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Everything In Its Place: Say goodbye to clutter with these good buys
Jul 08, 2009 (The Bulletin - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) --
One thing The Spacial Specialist Dana Black would like to make clear: Buying a bunch of storage containers will not make you an organized person.
Too often, this organization maven has seen clients splurge on all the tools to make their homes organized, and then fail to use them. But certain tools do help encourage a waste-free and de-cluttered home, Black says.
Whether you're using boxes or cabinets that were gathering dust in your garage or buying cheap new plastic tubs, getting organized can help save you money in your home.
"The key is once you've set up a system, take the time to show the entire household how to use it," says Black, who charges $55 per hour for her organizational work. "When I organize a house, I take sticky notes and write what goes in each drawer or cupboard, so the family gets used to it."
You'll find that with a clear system of organizational tools, you won't waste money on buying items you already have stowed elsewhere or buying things that you'll never use.
Black has shopped all over the state for her clients. In her experience, many storage containers are really expensive -- up to $20 each -- so she tends to watch the ads for the sales, use coupons and focus on items she can reuse.
Her go-to retailers locally: Bed, Bath & Beyond, with a $5 off or 20 percent off coupon; Shopko, when they have their buy one, get one half off sales; Fred Meyer for its organizational blowout sale at the beginning of the year; The Dollar Tree for plastic boxes; and Costco for in-bulk storage items that range from velvet hangers to bamboo drawer organizers.
She also typically shops at Target, Wal-Mart, Staples and OfficeMax, sorting through the clearance racks when applicable.
Home office
Best buy: Filing cabinet or drawers with hanging files, drawer organizers, in-box/out-box baskets or desk organizers, plastic storage tubs for extra supplies (also great for your kids' school supplies), computer program for calendar- and address-book organizing, label-maker.
"First of all, assess your area," Black says. "Remove or donate any unwanted, broken, never used, someday-will-use or sentimental-but-never-used items."
This could mean emptying your entire cupboard or bathroom cabinets or closet. After you sort out the non-used or unusable pieces, clean the space and then put everything back. Now, decide what you need to make that space more organized.
They key to organizing a home office is finding a good filing cabinet, Black says.
If nothing else, Black recommends buying a cabinet with at least two drawers, for your current and valuable documents. Don't use up valuable office real estate on old files, she says.
Instead, go through your existing files and identify those you'll need forever, then shred or recycle the rest. If you don't want to destroy anything, at least put files that are more than three years old into a storage box for the attic or basement.
Black recommends going through all your files once per year to weed out unwanted stuff. Keep your current info and shred duplicates -- if you ever need an old copy of something, such as a utility bill, call the service company and request the information.
Even better, set up an online payment system for your bills, which all utility companies offer these days, and cut down on even more paperwork.
SecureShred, a local shredding company, will come to your house to take anything you have that needs to be shredded. Additionally, free-shredding days are organized occasionally. The Deschutes County Sheriff's Office and SecureShred are hosting a free shredding day July 18 from noon to 4 p.m. The disposal will take place at the Sisters Sheriff's Office, 703 N. Larch St. For more information, call 541-549-2302 or visit www.deschutes.org.
Having your own shredder is a huge advantage, Black says, and you should keep it right next to where you open your mail.
Cheap shredders -- less than $60 -- might break faster, but Black says she finds great shredders for $60 to $80 at local home-office stores. The nicer ones are around $120.
In filing cabinets, Black thinks it is repetitive to have hanging files with manila folders inside them. Manila folders are rarely reused, whereas hanging green folders have removable tags that let you change their subject matter.
Next, your desk. Black likes to have an attractive basket on her desk with must-do items, such as bills that need to be paid or correspondence that needs to be answered. If you aren't going to use something that week, put it in a drawer, she suggests.
In Black's house, she keeps a basket under her mail slot, so when the mail arrives, she's already one step closer to organizing it.
She also recommends getting rid of all your calendars, especially if you have a computer and cell phone with easy calendar programming.
Black likes to set up a Microsoft Outlook program in which she adds all her calendar entries. That program updates her Blackberry planner, and vice versa when she plugs her phone into the computer. Her phone's search functions are so easy that this system saves her time and office space that would normally be covered with a calendar scribbled with information.
In your desk drawers, Black recommends inserting drawer organizers. These can be inexpensive plastic or pricier metal or bamboo.
You don't need 1,000 pens or paper clips. Select just a few writing utensils and scant office supplies to keep in the drawer and leave the rest in a see-through storage box stowed away. Or donate your extra paper clips or staples to a local nonprofit that might need them.
