Are your pantry shelves cluttered with miscellaneous bags of snacks and open cereal boxes? Do you find yourself throwing food away that’s gone stale because it wasn’t stored properly? How do you keep all of these boxes and bags organized on your pantry shelves? One option is to place snack bags and boxes of crackers inside small shelf baskets to keep them contained and prevent them from falling off the shelves. Better yet, consider transferring all of your snacks and cereals into attractive sealed canisters. It is one extra step when you open up the boxes, but it can soon become a habit that you will appreciate for years to come.

What Food Storage Canisters Should You Choose?:

I recommend that you choose clear containers, which enable you to quickly see the contents of each container. However, in order to find it even faster, label all containers with a labeler machine.

Dry Food Dispenser Canister

Food Storage Canister Tips for Dieters:

If you’re watching your weight, you’ll want to look at the dry food storage canisters that will dispense a certain amount of food at one time, allowing you to control your portions a lot easier. This can be especially helpful when snacking!

Dry Food Canister - Double

 How Dry Food Canisters Can Help with the Food Budget:

Watching the grocery budget? Dry food storage canisters will save you money because there will be less waste. You won’t be throwing away snacks and other dry foods that previously wasn’t stored properly. Also, because your food will be in clear labeled containers, you’ll be able to see everything you have, resulting in less trips to the grocery store buying food that you didn’t know you already had! Transferring all of your boxed cereals and snacks into dry food storage containers or canisters will help to keep your pantry shelves organized with very little effort.

Check out the pictured dry food storage containers at Home Storage Warehouse.

Jacquie Ross is a Maryland based Professional Organizer, writer, speaker and owner of CastAway the Clutter! Jacquie has been writing for Home Storage USA since 2007. A member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), NAPO-Baltimore Chapter, and Maryland Association of Professional Organizers, she shows homeowners how to reclaim their time and space, and offers organizing and time management workshops and group presentations. Jacquie is also the author of Take Control of Your Clutter Before it Takes Control of You: 101 Tips to Success.  Visit CastAway the Clutter to get a free organizing goals worksheet when you sign up for her organizing tips at www.castawaytheclutter.com

There are many organization solutions in the marketplace today that can help keep closet clutter under control without spending a fortune on high-end custom closets.  Outfitting your child’s closet with a custom solution may not always be the best idea when they still  have a lot of growing to do.  It might make more sense to use less expensive organization products that can be changed and adjusted as the child grows.

Here are a few ideas that can be incorporated into your child’s existing closet, assuming you do not already have built-in shelving installed:

Hanging organizer shelves for clothing
Storage cubes to corral small toys
Hanging shoe organizer to keep shoes off the floor
Shoe stands, also to keep shoes off the floor
Quality hangers to take better care of clothing

Closet hanging shelf organizer

Magic toy pop-up cube

Closet hanging shoe organizer shelves

Stackable shoe shelf organizer

Childrens' wood hangers

Folding canvas bins

Rolling bins or carts to hold folded clothing or toys can also be helpful.  Find more closet organizers at Home Storage Warehouse.

Jacquie Ross is a Maryland based Professional Organizer, writer, speaker and owner of CastAway the Clutter! Jacquie has been writing for Home Storage USA since 2007. A member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), NAPO-Baltimore Chapter, and Maryland Association of Professional Organizers, she shows homeowners how to reclaim their time and space, and offers organizing and time management workshops and group presentations. Jacquie is also the author of Take Control of Your Clutter Before it Takes Control of You: 101 Tips to Success.  Visit CastAway the Clutter to get a free organizing goals worksheet when you sign up for her organizing tips at www.castawaytheclutter.com

Does your children’s clothing spend most of the time on the closet floor or hung on the clothing rod?  If your child is too small to reach the rod, you may find that you’re spending way too much time picking up clothes and trying to keep the closet organized.  Many closets consist of a single rod and shelf, but there are many affordable closet organizing solutions to help with eliminating closet clutter. To begin with, store their most frequently worn, or favorite garments at their level so that they can be responsible for putting away their clean laundry and choosing their outfits for the day. 

By incorporating some additional storage options inside the closet, you can also teach your child to be responsible for keeping their closet neat and organized.  Set up an easy organizational system so that they can select their outfits each day, with very little help from you.  One way to do this is to install a hanging pocket shelf organizer. Hanging shelves, which usually include at least 5 pockets for each weekday, are a great way for them to feel grown up because they get to pick out their pre-selected outfit for the day, without help from you. 

