For Our Sanity

One of those things constantly on our To Do List is organization, creating a place for everything, so everything can be in its place.  Yes, I worked at a storage and organization store for several years.  I can organize other people’s spaces like mad – I am an expert, after all.  😉  I just never seemed to apply it to my own home.  Is that like the cobbler’s kids with no shoes or the handyman whose house is never completed?  No, it’s probably just my usual…I’m so overwhelmed with the whole idea of doing it all, I choose to ignore it.

But over the past two days, we made headway!

Our Recycling Center

Several years ago, we began recycling everything we could through our local recycling bank.  Our contribution to the landfill has decreased dramatically, but we’ve been drowning in a sea of recyclables ever since.  I’ve been “meaning to” get a shelving system up solely for the recycling for about four years now.  We finally hit Ikea for these shelves a couple of weeks ago and got them built (and the space in the garage cleared for them) last night.  I filled them today, complete with nifty little clip-art-enhanced signs.

In case anyone is curious, the categories are:

• Egg Cartons & Meat Trays (styrofoam)
• Phonebooks & Magazines
• Plastics that won’t be taken at the curb, #1-#7
• Cardboard & Paperboard (obviously our most voluminous category)
• Office Paper
• Curbside Recycling (our city is picky – only milk jugs, soda/water bottles, cans, glass, & newspapers)

Now we get to figure out what to do with everything that used to be sitting in that corner…

*Aimee’s storage tip of the day:  Avoid using cardboard boxes that are held together with glue or tape as storage boxes.  These adhesives are a favorite food of spiders, and they will be drawn to these boxes and nest in them.  Totally true, I promise.  Gross!!  If you want to use cardboard boxes, get the file boxes that fold together, like the ones in my photo.  Those old diaper boxes, paper ream boxes, etc…?  Recycle them.  Trust me on this one.