target Archives - 2 Sisters 2 Cities

My boyfriend and I live in a 2-bedroom apartment and those of you who live in small apartments know that storage is at a premium. We are lucky enough to have an extra bedroom to help out with storage. The only problem with having a second bedroom is that it does become basically that- another storage room.

We were having trouble with putting the room together after the move and up until the other week, it had been filled with boxes of things we hadn’t unpacked yet and random furniture we hadn’t been able to find a place for. We finally came up with a plan for the room and it started to come together. Once again, our second bedroom became the guest bedroom –slash- office-slash- craft room. The only problem is that because the room fills all of those functions, I need a different type of storage for my crafts so that I can I take out what I need when I need it.

This is what the craft closet looked like before:

Extra Closet Before Project

Total chaos. It was so hard to fine anything, which is not really conducive to creativity.

Storage Project

So what do you need? I bought a bunch of 16 and 6-quart Sterlite storage boxes from Target (they were the cheapest here: only $2.60 and $1.00 respectively) and a label maker from Amazon. You don’t really need a label maker to do this project- you can easily print out labels from your computer, cut them out, and put them on the box with clear mailing tape. Then, organize everything into all its own boxes and create labels.

New Closet Organization

You can box together whatever makes sense for you, but I had a box for: stationary, cookie cutters, fabric, ribbons and strings, sewing, paper cutters, paper, sprinkles and baking cups, and labels and markers.

Closet and Craft Organization After

Ta Da! I love the results- It is so much easier to find everything. Also, we finally got a tool box to fit both of our tools we have collected over the years. There are two file boxes on the floor for both of our files. I left them out in the open like that so we can put away important paperwork more easily and stay ahead of the piles of paper that build up so easily.

Closet Organization for Crafts

The games pretty much stayed the same, but I put the small games in a box together and it made them look neater.

My Favorite Label

This is my favorite storage label because I figured out how to use the icon on my label maker! A cupcake icon for the baking cups and sprinkles. Mmmm …makes me both happy and hungry for a cupcake! Yay for organization!!!

What projects have you been working on in the New Year?

sisterk (2)

It’s been our first full week back since Hawaii so now that we are unpacked and no longer jet-lagged, I have been trying to focus on doing a little bit of organizing each day.

This week I tackled my junk drawer. When we first moved to our new house in October, Husband M and I each picked a kitchen drawer that would be ours for personal items (a huge luxury since our city condo definitely did not have enough storage space for this!) I had just been throwing random items in it up until this week, but I finally sorted it down to the items that I would need every week and put all the other miscellaneous items away where they belonged. I also repurposed a Crate & Barrel drawer tray to hold all the items. Behold, my new junk drawer:

While I was shopping at Target today, I stumbled across some super cute items from the brand Greenroom. I found this adorable binder for a little over $7:

In my resolutions post, I said I was going to re-use my old gray college internship binder to hold our important household papers, but how cute is this one?!? I decided it would be worth the splurge since I have been using the binder on an almost daily basis lately. There were a few other really great designs and I it was really difficult trying to pick just one (baby T was ready to jump out of the shopping cart I was taking so long!)

In this month’s Better Home and Gardens, there was an article about organizing all the papers that start to pile up every week. They recommended setting up a filing system with three sections: Do Now, Do Later, and Pending. I loved the file folders they used in their picture and here they are!

For 2012, I am also attempting to ditch the paper planner and do all my scheduling on my Apple i-Cal (using the new iCloud on my Mac and iPhone.) However, there are always instances where I need to jot something down on paper quickly. I found this little notepad for a little under $3:

Wow, these items definitely excite me way too much. I’m such a sucker for office supplies:

What organizing tips and products do you recommend for the new year?

-m