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Tag Archives: Organizing

Flea Market Finds: Vintage Storage

17 Tuesday Nov 2015

Posted by in Inspiration, Organizing, Our Etsy Store, Vintage

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234ShelfFull
260StandFar
285FirstAidSide
257IronstoneFront
311Box2
312Bucket
I spent the week organizing.  I tackled the upstairs storage room on Monday and gathered five bags of clothes and toys for donation.  I updated our kids’ clothes bins and organized items per child rather than per size.  I filled a giant Ikea bag with shoes and clothes of my own to bring to the consignment shop.  Dare and I worked on organizing the storage room at Josie’s school this morning.  I had hundreds of other things I should have been doing this week, but when my head is swirling with to do lists and I find myself up at 2 am despite a lack of newborns in the house, it is time for me to organize.  Editing, tiding and purging stuff totally clears my head.

I read Marie Kondo’s The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up a few months ago and of course loved it.  Marie uses a simple system to remove clutter and has clients keep only pieces that bring joy.  I totally agree.  I love her system.  We do not follow her advice perfectly, but when we do it makes daily life with three kids run much more smoothly.  My only hesitation with the book is that Marie does not mandate that the pieces used to store and stack be as beautiful as the items saved.  I think any large organizing job requires the right storage pieces.  If you are going to put in the effort to edit your belongings you should also extend this editing to your storage items.  We often use vintage pieces repurposed as storage.  My favorite trash cans are old enamel buckets.  We use a large wire bin to hold bath towels and antique pitchers to contain cooking tools on the kitchen counter.  I love storage that is beautiful, simple and useful.

The pieces pictured above are available in our Etsy Shop:

*Corner Spindle Shelf, perfect for plants in a kitchen or bath.

*Wicker Plant Stand, for a single pot.

*Green First Aid Box, great Band-Aid spot in the bathroom.

*Huge Antique Ironstone Urn, awesome umbrella stand.

*Vintage Tackle Box, art supply storage.

*White Enamel Pail and Lid, great as a small trash can.

 

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New Year’s Resolution: Organizing

09 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by in Organizing, Projects

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Armoire2Armoire1Armoire3
Armoire4
One of my resolutions this year is to finish projects, namely to organize things in order to make daily routines simple and more enjoyable.  I have had armoire scrawled on my list for quite some time now.  It is difficult to find the perfect armoire in the perfect size for the perfect price in this city.  We have found several that were beautiful, but too large to fit up and around the curve in our stairs.  We found several that were in another state and too large to put on top of the Volvo.  We found several that were really ugly/smelly/strange.  The reason we need an armoire upstairs is because we have a huge rolling rack with all of our clothes downstairs – in the dining room.  (Old houses like ours have little to no closet space).  We neglected to measure the rack before we purchased, strapped it around the Volvo and dragged it up a flight and a half of stairs only to be forced back down when it would not fit up and around the curve.  The rack has been in our dining room for over two years now.  (Did I mention that this is the year we are crossing projects off of our list?)  The above armoire was a $50 Craigslist score (thanks Leslie!), and set of matching hangers was $20 on Ebay.  This armoire does a great job housing the girls’ shoe, blankets, and clothes and has helped to simplify our morning routine.  The armoire is still not perfect – the front of a door has water damage.  We are going to have a carpenter fix the damage when he builds a custom armoire for adult clothes into our upstairs bedroom space.

The Ball Jar

11 Friday Oct 2013

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BallJar
Our house is full of rubber balls.  The girls love to drop them from the top of the stairs and watch them bounce and roll down the four floors.  It is annoying, not to mention treacherous to step on the remnants of the girls’ physics experiments on the bottom floors.  I decided to designate this Anchor Hocking Cracker Jar the official ‘Ball Jar’.  We got our cracker jar from Target for under $6.  Anchor Hocking still produces their glass products in the United States, as they have since 1905.  The girls are now in charge of rounding up their lost charges after the descent and herding them into the jar on Ada’s mantel.  The rubber balls look pretty and organized staring out of their glass windows.  (Pretty much anything looks beautiful when it is shown in multiples inside of a jar).   And we have hopefully all averted a trip to the emergency room.

