Sorry for being absent for so long.  We have been doing things at the Patch, I just haven’t had the time to blog about it yet.

Today we are starting with a before and after of a project that would never have happened if I had not been part of My Organized Chaos.   I can’t believe I’m going to show you some of this stuff, but I think I’m a great example of what is possible when you have some guidance, goals and outside influences in your organisational life.

Let’s start with the before photographs.  The subject of the organisation is the art and craft supplies that we use (mine and the children’s).
First up we have my son’s closet, which has been home to not only toy storage but general art/craft and junk storage.

Once the boxes and recycling pile were removed and laid out on the dining room floor it turned from a tower of clutter into a large flat, and scary amount of clutter, as you can plainly see.

Attractive isn’t it?

Then I got stuck about the recycling pile first.  Who needs that many bits of random cardboard?  Or bubble envelopes?  Or egg cartons? Seriously?
Not quite enough to be classified in the “little old lady with 100 cats” category, but heading down that slippery slope none the less.
I felt immensely lightened by the simple act of chucking out cardboard, paper, useless magazines and then laying everything out so I could see exactly what we had and how best to store it going forward.  It took all of an hour one evening.  Then the next morning, yes I slept on it, I spent about thirty minutes repacking everything and the result is below.
The box on the left has the art or craft stuff, the middle box contains the tools to do art or crafts and the box on the right is my recycled materials for crafting with the kids.  After this photograph was taken I also labelled up the two plastic tubs so that there would be no mistake about where things should be put back.

So, I’m a very happy camper.  This is the bulk storage of our art and craft supplies and it is finally back to some semblance of tidy and organised.  Thanks Jo for the inspiration to get on top of this.  At some point in the future I will show you where the “in use” art and craft supplies are, and how we store them.  They were not quite in the same miserable condition.  🙂

If you feel inspired, Jo is giving away two spots on her October course.  Here are the two ways to enter her competitions.