Plastic shoe-box organizers are good for office supplies, Black says, because you can easily label them, they are sturdy, they let you see what's inside and they stack easily.
"Keep in mind that lots of people's home offices are in the kitchen," Black said. "You have to make sure that if that's going to be an office space, make it an office space; don't let any random key or broken toy fall into your office drawer."
The key to keeping your home office organized is to use your "prime real estate" space for items that you always need at your fingertips. Everything else should stay tucked away in a wall-labeled drawer or box.
Speaking of label-makers, Black says that they are a great little gadget to have. You can add a label to something and peel it off when you're ready, unlike marking a box with a permanent marker.
The most expensive part of owning a label-maker is replacing the labeling tape, Black says. Costco sometimes carries a nice label-maker for less than $30 that comes with two cartridge refills of tape.
Black recommends the brands Brother or Dymo, which can be found anywhere from Target to Shopko or OfficeMax. Brother machines are more expensive and offer different fonts, vertical labels, various label sizes, different backgrounds and easier-peeling tape. The more affordable Dymo brand tends to have fewer variations and the labels take a little elbow grease to scrape off, Black says.
Bathroom
Best buy: Plastic storage bins or baskets that are easily labeled and drawer organizers.
Stop buying toiletries. Repeat that rule as often as you need to, until you use up all those half-full bottles of shampoo or unused bars of soap clogging your bathroom storage space, Black says.
"Line all that stuff up together and just use it until it's gone," Black says.
Most people's biggest bathroom problems are in their medicine cabinets, she said. She keeps plastic tubs that are easy to clean both under her sink and in her cupboards. One container has things like cotton balls or cotton swabs, another will have your backup toothpaste or mouthwash and another will have travel-size toiletries.
Black also keeps extra plastic storage bags in her bathroom, for storing her liquid products for trips and vacations.
You want all your medical aids in an easy-to-find place, so when your children are sick in the middle of the night and you're looking for medicine, you don't have to rummage through a mess of products, she says.
"I like to do stackable plastic shoe boxes," Black says. "It depends on your area what size to get, but I separate them out by things like cold, flu, first aid, stomach pain, etc."
You can get plastic boxes with pull-out drawers, which might make it easier if your boxes are stacked.
Black even has a box that her kids can reach, full of items they might need, such as bandages.
For bathroom drawers, Black loves the deep, rectangular drawer organizers that she finds at OfficeMax, although other office-supply stores will have similar items. The boxes are deep enough that your toothbrush won't get tangled with a hairy brush and your toothpaste won't roll around and leak on other items.
The organizers also have a space for little rubber hair bands or clips.
"One major key," Black says, "is to measure those drawers. Nothing is more frustrating than finding the perfect thing and it doesn't fit when you bring it home."
Bedroom
Best buy: Velvet hangers, plastic storage tubs, long rolling bins for under the bed, metal racks for shoes.
For kids' closets, Black recommends setting up a system that separates clothes they are growing in and out of. This could be space on the racks or in cardboard boxes or plastic storage bins, always well-labeled.
"I can't tell you how often I do someone's kid's room and they'll say they're too big for this or that," Black says. "So a system is good, in any closet, really."
Always keep a container in or near your closet for collecting donation clothes. This way, you won't be tempted to put something back on the hanger if you tried it on and realized it doesn't work for you anymore. When the container is full, put it in your car for donating or in a designated spot for garage sale items.
When you bring clothes back from the dry cleaner, immediately take the plastic coverings off and put your clothes where they belong, Black says.
Black buys the thin velvet hangers, which have swiveling hooks, at Costco -- less than $20 per pack of 50 hangers. These hangers, which are also offered at home-supply stores, take up less space than wooden hangers and will clutch your most slippery shirts or tank tops.
She recycles the wire hangers at her neighborhood dry-cleaning business.
If you have space to store belongings under the bed, Black recommends using wheeled boxes for stowing your off-season clothes or other items that clutter the closet.
For shoes, you really need some sort of rack system that will keep the shoes with their matches and unharmed. You can buy shoe racks that screw into the wall from home-supply stores, or put together a set of metal racks that stack on each other. The trick to shoes is using space you can afford, such as the space between your hanging clothes and the floor.
Shoe holders that hang over doors aren't Black's favorite -- they are heavy and bulky and sometimes your shoes won't even fit in them.
Finally, Black has one piece of advice that she cannot repeat enough: "Always put things away!"
As we all know, closets can become a jungle of clean and dirty clothes in a jiffy.
Anna Sowa can be reached at 541-383-0304 or at asowa@bendbulletin.com.
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