Have I told you that I have been blessed with a 120 square foot master closet? Yep, 6 feet wide by a whopping 20 feet long. The advantages to this are obvious: there's room for a lot more than clothes in there. The disadvantage? I rarely get rid of anything, because there's always more room in my closet. After 4.5 years in this house, the collection of "stuff" and its disorganization had reached a breaking point. (Technically this is a "before and after" post but alas, I have no before photo.)
Have I also told you that I do some bartering in exchange for piano lessons, for a few of my clients? Well I made a little deal with my sister Jamie, who apparently loves to clean out closets, and she came over a couple weeks ago to tackle my beast of a master closet. She stayed most of the day and the results are lovely, and a huge improvement:
The main difference is that there's a lot more carpet showing now. The aisle had gotten progressively more narrow the further back you'd walk. The very back of the closet was a no-man's-land collection of luggage, extra food, 72-hr kits, wrapping paper, and leftover party supplies. Now everything has a place, and we even brought 400 lbs. of wheat in from the garage (white buckets at the back). Hooray!
Jamie was tough with me (but I needed it): "Sara, this shirt is SO outdated. Seriously, when are you ever going to wear this again? You need to get rid of it." And, "Here are eight pairs of shoes with dust on them. You obviously never wear them. You are allowed to keep four pairs of these and you're giving the rest away." And, "WHY do you have all these old sheets? Seriously, what on earth could you honestly make out of them?" Even when I tried to turn it into a chit-chat visit, she kept to her task and didn't stop until she was done. She took a LOT of stuff to Goodwill for me, like enough to fill a small car, and she left a list of assignments of things for Aaron to get rid of, which he did the following Saturday. My fabric is organized in bins, my wrapping paper is in handy stand-up wrapping paper containers, my food storage is all in one place (except for some stuff under my stairs, and several hundred pounds of sugar which is still in the garage... but I don't think the heat can hurt sugar).
Thanks Jame! It's awesome! I still smile whenever I go in there looking for something.
Now I have a NEW dilemma:
What you see in those brown boxes is a buncha food. As in, food storage food. Over 100 #10 cans of oats, rice, flour, beans, dried carrots, pudding mix, etc. It's all labeled (and yes, I realize some are outdated & need to be tossed) but it's not easy to get to. For example, what if I wanted to open one of those boxes underneath the peaches? I would have to first move 3 dozen quarts of canned peaches (HEAVY) plus whatever other boxes are on top of my goal. That doesn't sound like any fun to me (even though I would consider it to be my exercise for the day), and I think that's why a lot of this food is past its expiration date (that and the fact that I don't know what to do with beans).So I've decided that I really, REALLY want this:
which is available here on sale for only $367.99. Ouch. But it would seriously solve all of my #10 can issues and it holds as many as I already have in the house! I do want to save up for this and get it eventually, unless I can come up with a cheaper solution.So... got any ideas?
What do YOU do with all of your #10 cans?? Help!!
9 comments:
my mom just told me yesterday that those shelves were on sale at costco for half price! she's been looking at them for a long time too and didn't want to spend so much. Also - your closet if freakin' HUGE!
So jealous of your huge closet. That is one reason I want to move is for more closet space. I have absolutely no room for food storage so i have been lacking in that department which is not good. Yay, for a clean closet!
We have a pretty big master closet in this house - it was a requirement when we got a bigger house. It has become a breeding ground for junk too because I never have to clean it out. Your sister sounds awesome - I love brutally honest people.
As far as my food storage goes, I have a cupboard for my #10 cans. I have a few of each thing in there (including one open that I'm using). Then when I need more of something, I go to the huge pile of heavy boxes and get a few more. I only have to go to the heavy pile every few months to restock my cabinet. All of my boxes are dated and the oldest are on the top so it's really not that much work of heavy moving until I buy another box of the product. Does that make sense? I would LOVE one of those Shelf Reliance things, but I have no good place for it. I did hear (as someone else mentioned) that Costco sells them cheaper.
I am seriously coveting your closet.
We bought some of the small shelf reliance shelves for our pantry - the kind that you put on your shelves and they hold a few rows of cans. We hated them so much that as soon as we had them all filled up in the shelf, we emptied them, took them apart and brought them back to the store. They took up SO much space for the small number of cans they held. It made me wonder how I would really feel about the huge ones. You'll have to let me know if it's worth it when you do get it.
Update: tonight online I found a site where you can order plans for building your own shelves like these... $14.95 for the plans and then whatever lumber/hardware is needed. I showed it to Aaron and he says he could figure out himself how to make something similar ('cause he's handy like that).
Melanie: I have thought the same thing about the pantry can holders; it seems not worth the space. My idea for my big #10 rack is to have it in the back of my closet; there's plenty of room back there so I think it would be worth it. If/when it ever gets built I'll definitely take pictures!
Danika: when we get new kitchen cabinets someday and I have an extra top shelf (because I want to get cabinets that go all the way to the ceiling) I was thinking about doing the same thing; keeping a few cans of each food on that top shelf. I think that would work well.
I've got no ideas for you...just wondering what I could trade Jamie to come and do my closet. And mine is a lot smaller.
looks great! Makes me wish I had something I could barter with!
Nice post!! I love the title! It was quite the job, but I really did enjoy doing it. You were very good about throwing stuff out too. You can tell any of your readers (i.e. Meredith) that I am willing to clean any closet for anyone... if we can't find something to trade, I do accept cash or personal checks!
Oh man, jamie and I are cut from the same mold. I LOVE de-cluttering. The closet looks great. We have all of our #10 cans on some sweet shelves that nate built for me in my basement. (we don't have NEAR the amount you do, though)
Post a Comment