fill them with salt and pepper shakers that we've picked up on our travels, some seasonings and probably some mystery items stashed in the back.  :)

 Our corner upper.  We keep our plates, cereal type bowls and our pottery in this cupboard.

 A close up inside the corner shelf.

Umbra organizer.  I love Umbra.  :)

Manual Storage

I sort manuals into themes like "kitchen", "garage" etc and put them into labelled ziploc bags and store them in a paper box.  It's handy to have them all in one place but tucked away.

Coming next time...kitchen....

Master Bathroom

Just what you wanted to see was pictures underneath our master bathroom sink right?  Blame Mrs. Smith.  All the containers pictured above are from London Drugs.

This handy little find is great for storing curling irons and hair dryers.  The best part is, it hang right on your towel bar.  We found this little treasure at Costco.

Shoe Empire

Both my husband and I have a shoe problem.  We counted them up one day and realized that we are equally afflicted.

We use a Billy bookcase with extra shelves from Ikea to store the empire.

Laundry Closet

Our laundry area is on our upper floor inside of double closet doors.

For Mrs Smith's continued quest to see inside my house - here is the laundry closet

The Tupperware container on the upper shelf contains various stain remover products.  I love the solid stain sticks that you can use and leave on for a few days before doing laundry.  The little garbage can on the washing machine is my lint garbage can.  It's brand name is Umbra - one of my favorite brands!!

Photos for Mrs.Smith

My friend Mrs. Smith has been bitten by the organizational bug.  She is reorganizing and redesigning her entire place and has challenged her friends to post or send pictures of their houses for her to get ideas from.

Here I am posting pictures from the kids bathroom.

In the top of the 3 tiered organizer are tubes of toothpaste and some bubble bath.  In the middle are some bath salts and the bottom is filled with floss sticks.

The brush cup to the left of this is from Ikea and used to live in our kitchen for utensils.

The towels on the shelf above the toilet match the shower curtain which of course I forgot to take a picture of.  :)

Organize This!

I'm not a fanatical housekeeper.  I'm not even a good housekeeper.  LOL.  Amongst the chaos though, there are pockets of organization that make me happy.  Some of these you may have seen before...

Ahh Tupperware's Modular Mates...How do I love thee?  These are the sole reason that I started selling Tupperware.  These are the rectangular ones.  I keep flour, white sugar, brown sugar, icing sugar and potatoes/onions here.

More Modular Mates - some more rectangles and a few ovals.

Did I mention that I like Modular Mates?  And K-Cups?

The little spinning thing to the left is from Regal and it holds all my packets.

This is a look at the inside of my pantry door.  My husband made this after we saw a very similar thing done at my Aunt & Uncle's house.  These were bought at Lee Valley Tools.

A close up look at one of the rows in the pantry door.  These jars are from Ikea and are great for holding my soup ingredients.  This picture reminds me that I need to go shopping for refill ingredients.  LOL

This is the top of my daughter's dresser.  The jars are once again from Ikea.  They are a great way to hold all the little pieces that used to be scattered at the bottom of her toybox.  She loves them in the jars now and uses her stool to grab whatever jar she wants.  The tops of them open easily.

The hanging organizers are from Ikea.  The one on the left is for our seasonal outdoor wear.  Toques, scarves, mittens and more all have homes here in the winter.  In summertime I change it to hats, sunglasses and whatever else we have around.

The clear plastic boxes in the right hand organizer are from Rona. They hold all our craft supplies.  I still need to go buy 2 more and need to label them.  Right now they have markers, pencil crayons, wax crayons, stickers, glue, pom poms, pipe cleaners and more.

Organize It

I'm a little lazy when it comes to laundry.  I don't want to sort a whole lot so I have 4 groups: Normal wash & dry, delicate wash - no dry, sheets  and finally towels.  As the dirty clothes/stuff get removed they get put into the correct bin right away (sheets & towels are combined in the bin for purposes of space).  This fun sorter comes from Costco!

Gift wrap.  I had vague imaginings of having a gift wrap station in my scrapbook room.  The roll wrap would be mounted on the wall.  There would be a slide out knife block style working surface for wrapping...it was marvelous.  As it turned out I own a lot more crafty supplies than I thought and the gift center was put into our closet.  Still - things are sorted into their places and it does the trick.  The top drawer of the narrow 3 drawer is bows. The middle drawer is gift tags, tape and wrap cutter. The bottom drawer is ribbon and ties.  The top drawer of the larger cabinet is tissue paper. The middle drawer is flat wrap and the bottom drawer is gift bags. All roll wrap is off to the side stacked inside a square box.  These containers were bought at London Drugs.

Lint Can!

I found this at Winners last week and I'm in love...

(Canadian Tire money in there for sizing)  Since we have moved into this house I've had my eye out for a tiny garbage can to put on top of my washing machine for lint.  Yes, I could walk the 20 feet to the bathroom garbage...but I don't.  I put the pile of lint on top of the dryer fully intending to throw it away when I am done transferring the load.  Then I forget and walk away because my memory is THAT bad.  But now...Mwa - ha -ha!!

Teeny Tiny Paint Can

I bought this about a week ago to store my ribbon scraps in.  It's just so cute!!

Love This Desk

I am totally hooked on a new-to-me blog called
http://creativeorganizing.typepad.com/

I read the first few entries and am now ignoring all new entries as I have gone back to read it all from the beginning!  I think I am caught up to some time in 2008 right now.  :)

One of the books she recommended for getting inspiration for your workspace was Pottery Barn's Workspaces.  I put it on hold at the library and was able to pick it up yesterday.  Although I am a fan of some Pottery Barn things from a distance - it's not a place that typically inspires me.  It probably helps that there is not one in my city. 

Typical for me - I've been jotting down the ideas that inspire me on a post-it....which I have since lost in my house.  LOL  I *think* it's trapped beside the fridge in that clutter hotspot but I haven't ventured over there to check yet.

Blah blah blah.  Anyway - when I saw this page - I got all revved up about it. Excuse the crappy photo but it's from my Blackberry:

Isn't it great? It is a raised glass top on a desk so you can tuck your most used supplies underneath or a scrapbook layout that you don't want disturbed.  I was so excited about it that I left the book open on my co-worker Mrs. Smith's desk so she could see it too.  Mrs Smith is a fellow office supply lover and thus, is totally understanding of my desk organizing worship.  She was acceptably excited as well.

You'd think that my organizational worship would mean that I have a neat desk.  No - then there would be no point in coveting the just out-of-reach perfectness of these desks.  Take a look at my desk right now:

Speaking of which - it's time to attack it....

Organize it!

This is how I organize my scrapbook paper.  On the left hand side is 8.5x11 cardstock.  The middle is patterned paper divided by themes such as: Baby, Christmas, Kids, Heritage, Plaids, Stripes, Sports etc.  The right side is my 12x12 cardstock.

Organize It Wednesday

On Wednesdays I like to post stuff that is organized.  It is not always my stuff but it's stuff that I like.  :)  Yes, I know it's not Wednesday yet, but it's less than 2 hours from now.  Close enough...

This is a scrapbook embellishment holder that I have in my scrapbook room.