I’m determined to find a place for everything. It was my New Year’s resolution for 2010.
Another view of the stuff:
Imagine all of that stuff in that small linen closet. Imagine the parts of sheet sets not necessarily being on the same shelf. Imagine things – shoved.
Now imagine it worse than that. A little worse . . . there, that’s it.
I employed one of orgjunkie’s tricks that I used in the February Organizing Challenge. I pulled EVERYthing out. That stresses me. I never know when I’m going to have a flare-up of my Anti-Task-Completion-Syndrome.
I can’t tell you how many times, pre-blog, I would get a burst of organizing energy and pull things out of a closet/cabinet/whatever . . . and then leave the pulled-out mess there for, well, weeks.
But I’ve learned how quickly most of these tasks can go, and I knew that I needed to see what was lurking in there before my garage sale this Saturday.
I had too many sheets. If I only have one full-size bed in the house, I don’t really need 5 sets of sheets for it. I thought about going down to two, but decided that since its inhabitant is still in the multiple-changes-a-night-in-case-of-sickness stage of life, I should keep three. For the boys, I kept four total. They each have a twin bed, so with my new Laundry Day, there should always be two sets of clean sheets. I got rid of the stripey ones that give me a headache . . . and the Pooh ones. The boys are just too old for Pooh, but it makes me sad. I bought those sheets as enticement for my oldest to sleep in a big boy bed.
I employed a trick that I read about in a magazine, and which a reader mentioned a few months ago. I stuck each piece of a set into one of its pillowcases. This way, they don’t get lost or separated. I tried to organize the shelves according to the height of the people who would need to get to them. Towels and washcloths are on the lowest shelf. Kids sheets are on the middle shelf. Grown-up sheets are on the next shelf up, and odd pillowcases and beach towels are on the very top half-shelf. The beach towels are about to come down in a few weeks, and they probably won’t make it back into the closet at all for the summer, as we swim almost every day.
Here’s the end result:
And here are the things I’m putting in the garage sale:
I had to do quite a bit of self-convincing on some of them. I tried to use the concept I finally grasped yesterday, that I can only have as much as will fit in the space that I have.
This linen closet is a perfect example of how necessary that concept is. I couldn’t find anything in its overcrowded state, so even though I had way too much, it felt like I didn’t have enough. Make sense?
The closet looks great! You're going to end up having a terrific garage sale.
Your linen closet is a thing of beauty. "Accidentally" leave that door open when you have guests over-ha, ha! I love the way you rolled the towels. I always fold them in thirds, but my shelves are too narrow for them to stack neatly. I'm going to try rolling. And the pillowcase idea is a great one. Keep up the awesome work. I'm proud of you!
I just found your blog through Works for Me Wednesday – and I want to keep reading. I think we might be related. I can relate to everything in your posts. Maybe there's help for me too?
I am "back-reading" today and came across this blog post. I need to do this to my linen closet…..BAD!!
The reason for my comment is about your camera. On most cameras you CAN get the pictures off the internal and move it to the disc. Have you figured how to do this? If you have, mute point. If you haven't and would like to know how, send me the specs of your camera and I'll figure it out and send it back to you.
Thanks for all your great tips!!
oxox
Tammy
omg- seriously laughing at my computer screen reading about your shoving and closing doors with your shoulder!
Love the idea to put sheets into pillow cases- toatlly doing that! 🙂
This is actually my problem – and not necessarily one of my own making either – I’m downsizing my life from a 2 bedroom house to a 1 bedroom flat. So working out what I can keep and what I have to get rid of regardless of whether I was using it or not is a real heart-felt struggle.
Good for you on your linen storage!
This is a task that I was supposed to complete this weekend…. It didn’t happen, and I don’t have a reason (lol)…. But, after seeing your newly organized one, I think mine deserves it too, and I am determined to get it done… soon 😉 Keep up the good work!!! I’m still reading through start to finish.. I still have a year and a half, and there was a post a few months back that I seriously wanted to comment on and give you a suggestion, but well, you’ve probably already figured it out. 🙂
Dear Nony
You say you enjoy praise. Well, if you ever feel in need of some, you know who to call because I could ladle it over you by the bucketful. You also say you agonised at the outset over the title “A Slob Comes Clean”. With me, you hit exactly the right market. As soon as I saw it, I felt hopeful. There is a saying “it takes one to know one”. Once I started reading your blog, I felt, in mining terms, as though I had come upon a seam of pure gold. Like you, I have read endless books of advice for clutterers, which can be summarised as “just put everything in order”. Well, if it were that simple, we’d have done it. I doubt that those who write such books have ever known the situation where you are holding something which you want to put down but there is no free space. So you pick something else up, put the first item down and are left holding the second one…
I greatly enjoy your before and after photos. It is a true that a picture is worth a thousand words. Inspired by your example, I have started doing the same.
In an earlier comment, I said that scanning was solving my paperwork problem and that, keeping two copies of each scan on the hard drive and a USB data stick respectively, I felt able to destroy documents that I had hung on to for years. However, I have discovered that the USB stick in question is a fake and possesses only a fraction of the memory it was claimed to have. (I bought it from a reputable store and will be pursuing the matter.) In the meantime, there is a wonderful free-to-download program for testing the validity of USB sticks and some other media. It is called H2testw and was devised by a German man but has an English option. I am extremely grateful to this man. Having hoarded these documents for years, it is vital that I have confidence in an alternative way of keeping them.
Finally, I would add that, although I use a shredder, I would not advocate one in a household with young children because of the possibility of their injuring themselves.
Thank you so much for the kind words! And thank you for confirming the need for my title.
This shall be todays task! Looks somewhat simple with big rewards. Thanks for the pep talk!
Anti-Task completion syndrome. The story of my life. Its a relief to know that I’m not alone in this slob struggle Thanks for your transparency, your tips, and hosting an environment that is non-judgemental. So many blogs out there are.
Just started reading your blog about a week ago, working my way from the beginning and I’m up to this post.
Regarding “a place for everything and everything in its place”–Just because a place has been designated for an item doesn’t mean that item has a place. If the place is full, then there is no place for the item. If I were told to go sit on a chair in a room full of chairs, but every chair is already occupied, then there is no place for me. I try to think this way when I know where something “should” go or where I want it to go, but there isn’t room for it. Usually that means I have too much (or something in that place doesn’t belong there or needs a new place).