You know what I love to see? So many of the participants for last month’s round-up used my PROCESS steps to get their drawers organized. Yay! Everyone did such a great job and it was so hard to pick just one winner. Really I have no idea why I do this to myself :)
Thank you to everyone who joined in the fun and I do hope you found the PROCESS steps to be helpful and easy to use.
I picked Crystal this month not only because she followed the PROCESS steps beautifully when organizing her two drawers but also because she gave me such a great quick fix tip for problematic sliding baskets. She suggests using zip ties to tie them all together to keep them from going all over the place. Now why didn’t I think of that? So brilliant! Be sure to visit Crystal and check out her new drawers :)
Unfortunately I’m going to have to cancel the round-up for the next two months due to my family situation requiring a little more of my time. Please accept my apologies but don’t you worry because in the new year I hope to offer you more fun organizing challenges of some kind. If you’ve got any ideas I’d love to hear them.
The other day I showed you how I store my gift bags, wrap and cards in my gift closet. In case you don’t happen to have an available closet, I wanted to show you some other alternatives that I’ve found that may be helpful to you as you set up a system that works for you. The most important thing to remember, even if you don’t have a fancy dancy organizer, is to consolidate all of your supplies into one area. This makes it easy to see what you have, what you need and saves time because you don’t need to run all over the house looking for everything.
Let’s recap:
* Gather your supplies
* Consolidate supplies (discard the unused or unwanted items and organize the remaining)
* Containerize supplies
Won’t take you any time at all :)
Here are some examples of storage containers designed specifically for the purpose of creating a gift wrap station. Prices vary.
Don’t forget to take a look around your house to see what could be re-purposed. Love this idea for converting an old change table. Instructions here.
I also think those plastic drawers on wheels would work great for this purpose as well. This fabulous gift wrapping post over at Serene Journey shows you a great example of what I mean.
Now go get gathering, consolidating and containerizing. Sorry couldn’t help myself, I just had to say those words again. They make me happy. Try it, say them out loud with me.
When the going gets tough, I get organizing. It’s what I do to zone out and not think about anything else. It works amazingly well. The payoff at the end is awesome and it helps me to feel more in control when things around me might not necessarily be so. I’ve been wanting to tackle my gift closet for awhile because I knew I was going to run out of room to shove things in pretty soon :)
This armoire use to be used as my bedroom closet in my old house. When we moved into our new home 5 years ago and found ourselves with plenty of closet space in our bedroom, I moved the armoire into my office where there is no closet. It now serves many functions but the biggest one occurs around the holidays when I need somewhere to stash gifts for family and friends.
This is what it looked like last week:
And now it looks like this:
As you can see I finally had a chance to get everything out of the plastic bags and into some kind of order.
The two white drawers on the bottom shelf hold wrap and tissue paper in one drawer and party supplies in the other. The other tote beside it holds our warranties and manuals and above that is the tote I use for my occasion cards. The brown bag on the other side holds all my extra gift bags inside.
The two baskets on the middle shelf hold gifts I’ve found on sale and already purchased.
You’ll notice I’ve added two cardboard boxes to the top shelf. That’s because those are gifts that need to be mailed away. As I complete the list of things I need to purchase to send off I can continue to add them to the correct box. This allows me to keep everything going to one place contained and organized in the meantime. Then once I mail off those parcels, that will free up space for me to store my own family’s gifts.
How do I keep track of gifts purchased?
I use a simple notebook that I use year after year. Each year I write the new year at the top of a blank page and then write the names of all the people I will need to buy gifts for including birthdays and Christmas. As I purchase items I mark what was purchased into my notebook so I have a running list of what was bought and still needs to be bought. This system has worked well for me for years. It’s easy to use, I can bring the notebook with me shopping if I need to and it keeps me from buying duplicates as I can easily look to see what I purchased in previous years. Not only do I not want to rely on this brain of mine to just remember that kind of stuff but by writing it down I am freeing up all kinds of mental clutter. Awesome!
Hopefully this helps someone with their own gift space. Even if you don’t have an armoire you can use, maybe you can free up some closet space somewhere else, space under a bed or even the attic to consolidate and organize all your gifts into one place. If that’s not possible then even getting a big box for a corner of your bedroom will work. Just make sure to put a big KEEP OUT sign on it :)
Thank you so much for all the uplifting and encouraging comments so many of you left for me on this post. I have read them over and over and am so thankful to have so many supportive friends in real life and in blogland. We are hanging in there, taking one day at a time. I’m so sorry that so many of you are also experiencing something similar. It’s so sad and I pray things turn around soon.