Dealing with children who are a little unorganized can be a challenge and sometimes quite stressful.  Teaching your children to be more organized is much easier when you start early.  By assigning them small organizing tasks from a young age, it helps to teach them responsibility and the basic skills of organization.

Begin by setting up systems in their rooms and finding a place for everything.  If they keep toys in their room, there should be an area specifically set-up to store those items.  When it begins to get overcrowded it’s time to do some purging.  Although it’s difficult for very young children to part with their toys, it’s an important part of maintaining order.  Explain to them that they cannot have new toys if there’s no place to put them.  It may also help if you donate items to charitable organizations and an opportunity to explain that less fortunate children would love to be able to play with their old or outgrown toys.

Make organizing fun by using brightly colored containers as storage.   Also, use bright coordinating colors for labeling or use cut-out pictures found on the internet or in magazines.

Primary toy bin organizer

Pastel toy bin organizer

Hanging toy organizer

 

The typical bathroom cabinet is cluttered and disorganized due to the abundant amount of items typically used in the bathroom.  Toiletries, make-up, hair appliances, linens, medicine and other personal items are often used on a daily basis, yet the average bathroom has very little efficient storage options.  The average bathroom cabinet is deep and tall, but due to large protruding plumbing fixtures, there is usually no shelving installed inside to help maximize the available space.  

One way to solve this problem is to purchase organizers for use inside deep cabinets.  Stackable bins and containers are one option, or you can use a roll-out drawer. Roll-out drawers come in a variety of widths to fit most undersink cabinets and are available in either one or two levels.   The two tiered roll-out drawers can really maximize the space underneath the average bathroom cabinet and are also very easy to install.  Plus, roll-out drawers can also be used under kitchen sink cabinets to store cleaning supplies and in any other deep cabinet or shelf that may be difficult to access.

For the budget-conscious consumer, roll-out drawers can be an affordable alternative to custom built-in organizational installations. Home Storage Warehouse has a couple of options to choose from.  

Roll out 2 tier organizer

Roll out cabinet drawer

Roll out undersink drawer

Jacquie Ross is a Maryland based Professional Organizer, writer, speaker and owner of CastAway the Clutter! Jacquie has been writing for Home Storage USA since 2007 and is presently the “Ask the Organizer” expert. A member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), NAPO-Baltimore Chapter, and Maryland Association of Professional Organizers, she shows homeowners how to reclaim their time and space, and offers organizing and time management workshops and group presentations. Jacquie is also the author of Take Control of Your Clutter Before it Takes Control of You: 101 Tips to Success.  Visit CastAway the Clutter to sign up for her free organizing tips at www.castawaytheclutter.com

It’s nearing the end of Get Organized Month (SM). Have you started any of your decluttering and organizing projects yet?  Feeling overwhelmed?  Break the task down into smaller chunks and work on one chunk at a time. 

Let’s assume you need to go through several weeks of mail that you’ve been procrastinating.  Normally, when the mail hasn’t been sorted in a while, it may be found in many different areas of the home.  So before you start, spend some time going through your home searching for piles of unopened mail.  When you’re sure you have it all, schedule some time to begin processing it.  Here are a few easy mail sorting and organizing tips:

1. Have the necessary tools on hand before you begin.  Examples of what you mind need include: A shredder (or a container to store paper to shred later), letter opener, files, file box or filing cabinet, recycle or trash bin, pen, sticky notes, paper clips and a stapler and staple remover. 

2. Sort the mail by type.  You can usually tell from the outside of the envelope what type of mail it is, e.g. bill, statement, catalog, junk mail, magazine subscription, etc.

3. Open the easy action items first, e.g. place your magazines either in a magazine basket or give it to the person in the household who holds the magazine subscription.  Discard the junk mail and trash.

4. Open the bills and make decisions.  Pay now or later?  Set up reminder systems in your day planner or PDA for bills that need to be paid later.  Discard trash and file statements.

5. Schedule time to do the mail daily or every other day.  If you have a particularly crazy schedule, you can do it once a week, but no less than that!

Here are some paper and mail organizing products and tools that you may find helpful from Home Storage Warehouse.

