An Organization Project That Has Had Staying Power!

Now, as you scroll down, don't you go calling me a hoarder.

Here's a repost of an organizing project I did a year ago...that amazingly has had staying power. Just take a look at the "after" photos, one from January 2011 and the second taken yesterday, at the end of this post.

This is a hall closet where all the games are stored, along with sewing, painting and wrapping supplies, small tools, scissors, tape, pens, cards and just about every other little item you find yourself needing on a daily basis. With a minimum of harassment from me, the rest of the family has cooperated and learned to RETURN an item to where it belongs after using: The key to any organizing project having lasting results I've discovered.

The disaster from a year ago...

Not too bad. I approached this project by getting two large boxes to fill with any items worth donating, garbage bags for anything that should have been tossed a while ago, wicker baskets for storage and a lot of Ziploc bags.

This pile of random items is what was in front of the bins, the actual content hidden away inside the bins were emptied and sorted through later! Where did that lamp shade come from? This closet is deep and I was amazed at the amount of stuff our family had managed to tuck away, back in its recesses, over the last couple of years.

The game shelf is what surprised me! How is it possible we have that many games?

They were sorted through, with the ones used frequently put back on the shelf and the others donated to Goodwill.

What a mess! Bags of seasonal decor, acrylic paint, ribbon, wrapping paper and lots and lots of odds and ends.

Sort, toss, clean, pack up and organize into piles of similar items.

Then I tackled the bins.

Organize, organize, organize.

Finally, the post-its used for identifying the bin contents while sorting were replaced with pretty labels, and this project was done.

before

after (January 2011)

 Here's to it staying this way...for a while.

after (January 2012)

Well, what do you know, Yippee! With a few random additions, it has stayed organized!
You don't know how happy this has made me...