Keepin' it all out in the open...

Ribbons, trims and yarn make scrumptious eye candy, when stored in plain sight.

I have a need to have the things I love where I can see them.  I need to have the art materials and supplies I collect visible and accessible.  I pretty much live my life in full view on this blog, and in all matters of emotion, I'm known to wear my heart on my sleeve, so as you can imagine, with all that stuff in plain sight, life could get pretty messy.

Fortunately, I'm a born organizer.  Shelves and cubbies and bins, oh my!  Thankfully, over the years, I've refined my own style of organizing, and relaxed it to a passion, rather than an obsession, or worse, a procrastination technique.

Tiny bottles filled with small treasures fill the windowsill of my art studio.  Painting the lids black keeps the look as cohesive as possible.

Here are a few of my favorite ways to organize: 

• I've found it's worth it, if you have the skills or the funds, to build shelving to fit the stuff you need to store, especially in work spaces. 
• I know I need to store things in clear containers, and I like glass better than plastic, so I watch yard sales and thrift shops for glass candy jars to store all kinds of small items in, and save smaller glass bottles from spices and condiments for the really tiny things.   
• I need certain files kept out of the drawer, and rectangular "planters", from the silk flower section of craft and department stores keep them corralled and vertical, as well as portable.
• I use the sweater compartments in my closet to store my folded t-shirts, so I can pull the one I want without digging down through a drawer to find it.
• I hang all my pants, not just dress pants, but sweats and paint pants too, so I can easily grab what I wear most often.
• In order to keep pretty things from being useless clutter, I repurpose things like sugar bowls for pencil holders, a bud vase to hold my toothbrush, and a cup from my childhood tea set is a chain-pull for the kitchen light.



Often-used files are easy to access and easy to move around, when stored upright in a small metal planter box.

Keeping everything out in the open makes life so much easier.  Shoving things in a closet, be they feelings or posessions, to be sorted some other day, just creates a cloud over the future.  It's just not worth it to live with an impending avalanche, nor to tuck all the good stuff away for a special day.  Of course, not everyone will appreciate your stuff, but it's your home, your life, and those who don't connect? Well...

I can't claim to be a professional organizer, but if you want a pretty backdrop to enhance the life you've organized for yourself, check my website to view my portfolio, and get the info on how to hire me.  theartofthehome.com

If you have a comment, feel free to leave it below, by clicking "comments", or you are welcome to email me at dawnmariedelara@gmail.com.