Monthly Organizing Challenge: Under the Sink

Last week, I talked about wanting to create more interaction with all of you here on the blog. I hope you’ll sign up to follow me on Facebook, Instagram, or Pinterest! I’m here today with another fun way that we can all interact: A Monthly Organizing Challenge!

Each month, I plan to present a new challenge to organize a space in our homes. I’ll show you what I did in my own space and give you some ideas on how to get started in yours. Then, as you complete the challenge, we can share our results with one another. If you have an Instagram account, please share your monthly organizing photos using the hashtag #ocomonthlychallenge. You are also welcome to leave comments on each month’s post about what worked and didn’t work for you, and I encourage you to leave me some ideas on what spaces you’d like to see featured in upcoming months. So what do you say? Will you accept my challenge?
This month, I chose the area under the kitchen sink. This is one of the hardest places for me to keep organized. Here is a before shot of this space in our house.

It is cluttered with multiple open bottles of the same products, old products that might not even be usable anymore, and items that really don’t belong in this space.

To start this project, let’s remove everything from the space. 

Once it’s empty, wipe it down so it’s nice and clean. 

Then, go through your items and determine which of four categories each item belongs to: 

• return to the space
• return to a different space
• donate
• trash/recycle

When you’re finished dividing up the items, take the trash/recycle items to their designated containers right away. Feeling better already?

Let’s go back to the items remaining in the return to space category. If your space is like mine, you may need to consolidate like items. (I had three open bottles of dish soap and two open bottles of carpet spot cleaner.) 

Now that you have an idea of what needs to go back in the space, you can assess what types of storage containers are going to be most helpful. 

For this space, I decided on two major storage solutions. 

First, I hung a tension rod across the top half of the cabinet. This creates easy storage for spray bottles and keeps them up out of the way. If you have a lot of bottles, closet rod sockets are super easy to install and will prevent your tension rod from slipping.

I picked up my tension rod and the closet sockets at my local Meijer store with a 15% off coupon, spending just $5. (If you don’t have a Meijer near you, I’m sure you can find these items at Walmart or a home improvement store.)

Second, I moved a metal sliding drawer from our master bath cabinet. It doesn’t get utilized in that space and I think it will work much better under the kitchen sink. I used it to hold rags, dish soap, sponges, and a few products that can’t hang on the tension rod.

I also hung a simple command hook in the cabinet to hang the dish drying mat out of the way when it’s not in use.

When your storage containers are in place, return your keep items to the space. When you’ve got everything you want to keep put away, take the items that you determined belonged in a different space and put those away. 

I find it best to take care of these items last because, chances are, if I take a group of items into another room, I will get distracted organizing something in that room instead of finishing the project I started.

I showed off the space to my mister and he asked what I was going to do with all that open space? I said, “Nothing!”

So, now it’s your turn! I’m challenging you to organize the area under your sink over the next 30 days. 

I strongly encourage you to schedule the project into your calendar. If you don’t have time to complete it all at once, break it into parts and schedule each of those parts. It might only be 10 to 15 minutes here and there, but you have 30 days to get it finished!

Don’t be shy. Share your spaces on Instagram to encourage and motivate others! I can’t wait to see them!

What spaces do you find are most difficult to keep organized?

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Fridge Liners for Under $10

Refrigerators can be a breeding ground for science projects. Without some sort of organization, food can get lost in the back corners never to be found. Well at least not until we go digging through things trying to figure out where that smell is coming from...

I try to give our fridge a quick clean-out each week on trash day so that food doesn't sit in our trash receptacle for a week breeding its own germs and horrible smells. This also helps me as I prepare our menu plan to see what food I need to use up to avoid it going to waste.

In addition to these weekly quick clean-outs, I try to do a full cleaning of the fridge once a month. I take everything out of the fridge, wipe the shelves and drawers down, and return everything in a more organized fashion. The last month or two kind of got away from me though and I was left with this mess.

It's not a bad thing to have a fridge full of food. Unless you can't find anything and all that food goes bad.

One of the reasons I have fallen behind in cleaning out the fridge is that it takes some time to empty everything out, remove the drawers and shelves, wipe everything down, and return everything. But, unfortunately, to get to all the stuck on messes and crumbs, that process is often necessary. To help combat this problem, I started looking at refrigerator shelf and drawer liners. To cover my fridge, it would cost around $30 and I just wasn't willing to spend that much.

On a recent trip to our local Dollar Tree, a light bulb went on when I saw some cute cheery vinyl place mats. 

I hurried home to measure our fridge and then went back and grabbed 7 of the place mats for $7. 

I started my cleaning project by filling the kitchen sink with hot soapy water. This way, I could wipe down all the shelves and drawers easily and also wash any containers that got emptied as I went.

I worked on one shelf at a time, removing the items, wiping down the shelf, measuring and cutting the place mats to line the shelf, and then returning the items. The place mats cut super easy with a rotary cutter and mat. I also used a yard stick to keep my lines straight.

I tossed all of the expired items and rearranged the shelves and the door compartments so that like items were together - drinks on one shelf, condiments on another, left overs together, etc.

