Organizing home & shop for happy SS living

[Marianne]

What helped us the most at first was some old kitchen cupboards (scrounged), a couple old, small dressers and an obsession to label all the drawers. Now if I can get 'someone' to put stuff back (!!!!!), I'll be a happy camper!

In the past year, we bought three metal cabinets ($20 each) and got 3 really tall metal shelving units from our BIL. Cool. We had already built a tool cabinet with plywood, so now all the tools are behind doors. We don't have the shelves moved to the shop yet, so who knows what will go on them.

 

[so lucky]

My DH seems to be getting more forgetful by leaps and bounds. He thinks he can't find things when he needs them unless they are out in plain sight. Even then he sometimes can't find what he is looking for. As a result, he tends to leave things scattered all over any surface that I don't claim for my own. He also buys the same thing over and over. So right now he has 7 pairs of glasses, three flashlights, 4 jars/cans full of ink pens and pencils, two stacks of unused note paper, pieces of mail dating back to 2007, about 30 little bits of paper with a name or address on them, various small tools, pieces of tubing, a fuse, two or three lip balms.....well, you get the picture, on the countertop where our phone is. If I touch anything, he immediately needs it, and then neither one of us can find it. This trait is getting so bad, it leaks over into every aspect of his life. The garage is hopelessly full and cluttered with "useful" items, as is the workshop, the spare bedroom, the basement. I think he is one dumpster away from being labeled a "hoarder." When he starts a project, he spends about half his time trying to find some necessary tool he misplaced. The other half of the time is spent re-measuring, re-reading, pondering, re-sanding, re-gluing, etc. Then he does the whole thing over again because it is not perfect. I have to say this is getting worse with age. I'm actually pretty worried about him. I think he needs a pill! Getting organized is only a distant dream!

 

[Joel_BC]

What helped us the most at first was some old kitchen cupboards (scrounged), a couple old, small dressers and an obsession to label all the drawers.

I did something pretty similar with some kitchen cabinets we took out of our kitchen when I rebuilt it, about six years ago. Moved them out into our big shed, across a sort of walkway from my tablesaw. Yeah, they work great for shop purposes.

 

[me&thegals]

Completely agree. My motto at home is "A place for everything and everything in its place." It makes like calmer, quieter, more enjoyable and more EFFICIENT!! A person can spend a lot of time in life searching for lost things. I have my mom's neat-freak gene, and it brings me great joy in life (not exaggerating here) to deep clean every winter and give away/throw out everything that has become clutter.

So, my contribution, is to go through EVERY inch of your house once per year to keep things relatively organized and uncluttered.

And get whatever is necessary to organize space well. We just bought a new small shed, so I'll be spending a fair amount of time thinking about what it will be used for and trying to make the very best use of that space.

I hate to ask but if you are so well organized why did you need more space? ~gd still trying to get enough space to move my mouse around freely.

Fair question

I started a business 5 years ago. We've made room in our home/garage for the beekeeping equipment, the soap, body/lip balm making stuff and even the CSA stuff for the first 5 years, including 2 extra fridges. Now I'm expanding the CSA and the bins, seed-starting trays, 1/2 ton of potting soil, etc. have been taking over the garage and making DH crazy.

So, the shed will house a small tractor, all storage bins, a small walk-in cooler, all seed-starting stuff, rototillers, wagon, wheelbarrows, garden tools, plus a lean-to greenhouse for the obvious plus up to 1 ton of potting soil.

 

[me&thegals]

I should add that we have the great fortune to have been able to build our own house, at which point I made sure we had plenty of closets and storage. In our old place, staying organized was much more difficult because we had so little place to store things. I'm very grateful for our storage here--closets, mud benches, cellar, etc. It helps me be much more organized!

