So last week I blogged about a few systems we’ve implemented to keep me a little more Bert, but that still satisfy the Ernie in me–interim places for Stuff That Would Otherwise Lay Around, And Will Be Put Away Later. This week? Where that STWOLAAWBPAL actually goes.
I don’t remember if I mentioned this last week, but I’m a very out-of-sight, out-of-mind person. I bought a PDA about a thousand years ago, only the scheduling never worked for me, because I never checked it. When I was a kid, and occasionally we’d get neat little calendar books, same thing happened — it went into my backpack, never to be looked upon again. (I solved that problem by writing reminders on my hand.) Once I lost my cell phone, searched my apartment frantically, finally called for a replacement, and then found it. It was in my purse, under an envelope. In my transparent purse, I might add.
Losing things is a grand tradition in my family; not a morning went by in my teen years that my sister didn’t scream that she couldn’t find her hairbrush, or that my mom lost her keys (again) or that I hadn’t misplaced my shoes. (Check in the webbing under the chair in the living room!) We lost our puppy once; we spent an hour shouting for him outside, only to find him closed inside a recliner. Recently I spent four weeks without my favorite sweater, and then had the brilliant idea of actually taking everything out of my sweater drawers to see if it’d sunk to the bottom. I was on the phone with the hairbrush-losing RocketSis, said, “Damn it,” and she knew immediately: I had found it, and would have to tell RocketMan it’d been in my drawer.
My defense to RocketMan? “I come by it honestly!”
(By the by, if you’re looking for a cozy sweater to snuggle up in, but that also has its sporty sweat-wicking, no-smell functions, BUY THAT SWEATER. The prices on the site are New Zealand dollars, so it’s only about 80% of the price you see there. The model makes it look frighteningly Nordic and shiny, but it’s super-soft merino wool and just yummy.)
So this week’s blog is How Not To Lose Stuff, or Keep It In The Public Eye. As always, minimalists, be warned. But take comfort in the knowledge that everything has its home.
|
Return of the Pegboard
After finding my jewelry strewn across my dressertop a multitude of times (and the call of “Have you seen my…” breaking up many an evening), RocketMan suggesting using our kitchen pegboard idea in the bedroom. It’s on the wall directly behind the door, so it’s not visible unless you’re about to walk out of the room, so it doesn’t break up the room too much. I painted it to look as close to my favorite Rothko as possible; I do wonder now what abstract expressionists would think of a 21st-century chick hanging jewelry on their paintings, but no crying over spilled color fields. I love it. I can immediately see all of my necklaces, bracelets, some flowered hair clips; RocketMan’s even taken advantage of it to hang his belts. To the very far left, I hang my stage ponytails (go-go dancers need more hair than I’ve got), close to out of sight. I originally hung them in the middle of the board, but we both agreed waking up in the middle of the night to hairy creatures climbing up the wall was just creepy. |
|
And Then He Said, “Why Don’t You Slice the Bread Before Packaging It?”
Some solutions are so obvious as to be embarrassing, and this is one of them. I suspect some of you will raise an eyebrow and say, “THAT’S a tip? Really? Duh.” And I congratulate you on your foresight. It took me 33 years of life to discover this solution, and since RocketMan suggested it, I can’t even take credit for that. My mom stacked clothes in our drawers. Fold the clothes, stack them, stick’em in the drawer. So that’s what I did, too–resulting in the aforementioned loss of the sweater when it slipped too far down, and in countless other drawer-cleaning moments in which I rediscovered a sweater I hadn’t thought of in months, simply because it had gotten wedged into the back of the drawer. We recently bought this extra set of Elfa drawers (at The Container Store, of course), and I was transferring my t-shirts when RocketMan said, “Why don’t you stack the shirts horizontally? So you can see them all at once?” I felt like Obama had been elected all over again. In the two weeks since then, I still have the neatest drawers I’ve ever had in my life. I open up my drawer, select my item without having to think “Do I still have…?” It’s amazing. And a big DUH. By the way, we love the Elfa drawers, and we’ll be installing a full wall system soon. BIG recommendation, though: get these white mesh drawers, not the wire drawers. They’re more expensive, but they’re also more attractive, and the drawer stops work much better. |
|
And All the Other Stuff
We have several bulletin board systems — one in the kitchen; our grocery list is written on the side of the refrigerator with a dry erase marker; and this one, which is in the L-shaped hallway in the middle of our apartment. It’s hidden to all but whoever’s sitting at the computer. I included it here because I love the system. We wanted a magnet board, and something we could write on, as well, so RocketMan bought a piece of sheet metal, screwed it in to a sheet of plywood, and covered the sheet metal in sticky-backed laminate plastic. The result: an ideal place to hang airline vouchers we haven’t used, concert tickets, free movie passes, and the occasional Russ Meyer postcard. At the bottom corner is a dry-erase marker for general notes: which albums we’ve downloaded recently (we keep separate iTunes, but often share music); I started writing down when we’ve reupped membership to nonprofits, so I know when we’re actually due to spend more money. It’s basically for all the stuff we don’t need to see every day, but that do require occasional reminders. If those reminders went into a little book, I would inevitably put it somewhere very clever and never see it again. |
Holy hell! That drawer idea is Shear Genius (Thanks, Jaclyn Smith!)! Lately, I’ve been rolling my clothes into little wrap-looking things (works best for tops), but I still end up stacking the rolls on top of each other, “losing” clothes I can’t see and messing up the drawers as I pick through the rolls. I LOVE that you can see all your t-shirts in that pic! It totally seems like common sense, but some of us need to learn how to be a bit neater (or at least maximize space for all the cute sweaters and concert tees!). I think this may be a project sometime in the next few days. Thanks!
I love the drawer idea, but, unfortunately, bought completely SQUARE drawers. Or, maybe the proper description is CUBIC. So this would not work for me. BOO!
The pegboard in the bedroom is a great idea!