We used to leave our cell phone (and other) chargers out on the kitchen counter. Drove me bonkers. I finally found a solution that has made a big difference, and it was so simple! You can read about it over at A Brooklyn Limestone, as part of her Junk Drawer Overhaul series.

© 2011, published by Making it Lovely as Charge! | 24 comments

Obviously I have such a hodgepodge of items that a symmetrical layout isn’t an option for me (though I do love symmetry). I work around that by making sure that the overall layout is visually balanced. For example, see that open lattice-work square in the bottom left? That gets balanced out by the votive holders on the right middle shelf and the scallops of the vintage cake stand on the top left.

I add all the little bits and bobbins that I love at the end. Admittedly they can make the arrangement a little cluttered, so I do edit them down some. Not all of my pieces made it back in, but I tend to rearrange things often so they’ll be back next time.

I love having the built-in hutch to display everything. I wasn’t so sure about it when we moved in, but I’ve since embraced it. I’m still undecided about the beadboard (paint it or leave it natural?), but I’m going to live with it for a while before I choose. It ties in the wood floors and our wood dining set, and the contrast is nice with all of the white. I’ve pinned fabric to the back many times before, so that’s always an option as well. Besides, closing the doors gives the whole thing a bit more polish. Doesn’t everything always look better behind glass?

© 2010, published by Making it Lovely as Arranging a Collection | 43 comments

Organizing the catch-all closet in my office was one of the tasks on my 30 Before Thirty list (item number 12).

It’s hard to tell, but one of those bookshelves was already there along the back of the closet. I put it against the right side instead and brought up one more from the basement. All of my copies of Lucky and Blueprint (along with a few other magazines and catalogs) fit along one shelf.

Winter gloves, hats, and scarves are in the pink box on top of the bookshelf. There are also hooks above the shelves to hang a few things.

I gathered my many IKEA shopping bags into one big bag (the red one), and corralled the rolls of vintage wallpaper into a big plastic container. The green and white bag holds some random decorative knickknacks.

The coats are still hung along the left wall, along with my wedding dress at the back.

The end result isn’t as pretty as my bedroom closet, but it’s so much better than it was. I didn’t spend any money either, though I would have liked to have all new, coordinating storage boxes. Some day I do plan to replace that bare light bulb, but that can wait for now.

Have you tackled any similar projects lately (or are you going to now)? It’s not fun while you’re in the middle of working, but it’s so nice when you’re done!

© 2010, published by Making it Lovely as My Organized Office Closet | 53 comments

Still, the closet is looking so much better already from using the organizational odds and ends that I already had. Here’s a little inspiration though to check out while I continue working… How gorgeous are these Stockholm files? Lovely.

© 2010, published by Making it Lovely as Still Organizing the Closet | 19 comments

Notable contents:

• giant styrofoam ball
• argyle dog sweater vest
• every issue of Domino and Blueprint
• IKEA catalogs dating back to 2002
• five rolls of vintage wallpaper
• acoustic guitar
• my wedding dress
• empty boxes to be recycled
• embroidered Serge Gainsbourg pillow
• vintage 50s fur coat that was given to me over a decade ago but that I have never, ever worn and probably never will because I feel weird in it

© 2010, published by Making it Lovely as I’m Going In | 68 comments

I know many people keep their discs in binders or just go completely digital, but CD sleeves work best for us. Yes, we’ve imported a lot of our music into iTunes, but there is something to be said for being able to grab an obscure CD and pop it into the stereo rather than having to update a playlist and resync the iPod.

Organizing our collection this way allows for easy expansion while still keeping it all alphabetical. We also like that we can keep a handful of discs by the stereo safe in their sleeves, rather than having them sit out unprotected as they would be had we grabbed them from a binder. We ordered from JewelSleeve after Ana mentioned them when I asked for CD storage advice. Brandon and I love that the sleeves can hold the booklet and the tray card, leaving the spine with the artist and album title visible for easy browsing. If you’re looking for CD sleeves, I highly recommend them!

We’re storing all of our CDs, DVDs, and video games (we have a lot of media) in three hopen drawer units in Brandon’s office.