Now more than ever we will need to get tight with our grocery budget so I’ll be actively looking for ways to do just that. First and foremost I’ll be trying to use up stock from the pantry and freezer because you never know if moving is right around the corner for us. So this week’s menu is designed around what we have in the house to use up.
The Apple Cinnamon Pork Tenderloin didn’t really work out for me last week. I had no idea what cooking apples were so just used some Gala apples that we had in the house. They didn’t create any juice at all. Once I added some apple juice though it turned out okay but I’m not sure I’d make it again.
For those that don’t know who Stephanie is, she is the one who runs the fabulous A Year of Slow Cooking blog. Last year she committed to using her slow cooker every day for the entire year. Some of her recipes we’ve tried and enjoyed from her site in the past are Salsa Chicken and Black Bean Soup and Brown Sugar Chicken, both of which are also in the cookbook. So many great slow cooker recipes all in one place, super easy too and as a side note Stephanie’s recipes are also gluten free for those following a gluten free diet as I do with my son.
The only downfall of the book is that there are no pictures included but Stephanie’s reasoning behind that was to keep the cost of the book down. It retails for only $14.99 and includes over 300 recipes! Stephanie has pictures on her website though of many of the dishes if you like to see a picture of the finished product. I definitely think this book would make a terrific Christmas gift!
Okay, on my menu this week:
Monday:Oven Chicken Fingers served with french fries and veggies (missed from last week)
Alrighty it’s time to show off your drawers. Don’t be afraid, you’re among friends :)
Haven’t organized your drawer yet? No problem, you still have time. I’ll leave this round-up open until Wednesday, November 4th at 9:00 pm PST for you to link up. Need some inspiration? Check out my post on Organizing a Junk Drawer.
The Ultimate To-Do List Pack | Home & Family Edition contains more than 250 To-Do Lists, Schedules, Planners & Organizers. With these easy-to-use lists you can overcome the chaos and overwhelm of a busy home and family life – and restore order and harmony.
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The lists are all beautifully laid out in a fully interactive PDF. You can simply print and use or you can enter text on screen, save, print and re-use. The choice is yours.
I’ll be looking for someone that actively followed the PROCESS steps to tackle their project and includes both before and after pictures in their post. Also please be kind and link directly to your drawer post and not to your home page to make it easier for us to find the link in the future.
More details about past round-ups can be found here.
Yesterday, along with 500 other families, we were dealt the devastating news that as of the end of January my husband will be without work. We live in a very small community so news of this magnitude will be felt by the entire town. It is so hard to comprehend. When I sat my kids down to tell them I had bad news, my daughter immediately asked “did someone die?”. And right there the hand of perspective is dealt because while this job loss will be far reaching and painful, no one died. Not this time. We will get through this, that I have no doubt, and I draw strength from a God that provides hope in all circumstances.
There is no sense worrying about what we cannot control. What I do have some control over though is my gift closet. It’s gotten a little out of hand as I’ve started to prepare for Christmas and needs a bit of an overhaul. Today I welcome the distraction it provides. I’ll post the after pictures for you tomorrow.
PS: I’ll also be posting the Mr. Linky for Org Junkie’s Monthly Round-Up tomorrow. How are your drawers looking?
I recently had the pleasure of collaborating with one of my favorite organizer friends on a special project near and dear to my heart. Find out what it’s all about and how you can enter to win a chance to get organized for the holidays once and for all by visiting me over here!
Did you get a chance to check out all the delicious appetizer recipes? Oh my was it hard to choose just one recipe for my potluck but I did AND I was not disappointed either. This recipe combined cheese, roasted garlic and bread, a combination that got my mouth watering just thinking about it. The winning entry is #32 – Lori of Not The Mother of The Year for her Roasted Garlic Brie in Bread recipe!!! Boy how I wish I had a picture to share with you all but we actually didn’t get around to eating it until about 1:00 in the morning and then we absolutely devoured it in about 10 seconds flat. It went over really really well :) Thanks Lori for making me shine!
So next on my list of exciting things to tell you is the recipe highlight of last week. My entire family LOVED the Ham-Noodle Bake. It was easy to prepare and it had a nice little kick to it due to the added horseradish.
How about you? Any recipe highlights from last week?
