Help me organize? Here is what I have:

[Sue G in PA]

In our dining room/school room I have a 5-shelf, built in bookcase. This is where we do most of our schooling. Right off the dining room, in the hall is a linen closet converted to game closet/art supply/etc. closet. 3 deep shelves with space beneath (enough to fit a 3-drawer cart which we have in there already). In office/laundry room is my desk, 2 5-shelf bookcases, 2 6-drawer carts and one 5 drawer cart and a baker's rack. I have several 12x12 3-drawer plastic containers and crates where I keep each child's stuff/books, etc. I'm just at a loss as to what sort of materials to put where, kwim? I'm probably making no sense but I just need some ideas. What do you put where? My desk also has 2 shelves on it for books, etc. I just need homes for everything!

[Food4Thought]

What kind of stuff do you need to organize? Now that you know what type of space you have, maybe you could make a similar list of things that need a home. Put the things you use most often in the most convenient places. Things you use less often (like curriculum for later in the year or rarely used science supplies) can go in the harder to reach places. ??

[ElizabethB]

If you need more shelves for cheap, someone shared this link with me, it looks cool, if she can do it, so can you! (You notice I said you, not me. I might kill myself or something if I tried to make anything.)

 

http://www.knock-offwood.com/search/label/bookshelves

 

Also, if you are even less handy that that, you can buy used things and paint them all white and then they will sort of match. None of our stuff matches anything else and we just don't worry about it anymore. (Actually, I don't think we ever did...)

 

We have varying arrangements for things each move that depend on the layout of the house.

 

I like to keep everything I'm using for the year on separate shelves so I can ID it and find it easily, the rest of my books and reference materials go elsewhere (Ideally, all in one room. Here, they are all in one room. Some places, our bookshelves do not fit well all in one room, in which case, we generally separate "my" books from my husband's books. Whose books are whose changes, though! He "stole" my Federalist and anti-Federalist papers and other reference materials during a one year school a few years abo where he needed that sort of thing, I recently "stole" all that back plus some things for reference for our homeschooling.)

 

It's easier when you have like stuff with like stuff. Group your things and separate, put things in the spots that fit their size.

 

Don't let anyone else set it up for you!! Once, I let my dad arrange our books, I should have let him arrange the kitchen instead, it would have been less painful. My husband does a better job than my dad did, but it's easiest to find the books when I'm the one putting them away.