"Green" Organizing

Happy Tuesday! Sorry, I’ve been MIA from the blog lately…we’ve had a lot going on! Hopefully, I can get back to tackling my to-do list and sharing more organizational projects with you.

I’ve learned that sometimes a project sounds much better in my head than it does in actuality. I remember reading a post around Earth Day on my favorite blog about creating organizational containers out of items you already have around the house (here). I really liked this idea of organizing electrical and printer cords in separate “tubes” made from toilet paper rolls. If you’re like us, it seems like everything you buy today comes with more cords to add to our collection.

To get started, (after saving TP rolls for several weeks) I pulled out the “Electronics/Cables” box. It may all be contained in a neat little box, but it was a mess!!

I actually got the Hubs on board to go through the bundles and eliminate those cords that we no longer need. I was surprised we eliminated so many! Of course, one of my assistants had to oversee the project....

Now, I just have to find an electronic recycling program to donate this pile to!

I was left with a lot less cords than I planned, but I still went ahead with the project. Because I can’t just live with TP rolls the way they are, I used Mod Podge to disguise cover them with scrapbook paper. This was my first experience using Mod Podge and I kind of liked it…got me thinking about a lot of future projects.

After covering the TP rolls and letting them dry, I dedicated one cord to each roll. But…then I discovered that one roll was not large enough to store some of the thicker/longer cords, so I doubled up on the rolls for those.

Next, I used my handy label maker to label each cord for quick and easy locating when we need it.

I then put everything neatly back in the box. Once finished, I was a little bummed because it didn’t look as neat as envisioned. But, I was still happy overall with the project because in doing it, we were able to eliminate a lot of unnecessary clutter…so even though it didn’t make me as giddy as expected, I guess it wasn’t a total fail after all!