Organizing

15 Thursday Aug 2013

Posted by in Organizing

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AsRoom1 AsRoom2 AsRoom3 AsRoom4 AsRoom5 AsRoom6
I can feel the season starting to change around here. It is cooler at night and the leaves are looking slightly less green.  The change always makes me feel like organizing, moving rooms around and moving out things we aren’t using any more.  The two big girls were at Nan and Pappy’s for the week and I took my time rearranging their room.  I moved toys to a shelf that Ada can reach on her own, and got rid of bags of broken and forgotten things.  (I LOVE that NYC is now recycling all hard plastics!)  Now the room feels more airy and they kids are excited to see toys they hadn’t played with for a while.  Here are a few of the things I try to do when I am organizing:

*Get the ugly out of sight.  I hate looking at ugly things.  It hurts me.  I am not kidding.

*Group like things together (all the blocks in one big box, etc)

*Rotate toys by storing some out of sight, and displaying others.  When the kids get bored with the first batch, rotate.

*Make sure everything has a spot.  If it doesn’t, find a spot or get rid of the thing.  Do not leave something in a place it does not belong.

*Try to have each room back to its organized state at bed time.  There is nothing worse than waking up to yesterday’s mess.  It is a pleasure to start the day with order.

*Do not keep something because you feel guilty about getting rid of it.  Your life will be better when you are not carrying around tons of things out of guilt.

*Leave some space around things.

*Live with only useful and beautiful things.  Get rid of the rest.

*Do not keep something because it may someday be useful.  Aside from really special heirlooms, if you haven’t used something in more than a year you do not need it.

*If it is difficult to clean your space, than your space is too cluttered.

*Do not buy ugly storage containers.  If you don’t want to look at plastic bins on your shelves, don’t come home with them.  If the storage container looks worse than the mess, it is not working.

*Life is too short to use ugly dishes, or cups, or toothbrushes…you get the idea.

*Purge!  It feels great!  I promise.

Sales!

13 Monday Feb 2012

Posted by in Likes, Organizing, Shop

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Hooray for End of Season Sales!  We recently got our Crewcuts order.  These red shoes are making me smile.  Both the former girl and shoe designer in me are in love with them.  This order won’t fit Ada for another year, but I love to stock up when the prices are good.  We store clothes in clear plastic bins, organized and labeled by size.  It is like having a full pantry.  Very satisfying.

Organize

09 Thursday Feb 2012

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The supplies in the art room were getting out of hand, so we made a trip to Ikea.  Lucky for me, we took a wrong turn into the kitchen section and discovered these wooden silverware caddies.

I like that two small trays can stack the width of the large tray.  Supplies for a specific project can be grouped and carried to another room.  They would also be perfect for small tools and house projects.  Ikea’s site is notorious for not allowing you to buy directly, so you will need to make a trip.  (You can also find them here, but they are more expensive).  Clear zippered pouches keep small supplies visible but contained.

We keep a square of floral oil cloth under Ada’s easel.  It wipes off with a sponge and the retro patterns are always so cheery.  Now I don’t spend so much of my precious time in the studio cleaning up after the kids.

Mitten Bowl

30 Monday Jan 2012

Posted by in Likes, Organizing, Projects, Shop, Vintage

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A bowl near the front door helps keep mittens, hats and scarves organized.  The kids can help take care of their own things when they come in from outside, and you will always know where mittens are on your rush out the door.

We found this vintage Pyrex bowl at a stoop sale, but they abound on Ebay.  The scarf pattern is adapted from one by Pat Feeley for High Country Knit Wear.  You can also find super cute animal scarves at Acorn Toys in Brooklyn if you are more of a shopper than a DIYer.

Cabinet

25 Wednesday Jan 2012

Posted by in Organizing, Vintage

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Vintage bowls, cups, flower pots and glasses are great organizers for the medicine cabinet.  I like to group things by when and how they are used: jewelry in one , nail polish and makeup in others.  It is easy to pull out each group as you need,  and the pretty containers make me happy when I open the door.

Barrettes

23 Monday Jan 2012

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Ada’s barrettes were taking over the closet, so we lined them up on a piece of ribbon and pinned it inside the door.  Smaller bobby pins and hair ties are stored in a bowl on the closet shelf.  Now we can see all the choices and pick out a pair for the morning.  I love that Goody still makes the same barrettes I had when I was three.

Family Portrait

18 Wednesday Jan 2012

Posted by in Likes, Organizing, Projects

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This drawing was Ada’s first family portrait, (which of course made me cry).  I wanted to save it and was pretty sure the ripped newsprint it was made on was not archival.  So, we scanned the drawing and sent the jpeg out to Cafe Press to be made into an ornament.  Any of the photo sites can reproduce jpegs, and there are a lot of finished product options- from t-shirts to playing cards.  Cafe Press got these back to us in under a week, and Ada was very proud to give them as gifts for the holiday.