S Felton's Mt Vernon Method of tackling a really full space is described at http://www.messies.com/get_started/mt_vernon_method/
Good luck!
Cx
Good luck!
Cx
My Dirty Little Secret - Coming clean!
- Thread starter monablu
- Start date
It is not that bad-just looks worse than you think. I am dealing with the same problem here. When we moved the second moving truck put everything in the basement. I guess thinking they could read would have helped--hubby was in charge. So now the basement is a huge mess of boxes to open and organize which means the upstairs is in total disarray.
My kids rooms are horrible with toys taking over other parts of the house. Not to mention my bedroom because I have just a tiny closet and wanted to do a whole wall of IKEA closets which I have yet to order due to wanting to paint the room first.
My advice to you is to buy a lot of clear plastic bins in different sizes. Then start in one tiny corner and seperate in the bins. Do one of different clothing-sweathers, pants, shirts. Just do a maybe 1/2 hour a day. Once you clean up one coset area-decide if your closet storage is working. Maybe it will be easier to have wire pull out shelves (IKEA online is great for all sorts of storage)they have good boxes with see thru fronts. Maybe you have to space to do a whole IKEA PAX wardrobe system which will then give you seperate closets for everything. I had one closet 2 rails for shirts, one for pants and jeans and one for dresses, then the other one was for nightgowns and misc. I was so organized with my IKEA-which is now in the basement for future toy storage-but to me that worked more than anything in 20+ years. As you fill up a bin and will rehang everything up very nicely--decide if there are things you want to give away to a thrift store or consignment. It may amaze you that there are things you don't need and you will have room for all the treasures you love. Do you have the space that you can make one room your closet, storage room? My sister in law took a extra bedroom and made it a closet room-shelves and rods on all 4 walls, she then turned her bedroom closet into a open desk area. It looks pretty good. Now she only has one room to put the clothes, ect. in and her house is spotless. I think getting rid of all boxes and getting the plastic clear shoe bins are great. It is not that your place is a mess, it is just unorganized which overwhelms us all. I know how it is to not know where to start then get totally frustrated and it seems you make a bigger mess then you first had. I think Real Simple magazine has some organizer books which give good hints on storage. Start with baby steps and it will come together but do check out IKEA online they might have a store in your area. They deliver at a good price, the more you order the cheaper the shipping. Good luck and it is not that bad.
Hugs.
My kids rooms are horrible with toys taking over other parts of the house. Not to mention my bedroom because I have just a tiny closet and wanted to do a whole wall of IKEA closets which I have yet to order due to wanting to paint the room first.
My advice to you is to buy a lot of clear plastic bins in different sizes. Then start in one tiny corner and seperate in the bins. Do one of different clothing-sweathers, pants, shirts. Just do a maybe 1/2 hour a day. Once you clean up one coset area-decide if your closet storage is working. Maybe it will be easier to have wire pull out shelves (IKEA online is great for all sorts of storage)they have good boxes with see thru fronts. Maybe you have to space to do a whole IKEA PAX wardrobe system which will then give you seperate closets for everything. I had one closet 2 rails for shirts, one for pants and jeans and one for dresses, then the other one was for nightgowns and misc. I was so organized with my IKEA-which is now in the basement for future toy storage-but to me that worked more than anything in 20+ years. As you fill up a bin and will rehang everything up very nicely--decide if there are things you want to give away to a thrift store or consignment. It may amaze you that there are things you don't need and you will have room for all the treasures you love. Do you have the space that you can make one room your closet, storage room? My sister in law took a extra bedroom and made it a closet room-shelves and rods on all 4 walls, she then turned her bedroom closet into a open desk area. It looks pretty good. Now she only has one room to put the clothes, ect. in and her house is spotless. I think getting rid of all boxes and getting the plastic clear shoe bins are great. It is not that your place is a mess, it is just unorganized which overwhelms us all. I know how it is to not know where to start then get totally frustrated and it seems you make a bigger mess then you first had. I think Real Simple magazine has some organizer books which give good hints on storage. Start with baby steps and it will come together but do check out IKEA online they might have a store in your area. They deliver at a good price, the more you order the cheaper the shipping. Good luck and it is not that bad.
Hugs.
Another hint: I did my kids closets with great wood hangers from Hangers.com. The clothes hang better with all matching hangers and I seem to feel there is more room in their closets. I think the tools to make the closets/storage area work are the starting point.
