As a Professional Organizer, over the years I have tested and used many pantry organizing products. I have found several that I seem to use over and over again. I decided to post eight of my favorites to help you keep order in your pantry.

Stepper Shelves: These steps really take the Read the rest of this entry »

Situation: This garage had plenty of built-in storage but a mess was created when we decided to get rid of the off-site storage unit and consolidate everything into the garage. As with most organizing projects, there is usually temporary chaos before there is order.

Challenge: The back wall of this garage had built-in floor to ceiling, wall-to-wall shelves but they were completely full of childhood memories consisting of one large plastic bin per child per year.With three kids all of them at least in middle school, that meant a lot of bins!

Solution: We went through all of the kid’s  memory boxes. At first it was very hard for my client to get rid of childhood papers. She eventually became a champ at making decisions and letting go of enough memories so that each child’s memory items could fit into only one to two bins each. This reduced the storage bins from about 6-8 per child to 2 which gave us a lot more space to store items brought from the off-site storage unit. My client did an amazing job learning how to let go. Her kids still have plenty of great memorabilia to discover and uncover later!

Hi Kathi,

Thanks for the great tips on sock organization…. It seems to be working great…but I have a challenging question in regards to seasonal clothing.  My family of four is deep Read the rest of this entry »

Situation: This guest room had fallen prey to typical problems. Without use, rooms like this often become disorganized dumping grounds for whatever items do not easily fit into other parts of the house.

Challenge: A son was moving in for a few months and we needed to get the room organized and ready for him to live in. Where does everything now go and how do we also create enough closet space for the son?

Solution: We cleared out the hall linen closet and the master closet to make enough room to move out the extra items that were in the guest room. In the end, we were able to set up a nice space for her son with a computer desk, stereo and even room in the closet for his clothes!

Situation: An oven that had turned into a cabinet. A pantry that held almost everything but food and food storage supplies.

Challenge: This was a very dangerous choice. When space seems to be at a premium, folks will often default into using areas for storage that are really meant for other things. The real pantry was used to store games, wrapping paper, office supplies, almost everything but paper goods.

Solution: Get rid of excess grocery inventory, clear the pantry and make room for what supplies and food needed to be kept on hand.