The Dresser

Another organizing project.

A project about taking something murky and unconscious and bringing it into the land of intention, focus, usability and beauty.

Yep. All that.

This story begins when I was about 15. I stripped this dresser. I lost the hardware. Someone came along years behind me and added these rope pulls so it was functional again, at least.

I went away for many years. I forgot about the dresser.

Somehow, when I returned to the city I live in now and set up house with my husband, the dresser returned to me.

It sat in the basement, neglected, sad, crammed full of stuff.

The top drawer (of which I don't have a picture, naturally) was full of seasonal type decorations and artificial flowers.

The second drawer was full of wrapping paper supplies. It was the only drawer we actually used.

The third and fourth drawers had cords...electrical and telephone and audio-visual. There were coax and digital cables. Speaker wire. Adaptors, the list goes on. And on. Somehow, I only have a picture of one of the two drawers. Too bad. It was impressive.

The bottom drawer stored old book jackets, walkie talkies, and fax paper.

The really great thing about re-organizing a large space like the basement--and the laundry room within it--is that you have a chance to think about what you need. You have a chance to reinvent the way you do things if the old way isn't going to work any longer.

I had to move the dresser to make room for the paint cabinet--which was being moved to make room for a large wonkin' cabinet coming out of my husband's workshop--to make room for a bin he wanted to build to hold his wood.

But that meant the swimming gear would be homeless. I kept it in a plastic case on some wobbly wire shelving under this window.

 

I also needed a new home for those towels, too. I created it in my "Linen Closet" (which is actually just open shelving between the pantry and the upright freezer kitty corner from here) by removing and donating two huge old IKEA pillows.

 

 

So, when I thought about what I needed, I realised I wanted one of the dresser drawers to hold the swimming gear.

 

 

 

I had wrapping supplies in two places: this drawer and another, close to it's original location at the foot of the stairs. Since this dresser was moving, I wanted to put all the wrapping supplies in one place. 

 

 

 

When we cleared out the area under the stairs in order to insulate the wall and put up the wallboard, I discovered two boxes of my husband's old jeans. I had kept them as "patching material" for the jeans he wears to work. I went through them and kept only a few in the best of condition. And then, I put them in a drawer along with some sewing notions and tools stored in yet another place!

 

 

 

Finally, I went through all the cords and cables and chose to keep a few. They went into the bottom drawer.

 

But I wasn't quite done.

 

This piece was stripped more than 30 years ago. It sat in an outdoor shed for years. It's been in my basement at least 15 more. So, I cleaned and nourished it. I used 1/2 cup olive oil and 1/4 cup of lemon juice and an old tea towel. My dresser drank it thirstily.

 

Can you see where it has been cleaned and nourished? The bottom of this picture should look a smidge darker.

 

 

And so, here it is. All fed and spiffied up. Awake and intentionalised. Useful and beautiful.

 

Another post for the William Morris series hosted by Jules at Pancakes and French Fries.

 



The Bumpy Road

Some time in the last few months, I got the idea that I could organize every single nook and cranny of my home.

That doing so would mean several things:

1. There would be no more murkey corners crammed with half-forgotten things I wasn't sure about.
2. Everything would have a home.
3. I would know where everything was--and be able to find it!
4. Everything would be put away. No clutter!
5. There would be nothing we wouldn't use in the house. (Except for a very few sentimental items.)

But I don't believe I had any notion of how disruptive the path to this destination was going to be. I have several areas ripped apart, not just because it is more fun to start an organizing project than to finish it, (and it is) but because that's the process.

I think I have multiples of very cord known to man.

There were many, many more behind me.

 

1. Empty out the space to be organized.
2. Do a quick purge of the obvious useless.
3. Sort the remaining into piles.
4. Purge again
5. Put back only what you will be keeping.
6. When you put it back, containerize everything.
7. Admire.

I have no idea what I was trying to sort on this day!

But wait. We're not quite done.

1. Run around the house and put away the items which need a new home.
2. Empty the trash, the recycling, go to the Eco centre with the hazardous waste (or whatever you do where you live.)
3. Take the donations to the donation place.
4. Deal with the stuff you have decided to sell (if you are selling stuff).

OK, now admire.

I'm sorting and organizing jewellery on my dresser while my daughter's school work waits for me to sort it.

Except-- I have moved on to other areas already--several, in fact, and I could be anywhere in the process--and so on and so on until everything has spilled out everywhere.

But I can't dwell on that. I have been slowly putting things back together.

Everyday I get closer to destination Organization.
I just need to remember that!

(None of these are "before" pictures. They were all taken while I was organizing something.)

