8 Practical Tips to Ease Your Storage Problems

No matter if you hang your hat in a cozy Cape Cod, or in that huge ‘house on a hill’, home is a lot more liveable and spacious if you take the time to make maximum use of your storage spaces. While your ultimate goal is to keep your ‘stuff’ close by and yet invisible, organizing your storage spaces will aid in keeping your things secure, in top shape, and right at hand when you need them. Here’s some helpful knowledge to keep you clutter-free.

1) When stacking your china, try using paper or scraps of felt to minimize or outright prevent damage from scratching. This strategy will also help when you’re stacking your cookware, but here, use either soft paper towels, coffee filters, or both, between pots and pans. Take the lids from your pots and then place them in a drawer or stack them horizontally on a shelf, going in size from smallest to largest.

2) Use a large plastic bucket when storing your cleaning supplies. This keeps them in a central location, and also makes them portable for those ‘remote’ cleaning jobs that take you to different parts of the house.

3) See-through containers are great for visual identification. You can quite easily check, and identify, the contents of a box or tub without having to open them.

4) Labeling your shelves serves two purposes—labels aid in organizing shelves, and allow all family members to have a hand in keeping things in order.

5) You have built-in storage space in your bedroom, and may not realize it! The areas directly underneath your bed are excellent for keeping your out-of-season clothing out of sight. There are quite a few types of containers (both cardboard and plastic) that are manufactured specifically for under-bed storage areas.

6) Use the ‘Manhattan Theory’ for utilizing vertical space—when buildings go up in Manhattan, expansion is usually in an upward direction. Extend your shelving toward the ceiling of your room. When choosing furniture for this purpose, tall bookcases or armoires are ideal for storing loose toys, office supplies, and craft materials.

7) Try to think creatively…if something was made for your bathroom, no law says it can’t be utilized in your office, and vice versa. In search of ideas? Try perusing your local craft and hardware stores, as well as office supply stores. In addition to the usual things (cabinets, drawers, closets, and shelves), also try going with racking, baskets, boxes, pegs and pegboard, buckets of all sizes, dowels, and hooks.

8) Speaking of baskets, use them to store small items by hanging them in grids along your wall, as opposed to piling them on desks and countertops, which only help to promote more clutter.

If you plan well, you’ll find that organized storage will aid you and your family in locating things more quickly, and give everyone peace of mind and ultimately a more spacious and accessible living area.

Keith Guyton is an aspiring writer and infopreneur. He resides in Middletown, Ohio with his wife Cheryl and their dog, Max.