Desktop organizer

Newspaper and Magazine Rack

File/Letter Desk Organizer

Jacquie Ross is a Maryland based Professional Organizer, writer, speaker and owner of CastAway the Clutter! Jacquie has been writing for Home Storage USA since 2007 and is presently the “Ask the Organizer” expert. A member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), NAPO-Baltimore Chapter, and Maryland Association of Professional Organizers, she shows homeowners how to reclaim their time and space, and offers organizing and time management workshops and group presentations. Jacquie also writes a column at the Baltimore Examiner, called Organized Families and is the author of Take Control of Your Clutter Before it Takes Control of You: 101 Tips to Success.  Click here to learn more. Contact Jacquie by clicking here. Visit CastAway the Clutter to sign up for her free organizing tips and learn more about her presentations at www.castawaytheclutter.com

A long time ago, the baker’s rack was used in bakeries to cool batches of pies and other baked goods.  The baked goods were placed on metal shelving allowing them to cool.  

Nowadays the baker’s rack is a stylish piece of furniture used to store and organize all types of kitchen and dining items.  Some baker’s racks are also used in other rooms of the home for storage or display purposes and may showcase the homeowner’s decorative items and collectibles.  Either way, the baker’s rack can be used as an extension of your kitchen countertop, additional storage in your dining room, or storage in any room of the home.  Here are some ideas of how you can take advantage of the storage space in a baker’s rack:

Kitchen: microwave, small kitchen appliances, kitchen canisters, cookbooks and cookware.

Dining room: china, collectibles, table linens, servers, wine bottles (choose one with a built-in wine rack).

Living room: As an étagère to display collectibles.

Bathroom: towels, decorative items, toiletries (use baskets for smaller items), extra paper supplies.

Hall/Entry: As an entryway organizer for backpacks, bags, hats, gloves, scarves (use baskets), keys (some baker’s racks have built-in hooks).

Covered Patio or Outdoor Shed: As a potting station for small garden tools, gloves, apron, seeds, potting soil etc.

Baker's Rack with wine storage

Linen white baker's rack with wine storage

Baker's rack with drawers

Green baker's rack with wine storage

                   

There are many other “out of the box” organizing ideas that you can use Baker’s racks for.  Take advantage of the vertical space in your home and organize your stuff in style!  Click here to shop for these baker’s racks and other organization products!

 

Jacquie Ross is a Maryland based Professional Organizer, writer, speaker and owner of CastAway the Clutter! Jacquie has been writing for Home Storage USA since 2007 and is presently the “Ask the Organizer” expert. A member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), NAPO-Baltimore Chapter, and Maryland Association of Professional Organizers, she shows homeowners how to reclaim their time and space, and offers organizing and time management workshops and group presentations. Jacquie also writes a column at the Baltimore Examiner, called Organized Families.  Contact Jacquie by clicking here. Visit CastAway the Clutter to sign up for her free organizing tips and learn more about her presentations at www.castawaytheclutter.com

 

Toy organizer - 12 bin

Today’s kids have busy lives.  At least they like to think so anyway!  They have school, homework, afterschool activities, playdates and family time. Who’s got time for chores? Keeping an organized bedroom is generally not on the top of their list of priorities, creating frustration for busy parents.  Often it’s a case of simply not knowing where to put their stuff.  They may have a dresser, chest of drawers and a closet for their clothing, but kids seem to always have a bunch of random items that don’t have a home. 

Allocating space for every item that is stored in their room can be a tedious chore, but it’s a very important part of teaching them, not only to be organized, but that every item should have a home.

If your child’s room is a cluttered mess, then decluttering is the first step.  Sort, purge and organize.  The organizing part can be the hardest part when you’re dealing with a small space or simply don’t know where to start.  Hiring a local professional organizer to help create organizational systems can save both time and stress, freeing up more time to do the things you actually enjoy. 

Nightstand valet for kids

Home organization designers and manufacturers are getting very creative, resulting in new and improved furniture and products to help us to get organized and stay organized.  Organization products for children has become a fast growing industry, providing us with a lot more choice. By making the organizers more visually appealing and fun to use, we can only hope that our children will be more inclined to use them!  Here are a few organizing products from Home Storage Warehouse, designed with kids rooms in mind. 