Organizing Drawers 2, 3, and 4.

I have fallen out of the habit of blogging regularily which means I have also fallen out of the habit of taking the proper pictures to tell the story.

My apologies.

I did a bona fide organizing project today and I am mighty proud of myself. I have been meaning to tackle these three drawers for a long time. They are dedicated to the "office" functions of the Dining room/Home Office. I also scrapbook in this room, work on my classes, and sew. (I used to also plan homeschooling here. Since we don't homeschool anymore, I've been able to clear some space!)

Today, I felt ready.

As part of the FUNdamentals Course at Simplify 101, for the past couple of weeks, I have been keeping track of what I use on different projects as I do them.

For example:
I had to write a cheque for someone and then deliver it to them. (Quite a rarity these days). I needed a long envelope and the cheque book. (Long envelopes are not always in the desk, but downstairs in the basement. That has changed.)

I was working on the budget.
Needed: printer, computer, paper, stapler, highlighters, calculator, rular, bulldog clips, and the files which hold our bills paid.

And so on and so forth. At first it seemed daunting, in the end, I realised that all I really need is:

Paper of different kinds for different purposes.
Envelopes
Cards and envelopes.
Folders
Labels (and a label "mini zone")
Office supplies: pens, pencils, erasers, pencil sharpener, highlighter, stapler, staples, paper clips, letter opener, stamps, address labels, etc. Mostof this stuff hangs out in Drawer 1.

And so I began.

At first, I thought I was only going to work on one drawer. So, this is my only before picture. Trust me. The other drawers looked just as bad.

Before: Drawer 2

Inside? Mostly paper. But so much and of such different kinds, I actually had to list it! Then, I sorted it: like with like. Then, I had to start on the other drawers because I knew I had stashed stuff everywhere willy nilly.

I decided to separate the piles into "paper" I used primarily with the computer, and paper I wouldn't. (Like graph paper and three ring lined notepaper.)

I discovered four packages of photo paper. One actually had nothing usable left in it, so that was easy to let go. But last week, I actually went to Staples and contemplated buying a package of 8 1/2 x 11 photo paper. I decided it was too expensive and that I would use the 4x6 pieces I bought when I bought my new printer.

Thank goodness!

I put paper for the computer in an upright magazine holder and it is now in the Expedit.

The other paper took some thinking. I realised I had some clear packaging I'd saved, knowing it should be good for something, and today it was! I put the loose paper--the 3 hole punched paper, the graph paper, and an 8x10 tablet of writing paper in the packaging--and then labeled the packages on the end. Postively perfect.

For the middle drawer, I decided I needed file tabs for my small collection of note cards. I'd been looking for a suitable birthday card, just this morning, and I'd had to thumb through practically every item. Irritating.

I need a better box than this old, cardboard tissue box. Of course, the boxes I use as drawers are even older. (I've had them 32 years. Can you believe it? That's what happens when something "temporary" works well. No wonder they are beginning to show their age!)

After, Drawer 3, now known as The Card Drawer.

There are a few files in behind for when I need to set one up. There are hundreds more in the basement. I decided to keep the notepads and magnetic tape, here, too. I put a strip of magnetic tape on the back of a notepad and stick it on the fridge for writing down the grocery list.

And finally, drawer 4.

After, Drawer 4, now known as the Label Drawer.

I decided to devote one entire drawer to the different materials and tools I use for labelling. Index cards, tags, peel and stick labels, post-it notes, etc. I need small organizing containers for inside the drawer to help things stay separate, but it's good for now. These items were scattered in several different places around the house.

Circling back to the second drawer: here it is, now.

After, Drawer 2, now known as the Paper Drawer

And there we have it.

I'm hoping that this will work for a very long time.

(If you are wondering about drawer 1, I organized it here, about a year ago, while enduring the blue screen of death and facing my fears. It's still set up the same way, more or less.)

Curing, Cleaning and Organizing: and a Project!

A dear friend and blog reader recently asked me if I was going to Spring Clean this year. For the past few years, I've taken on a two month project, modelled after the Cure by Apartment Therapy founder Maxwell Gillingham-Ryan.

I have been organizing my basement while also taking Aby Garvey's workshop, The Fundamentals of Getting Organized. (I'm also taking two scrapbook classes, so to say I'm keeping busy would be an understatement.)

So, without officially saying no, I have decided that it is doubtful I will be doing any Spring Cleaning, per se.

Nonetheless, it feels sort of like I already am.

