New Years Day has come and gone. Are your resolutions intact? Did you resolve to straighten out that garage? Never fear! Here are some handy organizers for that unruly garage.

Unless you’re having Closets Unlimited to the entire job, you can get great use out of the deep shelves available these days for your garage. They are available in two depths. There are even corner shelves to make the most use of those corners. The heavy duty castors are available separately.

Another handy organizer, especially for those who have a lot of small items rather that large bulky stuff to store are  filebox systems. An entire garage with assorted paraphernalia can be stored and labeled and handily accessed as the need arises. Be sure to buy labels for your boxes. These systems are very easy to put together as well.

Bike Rack

For special stuff such as golf and other sports other organizers are also available. For bikes, of course there are various systems of storage to keep them readily available and off the floor.  Handy racks are available to store a couple of huge water bottles and for the uber-organized gift-wrap organizers.

Golf club Organizer

With all such storage readily available your garage should be spruced up in no time flat!

Book lovers love books until it comes to a time when there are books, books, books all over the place and it becomes evident that other forces need to come into play. The book lover now needs to choose from his books. Some will stay and some will have to go.

The book lover needs to make good habits right from the start. S/He needs to think twice before s/he buys once. Only those books need to be bought that s/he absolutely positively cannot do without.

That’s what libraries are for. Libraries have reading rooms. Read as much as you can there. Bring home only the ones you will read and read right through.

Now comes the task of sorting out your books. Collect the books from all nooks and crannies of your home. Establish a place for your books. You may have a few shelves or ceiling to floor bookcases.

Arrange your books on the shelves in groups. The non-fiction can be clustered together. Certain shelves can display your bestseller collections. Once you have a designated spot for your books you will tend to return them to those spots.

These days there are many book trading sites on the net. Some of these are Bookmooch, PaperBackSwap, TitleTrader, FrugalReader etc. These become ideal for finding fresh reading and lovingly disposing of books from your collection as well.

Assign an area for the books that you borrow from the library or friends. You might want to label these “Books in Rotation”.  These books do not have a permanent spot among your collection, but still have a designated area just for them.

Periodically sort through your collection. You might want to give your books new homes. There are always hospitals, local schools, libraries, shelters etc. who take book donations. There are many bookshops that also take old books. Other places one might consider are books for soldiers (www.booksforsoldiers.com), the international book project (www.intlbookproject.org/), (www.writeaprisoner.com/books-behind-bars/). Each library posts its own wish list. So you might want to take that into consideration.

De-clutter your own living space and bring reading into other deserving lives. Such a generous thought with the holidays fast approaching.

One final thought, you may want to affix custom stickers with your personal information so books loaned out find their way home.

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There are those who collect their photos in shoe boxes (time to start labeling) and albums and those who go totally digital. They use digital cameras, store and share their photos electronically. Of course, if you’ve been collecting for over 30 years or inherited some family collections, you might have a combination of photographs in albums, photo boxes and some photographs stored digitally.

Another excellent alternative to traditional albums is scrapbooks. Scrapbooking as a hobby has become the craze for women of all ages, in all walks of life, with varying levels of skills and abilities. For those not very artistically inclined, there are various how-to sites that have easy step-by-step instructions that can walk one through this seemingly monumental task and come up with very fancy scrapbooks to make for oneself or to give away as gifts. Whatever the final outcome one desires, organization of those photos is a must. Storage could be temporary or permanent, depending on the final objective in mind.

If your photographs are tucked away in envelopes and those in turn, stacked together in shoe boxes, you may want to sort them according to your preference, either by date or events. You may have, for instance, a large number of photographs of Cousin May’s wedding, or Grandma’s 80^th birthday which was in fact a family reunion of sorts and so on. These would be wonderful choices for an album or scrapbooking project.

Go through them, envelope by envelope. Weed through them, toss out photos out of focus or overexposed. Toss out those you don’t really care for and don’t serve any other purpose either. This will pare down the amount of organizing and labeling you will eventually need to do. Store these in suitable envelopes marked according to year or event.

Depending on your current level of organization you might need to get albums, photoboxes, scrapbooking material, acid-free and PVC free envelopes, acid-free photo-safe pencil or pen (available at photo processors and art-supply stores) etc.

Albums: Choose a style of album that goes with the kind of photos you would like to put in them and that go with your décor. Then get a number of them. Albums lined up six or seven of a color or style look much better than a bunch of assorted albums stashed together. Older photographs that you’ve collected or inherited should be safely stored in acid-free, archival quality environments. Albums should be stored preferably upright on shelves away from direct sunlight or humidity. The ideal temperature for albums is 65^o to 70^o F with a 50% relative humidity level.

Photo boxes: For temporary or permanent storage, choose good looking matched boxes that can be stacked on your shelves and add to your décor. Remove the photographs from their old envelopes, separate the negatives for separate storage. Put photographs in archival quality envelopes, label them according to year or event. Label the negatives appropriately and set aside. Once you have matched stacks of photographs and negatives, the photographs can go in photo boxes and the negatives can be stored in a fire-safe box. Even if you lose all your photographs, albums etc. your precious negatives will be safe.

Help turn home office hell into divine order.

First separate and categorize the paperwork. Half the chaos occurs from not physically separating personal from professional. Next categorize each pile and store in manila file folders. This helps you deal with the paperwork in small bites. It wrests the control from the paperwork mess to you. Now you decide what you’ll work on. You don’t get hijacked by the nearest sighted due bill or renewal notice.