They look great and they’re working well for us, but I do have one complaint; the drawers don’t open fully and it’s hard to see what’s at the back. To counteract this, we placed blocks at the back to push the CDs forward. The blocks are made of 5″ wide boards of thick foam-core (available in craft stores), stacked up to make 3″ tall blocks. Then I cut single strips of thin foam-core to separate each row of CDs, keeping our rows nice and neat.

The random stacks of CDs that we didn’t have room for are gone now. All of our discs (1500 or so) fit nicely into four drawers, and it feels so good to have solved one of our biggest storage dilemmas.

© 2010, published by Making it Lovely as CD Storage and Organization | 66 comments

I tried to make the other side of the sink cute too. The green soap dispenser is for hand soap, and the olive oil bottle is for dish soap.

The green one is great but the other isn’t working out as well. I liked the look of it much more than any actual dispensers I had seen, so I thought I was being very clever when I bought it. When I tried to use it though, I realized I’d have to dilute the soap considerably for it to pour through the spout. Oh well. At least I tried, right?

© 2010, published by Making it Lovely as Cutest Dish Rack Ever | 115 comments

The great CD/DVD Organization of 2009 has begun. I have built the frames for two of these so far, but we may go with three.

© 2009, published by Making it Lovely as Needs Assembly | 13 comments

As I had mentioned, we’re not ready to go 100% digital. We’re probably about 40% there… Brandon has 34 GB of music on his computer, and I have another 22GB on mine. We do have most of the music we currently listen to on our computers, but we still play CDs all the time. And Brandon is a movie person. I think I have 10 or 15 DVDs, but Brandon has about 700. PLUS video games. Here’s where they’re all stored:

Those are Billy bookcases with doors in Brandon’s office, but we’ve filled them to capacity. Overfilled them, actually. And we don’t have any more room in our house for additional storage… unless we can use the dead space under the stairs leading to the second floor. The room looked like this when we moved in:

We just lined up the bookcases to block that big open space. If we got a couple of media cabinets from Can-Am though, I think we could install them so they seem built-in.

Brandon and I are both crazy about the way Rearranged Design stored their CDs. If we get the same CD sleeves and these DVD sleeves, we could fit everything into one tidy space. The only problem? This will not be an inexpensive undertaking. BUT…

• The CD sleeves show the spine of each CD insert, so they’re still browsable.
• The DVD sleeves hold the covers without cutting or folding them, and they hold two discs.
• This setup would solve our storage problem and we’d still have room to grow.
• Alphabetization would be easier to maintain with sleeves than with a binder.
• Taking out a few CDs at a time with their corresponding sleeves seems easier than grabbing a bunch of loose discs from several different binders.
• The cabinets have a safety feature to prevent toppling by only allowing one drawer to be pulled out at a time. Brandon was almost crushed by a filing cabinet once, so he’s all too familiar with the danger. We will soon have a curious toddler, so this feature is a big plus for us.
• The drawers can be locked. Again, with a curious toddler on the way this is another big plus.
• We could FREE UP SOME SPACE in the rest of the house.

Now we’re just trying to decide if we want to tackle this whole project at once, or if we should do it in phases. We could start with the CDs first, storing them in boxes that we already have. And when we move on to the DVDs (and outgrow the boxes), we could find an affordable dresser instead of the cabinets to save money. Or do we just spring for it all now? It’s a little crazy, but it would be so nice after it’s finished.

© 2009, published by Making it Lovely as Our Possible CD/DVD Storage Solution | 27 comments

Right now, we have most of our CDs in the five BENNO towers that are in my office to the left and right of my EXPEDIT. We also have several hundred more in my office closet though, and in the stacks and stacks that seem to accumulate throughout the house.

We need to condense our music library, but we’re not ready to go 100% digital. These Semikolon boxes look really nice, but I think we’d need too many. Plus, I already have a million IKEA KASSETT boxes in pink (which seems to be a discontinued color), so I could just use those. Maybe if we transfered all of the CDs into paper sleeves that would make boxes more of a practical option? Or these CD/booklet display sleeves so we can store the liner notes too? Or maybe the CD binder route would be better — I think that’s what Brandon wants.

How do you store your music? Or have you guys gone completely digital? And while we’re at it, what about DVDs and video games? ‘Cause we’ve run out of space for those too.

© 2009, published by Making it Lovely as CD Storage? | 175 comments