I don't want you to feel bad and congrats for sharing pic's. I throw too much away. My neighbor says she I have the best junk ever!
gillianna said:
I
matching hangers!! My family thinks I weird, but I like the way it looks when they are all the same color & shape.Monablu...I feel your pain!! When I feel so overwhelmed, I just don't know where to start. I wish that I could give you some pointers, but I am not so good at organizing. :shame:
Mona, you're too cute! What I would do is completely empty out the room you plan to make your closet. Visualize how you'd like the dressing room/closet to look. I would do one section at a time. Clothes, shoes, bags, accessories, etc. Anything you can part with donate/garage sale. You may want to have a professional install extra shelves/racks in the room. You can have shelves for your books, shoes. Just think how fabulous this can turn out. Maybe even sketch down ideas.
The worst part is getting started. Now I am not saying I am Miss Clean (ask Vlad, I am awful), but I know how annoying it gets when things are not picked up all the time. so it does not look great- but I am sure it just bothers you more that you live in it everyday! I always put off cleaning until the last minute, but I make sure that when I do it, I do it well. I completely take everything away and sort through it all. Even if you only go section by section, try to completely go through it all so you can get rid of things you don't need! We all have faith!
wow this looks so FUN! i say that, because all those pictures you posted, was MY ROOM about 6 months ago. my closet was completely unaccessible and if anything, was overflowing with pure CRAP that i could not for the life of me, part out with. My bed was up on a wall and i felt cornered everytime I came in..
watching enough of Mission: Organization, I motivated myself enough to get my room in order and went underway.. I threw out a LOT (and i mean.. like, 50-100 lbs of paper, trash, etc) of old stuff, and donated probably over $1,000 of clothes to goodwill (which is maybe about 6-8 huge trash bags full of clothes) that i no longer wore, and childhood clothes too.
I had a ton of fun (and frustration) doing it, but the end result is completely satisfying, and now i'm in zen mode whenever i go in my room!
if you need help putting plans into actions, let me know! I'd LOVE to help out... think of me of a Monica Geller (from FRIENDS tv), but not as psycho. haha. And I agree with Megs, totally do it section to section.. like, do just clothes first, cuz those are easier to part with (IMO - old or outdated, no longer fits, 'what was i thinking?' etc), then move on to papers (they require a lot of time to go through and make sure nothing has any personal information [credit cards, social security, etc] and is properly shredded or burned/thrown away), then lastly, knick-nacks, accessories, shoes, etc. reorganizing is MUCH EASIER done in sections.. so take each room, and section it off.
seriously, i love doing these things. i actually did it for some of my coworkers too. haha.
oh and completely emptying the room/area first would help, cuz you can put things back easier and makes for sorting easier.
have fun!
watching enough of Mission: Organization, I motivated myself enough to get my room in order and went underway.. I threw out a LOT (and i mean.. like, 50-100 lbs of paper, trash, etc) of old stuff, and donated probably over $1,000 of clothes to goodwill (which is maybe about 6-8 huge trash bags full of clothes) that i no longer wore, and childhood clothes too.
I had a ton of fun (and frustration) doing it, but the end result is completely satisfying, and now i'm in zen mode whenever i go in my room!
if you need help putting plans into actions, let me know! I'd LOVE to help out... think of me of a Monica Geller (from FRIENDS tv), but not as psycho. haha. And I agree with Megs, totally do it section to section.. like, do just clothes first, cuz those are easier to part with (IMO - old or outdated, no longer fits, 'what was i thinking?' etc), then move on to papers (they require a lot of time to go through and make sure nothing has any personal information [credit cards, social security, etc] and is properly shredded or burned/thrown away), then lastly, knick-nacks, accessories, shoes, etc. reorganizing is MUCH EASIER done in sections.. so take each room, and section it off.
seriously, i love doing these things. i actually did it for some of my coworkers too. haha.
oh and completely emptying the room/area first would help, cuz you can put things back easier and makes for sorting easier.
have fun!
gillianna said:Another hint: I did my kids closets with great wood hangers from Hangers.com. The clothes hang better with all matching hangers and I seem to feel there is more room in their closets. I think the tools to make the closets/storage area work are the starting point.
I actually have 2 boxes of 60 wooden hangers each, but they are under piles of shoes. Today I cleaned off one of my computer desks and found some fun stuff - my Confessions cd by madonna and a guess watch
terrible. It is so bad that I don't even have my housekeepers go in those particular rooms.
