Organizing Paper Clutter
Kitchen counter - Before
My goal - Conquer clutter
I have always been envious of organized people. You know who I am talking about. Their kitchen cabinets are neatly organized, and all their plastic containers have matching lids. I have boxes of plastic containers, but usually cover them with wrap, because I can't find the right lid.
My goal is to conquer all clutter. I started with paper because it is so visible, and gets worse with each trip to the mailbox.
My tools
Getting it done
I started by stapling the sides of the paper folders, leaving them open only at the top. Then I labeled each one with a different category of mail, and papers. Mine are labeled as follows: Bills, Insurance, Magazine offers, Business, Coupons, Pets, Misc. You could label yours with whatever you have most of. Then I went through my mail, threw away the trash, and put what I wanted to save in the folders. My plan now is to do this each day as soon as I come in from the mailbox.
The two binders were for the other type of paper I have tons of: recipes torn from magazines; and home projects, arts and crafts ideas, etc., that I wanted to save from magazines.
The first binder I reserved just for recipes. I labeled my dividers with the usual categories: Casseroles, Vegetables, Appetizers, Soup and Bread, Desserts, Misc. I glued the recipes to heavy paper, and punched holes to fit the binder, and filed them. It was fun going through these recipes. I found a lot of favorites that I had forgotten about.
The second binder was for various articles I wanted to save from magazines and fliers. The dividers in this binder were labeled as follows: Organizing, Decorating, Kitchen, Arts and Crafts, Sewing, Pets. In this binder I used a combination of heavy paper to glue articles on, and magnetic photo pages. You could use whatever works for you that you have on hand.
Finally done!
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Comments
Hmmm, spirit of excellence.
- AUTHOR
I envy you Lori. My kitchen is much neater now, but it takes work to keep it that way.
Susan,
My husband and I must be OCD because all of the plastic containers in our kitchen cabinets are neatly stacked in size order, as are the contents of our pantry -- all arrange in height order! :-)
Lori
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