With all the place mats in place and everything organized with other like items, things looked so much better! The fridge is bright and cheery and when messes do happen, I just have to pull out the dirty place mat, wipe it down with a damp cloth, and return it to its spot!

For just $7 and about an hour on a Saturday afternoon, our refrigerator is a much happier (and healthier place).

For other kitchen organization tips, check out my Pinterest board: Kitchen Organization

How do you keep your fridge clean and organized? Have you had a light bulb moment at the dollar store?

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How I Organized Our RV For Under $40

After spending nine days in our new-to-us RV, it was clear that some organizing systems were going to be necessary. Thankfully, organizing doesn’t have to be expensive.

When I need an organizing item, I shop my house first. Then, if necessary, I go to the dollar store or the thrift store with an open mind, and I usually can find something that will work. Sometimes finding a way to use a product other than for what it was originally intended will save you tons of moo-lah.

For example, I wanted to use an over the door shoe organizer in the bathroom to store toiletries, but the ones I found were too wide or too long or too expensive. Instead, I found a jewelry organizer for just $6 that works perfectly. It hangs on an over-the-door hook we already had.

To maintain order in the medicine cabinet, I picked up some narrow pencil baskets at the dollar store (3 for $1) to corral items and keep them in place while we travel. 

And, to avoid packing 7 different bottles of medicine every time we go camping, I also grabbed a weekly pill organizer from the dollar store and filled each pod with a different over-the-counter medicine – Advil, Benedryl, Pepto Bismal, etc. – labeling it clearly with a Sharpie.

A dollar store toothbrush holder with a little Velcro holds our toothbrushes and cups easily accessible on the counter and keeps them in place.

In the bedroom area, I found a couple fabric boxes lying around the house unused so I stashed those in the over head cabinets to hold things like bathing suits and pajamas. 

We had some hanging shoe organizers stuffed into a closet in our basement and, even though I’ve cleaned out those closets multiple times, I just couldn’t bring myself to ever get rid of them. I grabbed them and hung them in the hanging storage area and they now hold extra sheets, towels, and tablecloths.

I call hanging on to things part-hoarding, part-proactive thinking. The Mister calls it a gift. That’s why I love him.

Our food storage cabinets were organized with some baskets and bins from the dollar store keeping things from sliding around while traveling and making it much easier to find those marshmallows when it’s s’more time!

The first time I opened the refrigerator door after driving to our very first camping destination, I looked like a poorly trained circus juggler so I added some more baskets and bins in there and everything stayed exactly in its place on our next trip!

We really do camp with more than water and beer.... :)

We put our super old (and super small) TV/VCR combo in the trailer in case we have rainy days and feel like watching a movie. Our movie selection got slid into an overhead space. A tension rod ensures everything stays in place while we’re cruising down the road while a Velcro strip holds the remote in place when it’s not in use.

Deciding on my favorite organization tool in the RV is a tough one, but it definitely comes down to the paper plate dispenser and the sock organizer. 

I’ve never been more excited about a sock organizer in my life.

I used the sock organizer to hold our glasses, cups, and mugs in place; they didn’t budge! 

But, the paper plate dispenser does save so much cupboard space and makes it super easy to grab a plate when working in the kitchen or grabbing a quick snack. I say it’s a tie!

Our melamine plates did slide around a lot on our first trip so I was looking for something that would keep them all together and in place. I found a used Martha Stewart desk organizer at the thrift store for $2 and the plates fit perfectly!

To save counter space, I grabbed a shower caddy from the dollar store and hung it on the kitchen wall with a command hook. It's now our fruit holder! 

Our pots and pans are corralled under the sink and the lids are slid into a paper filing rack for easy access. Everything is kept in its place with a couple tension rods which can easily be removed while we’re settled into a camp site and put back in when it’s time to travel.

The tall cupboard by the entry has a ton of space but things often get lost because it is such a deep cupboard. Foil, plastic wrap, and sandwich bags are kept together and close to the front in a used magazine rack. 

Plastic bags for trash or doggy messes are kept in a dollar store cereal container.

A silverware organizer keeps things like solar lights, match lighters, and small tools handy in a way that keeps them from sliding all over.

The under the table storage is contained with two laundry baskets from the dollar store. While they work great, I might seek out some rectangular baskets to better utilize that space in the future.

I found some wall hooks at the dollar store and thought they'd work great to hang our dirty shoes on instead of them being strewn across the floor and tripped on. Since I wasn't 100% sure they would work, I didn't want to screw them into the wood paneling so I grabbed a couple more command hooks to hang them. Surprisingly, they worked great!

Outside, some heavy duty command hooks keep our cords and hoses off the floor in the under-storage area, making room for camp chairs and other larger items.

We used large utility hooks, often used to hold brooms or mops, to store our kayak paddles and broom on the side of our under-storage area. They are now out of the way and protected from being squashed by heavier items we stow under there. It’s not always good to be short vertically challenged, but for installing these hooks, it was a huge blessing.

$40 later our RV is adequately organized! For more RV organization tips, be sure to follow me on Pinterest!

How do you keep your camping gear in order? What items do you use outside of their intended purpose?

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and at

I'm An Organizing Junkie
http://orgjunkie.com/2014/09/eliminate-clutter-organized-rv-efficient-craft-room.html