To physically segregate use extra shelving, filing cabinets and bins.

If your desk is a virtual catchall, free it up as well for its intended purpose. Sort all papers that you need, toss out that expired notice that seemed so important at the time. Maybe it was important, you just couldn’t lay your hands on it. File all paperwork in the folders created and store in accordance with its purpose, in filing cabinet, on shelf or bin. For instance, you can house all home expenses and bills to one side and business materials and invoices on the other.

Next create a system for inflow and outflow. One option: Mount an inexpensive wire-mesh file to the left of the desk. Use it to keep track of paper flowing back and forth from the office. Use the upper slot as your Inbox. Store three manila folders labeled clearly: BILLS, Bank Statements and Filing. Toss bills, bank statements and papers to file in the appropriate file folder. The lower slot is your Outbox. Similarly tuck in outgoing mail, notes, any URGENT to do messages right there where it can be seen easily. Never leave behind anything you need to take with you to meetings, when you errands, anytime you leave your house any more! Stow right under it a portable filing box (shown in the picture next to the desk on the floor). Toss into it whatever you need to carry with you as you leave your house. Voila! no more running back to pick up things left behind or postponing chores just because all essentials are not with you to complete your errand.

Consolidate, consolidate, consolidate. Are there home office paraphernalia strewn all over your abode. Corral them all right at hand near your desk. Books can be stored right on the new shelves. How-to manuals for your computer can go right there next to the books. Office supplies can be a dull lot. Inject some oomph by coordinating magazine holders, file boxes and flat boxes.

Use bulletin boards to keep track of the various areas in your life.

Things rarely used can be archived. A future blog will give detailed instructions as to how you can do this safely and securely. Children’s report cards, artwork etc. can be stored in plain sight. Use labeled boxes for these and other things like stationery, waivers, and other business paperwork. Various boxes can be neatly stacked right on the shelves providing both organization and decoration.

Supplies used on an everyday basis can go into open trays where they can be readily accessed. Another box, basket or tray can be used (such as the pink basket in the picture) to store materials for a special project.

There you have it! Order out of chaos, and pretty to boot!

Fall’s here.  It’s the ideal time to take a good look at your closet.  Is it bursting at the seams?  Could it do with a makeover?  Let’s take a page from the experts.

All essentially spring clothes can be stored away to make room for the heavier sweaters of fall.  This is a good time to inspect all your clothes.  Do you need to pare them down?

Anything that doesn’t fit right, needs severe repair, doesn’t do much for you or your figure could summarily be dismissed to the Discard pile.  Good clothes that will be used through fall can be assigned to the Keep pile.  Closet makeover experts, Jesse Garza and Joe Lupo of Visual Therapy recommend an Archive pile.  This could be your storage pile plus any outfits of merely sentimental value.  You may never wear them but can’t bring yourself to throw.  These may include things like baby clothes, your wedding dress, your grandma’s gorgeous skirts from the home country.  The Archive pile has no place in your closet.  It needs to be relegated with other stored stuff to a little used room, a cool dry place in your basement or attic.

Jesse’s philosophy is we must “learn how to let things go back out into the universe. It’s the circle of life.”  Once the piles are made come the hard decisions.  From the Discard pile is there something someone else can use, should they be donated to the needy or tossed in the nearest garbage bag.  The archival pile and how they should be stored will be discussed in a later blog.  Now we need to deal with the Keep pile.

Double rods double up space for your clothes.  If you’re not very handy with a power drill or don’t know someone who is, you can opt for inexpensive hanging rods that hook onto the existing rods in your closet.

Now for the shelves above your rods:  Hopefully you have one or two of those.  This is where you can store three handy tools to corral your favorite slips, lingerie, trinkets, handbags, wallets etc.

Clear shoe boxes are excellent for storing rolled up slips, camisoles etc.  This keeps them from taking up hanging space and slipping off the hangers as they are wont to.  Square wicker or rush baskets or trays provide great storage for handbags, clutches, your gloves, wallets etc.  Keep your dressers clear and store your trinkets and baubles in small boxes housed in a large box clearly labeled according to your preference.

Line them up on your shelves as shown and stack your favorite cashmeres in between.

Storage Boxes

Once your closet has had its makeover, it becomes very easy to keep it lean, mean and a functioning machine for you.  All the pretty corralling tools with matching hangers for your clothes will have transformed your closet.  You will want to be keep it uncluttered and ship-shape.  The closet in its new avatar will itself be the motivating factor that will make you keep it in order.

Let’s face it: these days everyone wants attention for their company products and services. But if you’d like to have the advantage on your side – check out custom hologram stickers. You can easily add a hologram label to your product that customers won’t be able to look away from.

Not every product on the shelves has an attractive label – and many products just don’t have the up-to-the moment hologram label. Adding a hologram label gives your product a very “now” look that is perfect for the latest products, especially for youth-oriented products.

There’s a lot of competition out there on the shelves when a customer goes shopping. An attractive label makes a customer stop a few extra seconds to check your product out, see what it’s about. A hologram label is not something you see everyday – it’s unique and special because it is very of-the-moment.

Hologram labels can be customized to many sizes. Whether your product is large or small, a custom hologram label can be attractively designed to catch a customer’s eye and call attention to your product.

There’s nothing like a hologram label available today. The rainbow shimmers of the hologram label as it shines under the light. Customers love to roll your product back and forth, watching the label change color – as they learn more about your product and notice your cool label. “Hey, this product must be really cool if the label is this cool,” That’s what they’re thinking!