Junk drawers. A necessary evil made to contain the chaos in our daily lives.  We all have them, and they are nothing to be ashamed of.  But even junk drawers can be organized. I believe hiding our knick-knacks is key to a clutter-free kitchen, office, bathroom, craft area, or hallway.  No one wants to look at safety pins and scotch tape lying about right?  Drawer organizers play a huge part in my junk drawer organization efforts.  I say “efforts” because my many, many, MANY junk drawers throughout the house have a lot of work yet to be done to them.  Bigger compartments are best as catch-alls to stray hair ties and lint rollers, disposable wooden chopsticks and birthday candles.

So here’s the confession part…  I peek into people’s junk drawers sometimes.

“What?!?!  That’s so rude and intrusive!”

Yup. I know.  And they say a lot about the family and what happens in their lives.  That’s why I have a slight obsession with them.  I love the contents of junk drawers.  I don’t do it to be rude or to judge!  I do it to get a raw glimpse into the people’s lives within that house. Besides, I have no place to judge because some of my personal junk drawers are crazy disorganized.

My house has not one, but several junk drawers.  2 in the kitchen, a tower of 8 “junk” drawers for crafting stuff and 2 for pens and other stationery items in a bureau by the front door.

I recently organized a few drawers just as a refresher.  Divide and conquer is my thought process. I got a trash bin and just started chucking useless shit.

Dead batteries, un-rubbery rubber bands, scraps of paper with illegible e-mails scribbled on them, an entire set of dried out markers, rusty picture hanging nails, an unused roll of double stick tape that didn’t stick on either side…  You get the gist.  I filled that trash bin to the brim!  I found a crab claw cracker and little picks to pull out the crab meat that we have used… never.

Actually, now that I’m writing this, is any ‘top drawer’ in my house NOT a junk drawer? Why do we have so much stuff?  I welcome you to come over and take a look in our junk drawers.  What will you find?  What discoveries about our lives are hidden within them?

Hopefully a well curated and meaningfully collected mish-mash of junk which tells the story of our daily lives.

-K

In my dream scenario, I have a craft room with a locking door.

I’m a DIY, crafty type and I have crafting supplies coming out of my ears.  My husband calls me, “grandma,” whenever I bust out a knitting project on long drives and plane flights, or when the sewing machine gets pulled out to whip up some silly project I found on Pinterest.

Right now, I admit that my crafting stuff has found it’s way to various baskets and bins throughout our house and garage.  It’s all organized, but lackluster in space function.  I want it all in one accessible locale but the sheer volume of crap I own makes that impossible.  I do quite a bit of obsessing over how I will organize it all in the new house.  I already have a few ideas in mind, but find myself late-nights scouring the internet for more.  Hmmm, “how to organize and hide tons of craft shit in a small space?”  Hit Enter.

Our 3rd floor mezzanine is designed as a small flex space that lives above our new kitchen and is open to the living room below.  I fully intend on making this space mine, all mine.  If my husband thinks his home office is going up there, he needs to fight me for it, because I have every intention of making it mommy central. Besides, he runs a construction business!  No legit business should be run out of a craft room!  How professional would it be to look over plans whilst pushing aside knitting needles and gift wrap?  The entirety of my lovely collection of yarn balls and fabric scraps, 20+ pairs of scissors/cutting tools, my sewing machine, pens and paper stash will be organized (somehow) to a tee.  He better just be grateful that it’s all going to be up there in one place and that I’m not proposing to take over the guest bedroom… though that may be a good idea?…  It will have a privacy lock on that door…

No.  Focus.  The husband needs to get his own office elsewhere. I’m dreaming up my craft area on the darn mezzanine.  No more of this going out to the garage for the sewing machine, then back to this drawer for my rotary cutting tool, then reaching up onto that shelf in the closet for the cutting mat and back to the garage for the fabric bin.  Then cramming it all onto the dining table, kitchen counter and living room floor to make -whatever project I’m making.

In the new house, my crazy projects can be contained to one floor.  My little mezzanine crafting floor!  It may not have a locking door, but I can still hide up there and be my nerdy, crafty self without disrupting the rest of the house.

Claim, then design your nerd space.  Put a coffee machine in it, then get crafty.

-K

When it comes to countertops in a bathroom, less is more.  That thing we all do when guests come over, you know, the mad rush to hide everything in random drawers…  That should actually happen every day.  Just without the mad rush part.

There really is no need for anything on the counter but the pretty essentials.  Soap and a hand towel.  Maybe a candle.  If you can hide the make-up and shaving cream for the guests, it should be done on a daily basis.  A few organizational tools is all you need,  I personally love little plastic bins in drawers.  Clear lucite ones are nice.  Toothpaste tubes and hairy razors are not decor.  A pretty perfume bottle next to a candle or a glass canister of cotton balls is decor.  Hide what is ugly yet necessary and your bathroom will look more spa-like and less utilitarian toilet room…

I’d personally would rather keep my most personal things hidden.

-K