just in case

so back to the picnic and back to the questions. what if i need it some day for a super cool craft project?

ah, the what if . . . ah, the super cool craft project. the what if i need it someday people are certainly a category of clients i see. we all suffer from a touch of the what if. those with the worst cases end up with their preparations for what might happen impeding what is happening in their lives right now. it's groovy, i know but how can you make space for new things to come in to your life when so much is already there?

one way to begin to tackle the problem is to set some sort of time limit - one month, six months, a year - and ask yourself whether or not you've had reason to use the item within the time frame. now i know your answer might be "no, but i still might. what if . . . " give it away. in the unlikely event that you actually do need the item again, you can get it. you are choosing your space over your stuff.

now craft supplies are a whole other ball of wax (or ball of yarn and brick of wax as the case may be). it's easy for a crafty beaver (my all time favorite reality tv show team name - joan lunden, 2005) to surround him or herself with all manner of supplies for all manner of crafts. i myself once had nearly a whole closet full of random pieces and parts and yarn balls and foam squares waiting for genius. in my case, it worked because i had the space. when i moved in with my now husband, i had to make some choices . . . alas, i figured out how much space in the new house could be reserved for "what if craft supplies" and the rest had to go - donated to a very happy first grade teacher. the truth was that when i was itching to do a project, i never had exactly right stuff anyway so i'd go buy what i needed for the project and then keep the leftovers just in case. just in case what? just in case i ever needed an L shaped piece of cheap batting?

and that is the key - decide how much space you have in your house to devote to crafts and fill it up. when it's full, you're done. from there, something has got to go for something new to come in. this afternoon i came upon the craft organizer pictured above. the different compartments look like they might accommodate a variety of crafty endeavors and the barely visible little pockets on the side could hold some small tools. it takes great advantage of vertical space too. so that if you've decided that you have a foot of closet rod to devote to crafts, this might be a good way to do it. check it out at kangaroomstorage.com (they also sell it for purse storage.)

divide and conquer

unruly dresser drawers are a real bummer. one of the best solutions that we've found are these drawer dividers. they're called dream drawer dividers and they are nothing if not dreamy. they're spring loaded so they fit snugly and securely in the majority of drawer depths. the spring means they don't need drawer-ruining sticky stuff to stay put. plus, they're completely movable for when your drawers need a change.

beyond that, they're tall enough (at 4 inches) to keep clothing from making the jump over to the dark side. both bed bath and beyond and the container store carry them and they come two to a box. just what you need to make yourself a little sock library.

the right stuff

yup, it's a file folder. this is one of the products we use most in our organizing work. the key to making it work well is the tab. we always choose third cut files with tabs on the right (also known as position 3 tabs). line these up in your file cabinet and you're suddenly free to add a new file any time without "messing up" your order. what a great and simple product. they're right there in your giant stationery store among the regular boxes of assorted tab files. seek them out . . .

all charged up

pottery barn is definitely on the right track with its daily system recharging station. good work hiding cords and getting electronica up off the horizontal. sadly we can't really tell what is going on in the back. from the description it seems like the whole thing should be plugged into the wall. we don't get why we don't see a cord coming down. does it only look good if you have a plug in the middle of your wall into which to plug the whole thing? also, we wish that it didn't come with the white board. it would be much better if they were separate components so that if you're anti-white board like we are you could still have the benefit of a cord-hider recharger. nice work on the three color choices and lots of matching coordinates.