Girls weekly pocket organizer

Boys weekly pocket organizer

Toy storage bin

Kids saddlebag with straps

Click here to see more kid’s organizers

Jacquie Ross is a Maryland based Professional Organizer, writer, speaker and owner of CastAway the Clutter! Jacquie has been writing for Home Storage USA since 2007 and is presently the “Ask the Organizer” expert. A member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), NAPO-Baltimore Chapter, and Maryland Association of Professional Organizers, she shows homeowners how to reclaim their time and space, and offers organizing and time management workshops and group presentations. Jacquie also writes a column at the Baltimore Examiner, called Organized Families.  Contact Jacquie by clicking here. Visit CastAway the Clutter to sign up for her free organizing tips and learn more about her presentations at www.castawaytheclutter.com

The home office, often a clutter filled extra room in the house, is now more frequently used as a home office for a small business owner or telecommuting worker.   This is especially true today because many home owners are using wireless mobile laptops as their household computer, instead of a desktop computer, so are not really using their home offices as before.  

Working from home is convenient.  There’s usually no dress code, unless you use it for meetings, no office gossip and most work at home professionals have a flexible schedule.  However, even if you work from home only 2 or 3 days a week, having a dedicated home office space is important. If you don’t have an extra room, you can create a space within a room that is used only for business. Your office needs to be comfortable and functional.  A comfortable ergonomic chair and aesthetically pleasing environment will add comfort.  Good quality office equipment, file storage, desk accessories and lighting will add function.

When decorating and organizing your home office space, you have a lot more flexibility to decorate and organize it to reflect your personality, than you would in a typical work environment.  Have some fun with your home office accessories.  Choose colors you respond to and designs you love.  You’ll want it to be free of clutter so that you are able to stay focused.  Staying focused and motivated can be especially difficult when you’re working without a boss hovering over you! 

When choosing desk organizers, avoid purchasing several desk accessory items.  That alone can create clutter.   Also, avoid excessive décor items, like plants, family pictures and ornaments.  Pick one or two favorites and avoid clutter accumulation.  Try to keep your office space organized by imagining someone dropping in at a moment’s notice!  The thought of an unexpected visitor will keep you motivated to file away papers, shred what you don’t need and minimize paper clutter!

Check out some office organization products at Home Storage Warehouse.

Jacquie Ross is a Maryland based Professional Organizer, writer, speaker and owner of CastAway the Clutter! Jacquie has been writing for Home Storage USA since 2007 and is presently the “Ask the Organizer” expert. A member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), NAPO-Baltimore Chapter, and Maryland Association of Professional Organizers, she shows homeowners how to reclaim their time and space, and offers organizing and time management workshops and group presentations. Contact Jacquie here. Visit CastAway the Clutter to sign up for her free organizing tips and learn more about her presentations at www.castawaytheclutter.com 

Frequent business travelers are generally aware of what to expect when travelling for business and are usually prepared and organized and able to keep up with the ever changing airport rules and regulations.  They understand that anything that might go wrong could make or break their trip and they could miss that important meeting.  So they certainly don’t want to be worrying about their suitcase or carry-on bag falling apart.   

Anyone who travels frequently by air should pay special attention to the quality of travel bags they use for their trips.  If you accidentally drop your computer laptop, chances are it won’t break or crack under pressure if it’s stored in a protective case or bag.  It’s not a good idea to just slip your laptop inside a regular bag with all your other belongings.  If you decide to place it inside another bag, insert it into a computer laptop sleeve first for extra protection. 

Laptop bags have come a long way.  At one time, the styles and designs were basic and tended to only focus on what a businessman would want. There are now laptop bags for everyone, including businesswomen, busy moms and students.  You also don’t have to sacrifice style for quality. 

 Generally, there are 4 types of computer laptop bags: sleeve, shoulder bag, rolling and backpack.  Here are a few to consider from Home Storage Warehouse. 

For more laptop and travel luggage options click here.

www.HomeStorageWarehouse.com is always having a special.  Click here to see what they are offering today.

Jacquie Ross is a Maryland based Professional Organizer, writer, speaker and owner of CastAway the Clutter! Jacquie has been writing for Home Storage USA since 2007 and is presently the “Ask the Organizer” expert. A member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), NAPO-Baltimore Chapter, and Maryland Association of Professional Organizers, she shows homeowners how to reclaim their time and space, and offers organizing and time management workshops and group presentations. Jacquie can be reached at jacquie@castawaytheclutter.com. Visit CastAway the Clutter to sign up for her free organizing tips and learn more about her presentations at www.castawaytheclutter.com