order envy

It seems like every year at this time magazines are brimming with advice on how to be more organized (yes, this means that I have succumbed to subscribing to those  again, which is not helping my cluttering ways (woes?)), but I can't help but get all excited as they regurgitate the same information over and over -- use baskets! transform a closet into an office! label everything! hide everything! get rid of everything!  I can do that!  Except that I can never find baskets that fit in those spaces, and I don't have a closet to transform, wouldn't that be awesome?  And I seem to have a labeling disability since I've had two dozen matching spice jars waiting for me to fill them and label them for at least two years -- I even found a template for stickers to apply to their lids, but haven't managed to buy the right paper at an office supply store.  And I'd love to hide everything, but that takes us back to the extra closet issue, and I'd really love to get rid of everything, but as nice as that sounds it isn't completely reasonable since we acquired those things for a reason and use at least some of them occasionally (14 pairs of baby legs, mmmm).  Sigh!  


I did, however, tackle one very troublesome spot.  More than a spot really -- my whole bedroom!  I like my room to be serene, a place to get away from the chaos and bedlam, so I've painted it a calming color and try to keep it tidy, but recently we added yet another human being to the mix and sadly, there wasn't really anywhere to stuff him and his paraphernalia (cloth diapers, muslin blankets, baby legs!) besides our room.  Last spring I went through a brief period of obsession about dressers, but quickly realized that we didn't really have room for a dresser, and not only that, someone was going to leave within a year and then we wouldn't really need the extra furniture.  I won't go into the details of who might be leaving the nest, it's really just too sad to mention (or even contemplate for that matter).  So, knowing in the back of my mind that we would really only have to get through one year I decided to just use baskets for the baby's clothes, diapers, burp rags, blankets, shoes, wipes, toys (whew!  babies have a lot of c?!#) -- without remembering that although those things may be tiny and adorable, they still take up quite a bit of space and after a few weeks my bedroom was anything but tranquil and serene -- it looked a lot like a baby store had thrown up in there!  What to do?  My lovely next door neighbor is expecting a baby and she bought some storage with baskets from Ikea and is using the top for a changing table -- Hallelujah! I could practically feel the breeze from the angels flying above my head!  It was exactly the thing for my conundrum and can be used in other parts of the house later.

She has one big shelf with eight openings, but I bought the two with four so that it can be more flexible later.  They hold everything and I have never had a changing table before!  I have always changed my babies' diapers on the floor, but I have gotten way too old for that kind of nonsense -- I can barely get all the way up by myself let alone while holding someone -- so that is an added luxury.  I have dreamed up so many different ways of using it in the future I just might have to get some more.

I guess "they" were right -- putting everything in baskets!  and hiding everything!  really does work.  Now if I can just find big enough baskets for the children.  I've already labelled them.