December tiny projects challenge: Day 4

Today’s tiny project was the organizer on the desk in my home that I call the household desk. My husband and I each have home offices with desks, but this desk is in a central room in our living space and stuff definitely tends to accumulate there. This teak organizer that is a clutter magnet (and such organizers often are).

So I decided declutter and organize this little space, which I probably haven’t been done in a few years.

Here’s the before shot (please don’t judge):

I started in the top shelf on the left of the organizer and just worked my way through. I went through each shelf, slot and drawer, editing as much as possible. I threw away a number of old items (like business cards for contractors we didn’t choose and expired Airborne gummies). I relocated a number of things to my office, which helped a lot.

Here’s the after shot:

Probably the most helpful thing I thought of was to move the face masks that I would just toss on the organizer on a doorknob. There’s a door just to the left of the desk that opens in and almost always remains open. So I hung the masks by their earlobes on the inside doorknob, where they’re accessible but unobtrusive. And since I’ll surely go to the desk for a mask, they will be nearby.

Here are some of the other things I did that were easy to do and so effective in cleaning up this space:

• I moved the blood pressure cuff to my office, where I’m likely to remember to use it.
• I put Bix’s clickers for dog training in a little felted wool bowl I’d knitted
• I tested all the pens and removed most of them, so I would have easier access to pens when I needed them. (The pen holder was too full!) And I used a glass I was going to donate as a pen holder rather than less attractive red one I’d bought in the 90s.
• I moved one of my action figures (Robert Mueller) to my husband’s office, because three worked in that space, but four didn’t.
• I had an inordinately large number of wristlets and wallets (always searching for a solution). I gathered them up and moved them to a different space downstairs. I should probably donate most of them.
• Best of all, I got rid of the expired Bed, Bath and Beyond coupons, since they no longer accept expired coupons.

This one took longer than I expected—probably 40 (very pleasant) minutes. But I’m enjoying the results!