Thrifty organizing!

Some days it seems like there is just not enough room for things, or no good place to put them. There sometimes is just a lot of things laying around. The kids have school papers, somehow they all end up on my desk. They have chargers for all their various gadgets. At this age there are a lot of gadgets! They are strewn about the house and yes on my desk again. Seems that even though I have a place for things they still can't find a pencil for their school work. I know I just sharpened a bunch and put them on their desk. It really is not just the kids, the husband seems to think it my desk is the dumping ground also. So I decided to do some organizing and putting away of things. I re-purpose things I have around the house, a lot of the things that you buy at the store can be pricey, so I find what works! For example:

This is the kids desk. It was a mess, papers, pencils, erasers, mp3 players. There was toys and what not, I couldn't even begin to remember, but you can imagine. So what I did is I added some baskets, I had them hiding in the closet. The big one is for their papers and binders. There are some computer games in there also. The one on the right side is very multipurpose. I have added some cups ( they get them at the school parties, we have soooo many) I have put pencils and pens in one ( now they will have to find another excuse for not doing homework) I have erasers, scissors and other things like that in the other. There is room for the gadgets they keep over there and it helps to be a catch all for all kinds of things. The pink and blue boxes are what they keep their DSI XL in. One for each kid. They were once their school pencil boxes. This way they keep track of all their stylus and things like that. I also have the chargers in the basket, I did something different for that.

I took an old check box. I covered it in construction paper and then labeled it. Now they know right where they belong!

All those extra school supplies and office supplies we keep on hand I keep in a kind of decorative trunk that was given to me I just stand it up and when I need it, everything is handy.

It sets by an old bookshelf that I found upstairs. It has been handy. The girls have to read AR books for school, and we have purchased some through book orders. I have an old clementine orange crate ( we purchased and ate the oranges and kept the crate so it was a twofer) that I stand the books in. When they forget one at school, they can find one to read for reading time. I keep extra glue and crayons as well as flash cards in an old floppy disk container.

As for my work area I have dual filing cabinets. What is neat about that is one can have the folders for bills and important papers, but you can leave out the filing system in the other for those things that don't fit the traditional way! I also make great use of the desktop with a cheap folder holder. It works to keep things organized and upright. I again have reused the little check boxes at the back of my desk for the little things and all my sticky notes, it keeps things confined and ready to find or move.


I hope all this was helpful for you, and I encourage everyone to look around for something that will help them to make their lives a bit easier. It doesn't have to cost a fortune, it just has to work!