 

[Marianne]

My DH seems to be getting more forgetful by leaps and bounds. He thinks he can't find things when he needs them unless they are out in plain sight. Even then he sometimes can't find what he is looking for. As a result, he tends to leave things scattered all over any surface that I don't claim for my own. He also buys the same thing over and over. So right now he has 7 pairs of glasses, three flashlights, 4 jars/cans full of ink pens and pencils, two stacks of unused note paper, pieces of mail dating back to 2007, about 30 little bits of paper with a name or address on them, various small tools, pieces of tubing, a fuse, two or three lip balms.....well, you get the picture, on the countertop where our phone is. If I touch anything, he immediately needs it, and then neither one of us can find it. This trait is getting so bad, it leaks over into every aspect of his life. The garage is hopelessly full and cluttered with "useful" items, as is the workshop, the spare bedroom, the basement. I think he is one dumpster away from being labeled a "hoarder." When he starts a project, he spends about half his time trying to find some necessary tool he misplaced. The other half of the time is spent re-measuring, re-reading, pondering, re-sanding, re-gluing, etc. Then he does the whole thing over again because it is not perfect. I have to say this is getting worse with age. I'm actually pretty worried about him. I think he needs a pill! Getting organized is only a distant dream!

Oh, I'm so sorry...and I had to chuckle a bit as I can relate to some of that. My DH puts some things away, but not where they're supposed to go. I have learned when I can't find something to look up. If there's a nail or screw up above, there's usually something unusual hanging on it. When we moved, I found all kinds of goodies tucked behind things on shelves in his office - including a small piece of trim that I had insisted I'd stained, urethaned and put on his desk so he could nail 'er up. His office was generally pretty tidy, but all the clutter was just hidden. :/

 

[Marianne]

I should add that we have the great fortune to have been able to build our own house, at which point I made sure we had plenty of closets and storage. In our old place, staying organized was much more difficult because we had so little place to store things. I'm very grateful for our storage here--closets, mud benches, cellar, etc. It helps me be much more organized!

I took a different approach in designing our floorplan. We came from a house that had limited storage/closets so I was used to the routine. This house doesn't have room size closets or a gigantic laundry room. I figured that if we had to have all that, then we had too much stuff! But we do have extra wide hallways, wide doors or no doors and room to do what we like to do. For example, I love to read, so we have a small library instead of another closet.

However, the shop is a completely different thing. Plenty of room but way too many future projects/supplies aka stuff and everyone in the family thinks I want to store their extra stuff. But I have dreams and hopes...

 

[me&thegals]

A library--awesome!

We have 4 of us, plus sometimes others, so we definitely wanted storage space.

Cellar: root veggies, canned goods, saucer, jars, wheat grinder, canning supplies, soap-making supplies, dehydrator, etc.
Utility room: packaging for farmer's market, CSA, fold chairs, extra fridge, guns, ammo, baking carts storing curing soap
Mud bench: boots, hats, gloves, shoes, rollerblades, skates
Hall closet: dishes, vases, pitchers, extra bags, etc.
Doors built into sloping wall in loft: all outgrown toys to be hauled out when little ones come over

We love our space but definitely need to go through it to get rid of the unnecessary things that creep in

 

[Joel_BC]

Thinking of bins...

I live in an area where there are a lot of people living SS, to varying degrees and in varying styles. There can be a heartening amount of cooperation here, what with people understanding each others lifestyles and general attitudes and needs.

On the other hand, I've noticed over time that people tend not to give up their good stuff to garage sales and second hand stores too much. Try to find milk crates anymore, sheesh! Or hydraulic "bottle" jacks, galvanized watering cans, decent snow shovels, or anvils! Our local populace soak up these sorts of things like a blotter absorbs ink.

The U.S. has ten times the population of Canada. There's a lot of good second-hand stuff on the other side of the border. But, since there can be complications with shipping things across the border, good outside sources like eBay can be a problem.

One thing I enjoy is going to garage sales in some of the larger western Canadian cities. Urban people discard some amazingly useful stuff, I'd say.

 

[me&thegals]

Our maintenance guy at work just gifted me a wooden desk drawer with hardware removed, handles cut out, now storing Legos in my loft instead of an old tattered cardboard box. Yay!