The cure is structured around spending one week in one room of your house or apartment. (There are actually two Cures, as Gillingham-Ryam writes in his book of the same name. I'm talking about the "Whole House" version.) During that week, you not only clean, but repair broken things and assess how well the room is working for you. The latter, for me, is what is meant by "organizing." Do you have what you need where you need it to get the job done in this room? The "Spring Cleaning Cure" was an oppurtunity I took every year to do this assessment, clean the heck out of everything, and usually slap a coat of paint on something.

And, I'm doing that. But not, so far, in any methodical way. It is also important to me to do that, once a year. Check all the systems. Make sure everything is working the way it should. One thing that is most definitely NOT working is our closet in the Master bedroom. Yesterday, I finally did something about it.

Yesterday, I finally hung a new light in our Master Bedroom closet.

The original light in the closet was a long cord rigged up to a light socket with a pull chain. Someone had installed a hook in the ceiling and tied it up. The cord, however, ran through the ducts to my daughter's room at the other end of the house and plugged into one of her sockets. Why?

The light stopped working, I am ashamed to say, probably more than a year ago. But with only one pair of pants to my name and a couple of sweater coats which I kept in the closet, I didn't care.

But, I now have four pairs of jeans or so and only a few fit, but I couldn't find them in the dark closet. (Losing weight means hanging on to different sizes so you always have at least one pair to wear!)

I found this very cute lamp at the As Is department of IKEA last weekend.

It needed a part which my husband made for me.

Then, of course, I had to drill in a dark closet!

First, the wood into the wall (with anchors).

Then, the lamp into the wood.

But it worked. I elected to install the lamp up above the door so the glare from the light won't blind us. The shadows cast when I stand in front of it are fine.

Hubs said it was a "smart idea." That's high praise from that man!
Now, of course, I'm going to clean out this closet--and ask him to get rid of stuff--right after he drills me a hole through the wall to an outlet in our room.

Yes, the closet is yellow. And though I like the colour, you can't imagine how much I am itching to paint that baby white!

Basement Progress

I haven't been down there in a week.

Not even to do laundry.

My husband and my son were busy down there last week, building the framing, putting up the insulation and vapour barrier--and then the wallboard.

It is hard to see--and my husband doesn't stage anything for pictures, but they worked on this area under the stairs:

unfortunately, we had some insulation left over.

and came out the other side (in the new "games room")

and went around the corner for a bit.

That's what my husband intended to get done. He's quite happy.

My husband and I will finish up this wall in the last week of April. It continues on behind the shelves.

Now, we need to wash and paint these walls...and put back everything that came out from under the stairs!

Shuffle, shuffle, ball change....

The dance of the basement purge and shuffle continues!

Exactly one month ago, tomorrow, we moved my son out of the main area of the basement.

Tomorrow, we move him back!

When we set up this little area by the furnace, we knew it had to happen at some point. This adjoins the stairs and is the remaining half of the wall which needs to be patched and insulated.

But I could not have done anywhere near the amount of purging and sorting I have done if he had remained. I needed the space to work!

Remember the binders?

Here's what's left:

And, there's one final box of notebooks and workbooks to go through:

This table was full of memorabilia--papers, ticket stubs, receipts, the kids' artwork (boxes and tubs and a suitcase full of the kids' artwork!) postcards, and so on and so on....

I am now left with this:

Still a monster--but I can see the end!
I pulled all my cards and letters together from before I was married.

It took several sessions, but I weeded it down. More importantly, I feel like I closed a few chapters of my life. I was 33 when I got married--and I had done a lot of living before settling down. And I mean a lot! Confronting the stuff meant confronting my feelings. One boyfriend in particular--getting rid of the small amount of things I had from him felt like, finally, finally, letting go of him and all the regrets I have had over the years.

It was incredibly healing.

 

I still want to go through all of these picture frames and decide what to keep and what to toss:

I want to re-do my gallery wall in the living room with a mix of thrift store paintings and photographs I've taken of mountain scenery while on vacation. I have no idea which, if any, of these frames I ought to keep for that project.

Now, I should probably stop here, BUT I am going to treat you to a tour.

From left to right, from the bottom of the stairs. The curtains arepulled across the wall of shelves.

I am standing at the bottom of the stairs looking at the wall of shelves (with the curtains closed).

Now, looking into the corner.


Lastly, I'm the bottom of the stairs, looking straight ahead.

Incidentally, those boxes under the table are empty.

Looking straight at the shelves:

Looking at the shelves, curtains open.

Standing at the shelves looking back at the workshop. (Yes, we took down the makeshift wall behind the black plastic shelves. So much more light!)

It may not look this good again for months.

On Sunday, we will start pulling everything out from under the stairs in order to insulate. I will have to shift my focus and deal with all the stuff coming out of there!