Get your home organized with tips  by Andy Elstein of Boot Butler

2015 is well under way! Was one of your new year's resolutions to get organized? Keep reading: Posh Beauty Blog sourced Andy Elstein of Boot Butler who provided the following excellent tips to help you get your home organized and keep it that way.

Bedroom closets

●     Drawers

              ○     Only use drawers for socks, underwear, and other items that can sit neatly on a shelf. Foldables such as sweaters, jeans, folded dress shirts are better stored on shelves because they provide better visibility and access, and drawers tend to cause wrinkles where the folded garments meet the sides of the drawer.

●     Shoes

           ○     To maximize your space, use flat adjustable shelves, and space the shelves just far enough apart to fit your shoes.

           ○     Alternate the shoes to face toe in, toe out, so that the wider toe box is next to the narrower heel of the adjacent shoe. This saves about ¾ to 1 inch per pair of shoes which might not seem like much, but it adds up over several pairs of shoes across a shelf.

           ○     Avoid shoe cubbies whenever possible, they lack adjustability, can generally can only accommodate certain shoe styles, are a pain to keep clean.

●     Boots

             ○     While you're at it, organize that pile of expensive boots that have been degenerating on the floor with Boot Butler.

             ○     Boot Butler organizes your boots in half the space, and keeps them looking like new. It's the perfect way to utilize the new-found space at the bottom of your closet, and top off your closet overhaul!

●     Hanging

             ○     Stop wasting the space below your hanging clothing. Most people's closets contain a shelf, and a garment rod located between 64 and 72 inches from the floor; but 80% of of the average wardrobe only hangs down 25 to 40 inches below the rod...That means you're probably wasting between 25 and 40 inches of valuable space between the bottom of your clothing and the floor!

■     One of the biggest space saving improvements you can make to such a closet is to add a second garment rod to create double hanging. This can as much as double the capacity of your closet. The easiest way to do this is by purchasing an accessory often commonly called a Closet Doubler. Essentially, it's a rod that hangs from your existing closet rod. There are lots of options available under $20, but my favorite is this one that I purchased from Bed Bath and Beyond (pictured below with Boot Butler). I really like the fact that it's adjusts both vertically, and horizontally. Here are some more examples.

               ○     Hang your pants folded over the bar of a hanger rather than lengthwise so that they can fit into short hanging.

●     Hampers

             ○     Add several hampers to separate colors and drycleaning so that you don’t have to go through a giant pile to separate thing when it’s laundry time. This will also reduce the risk that an item gets rewined because it ended up in the wrong pile during the sorting process.

●     Purses

            ○     Use shelf dividers as though their bookend to keep your purses organised and standing upright on a shelf.

             ○     If your closet has some empty wall space where you can’t afford to put anything too deep, mount hooks to hang your purses.

●     Use the back of the door(s)

If you have a hinged/swing type door(s) on your closet, that’s a great place to mount any of the following:

■     Hooks (If you ever drape a piece of clothing you’re not finished with over a doorknob or piece of furniture, you need some hooks!)

■     Tie and Belt racks

■     Full length mirror

Pantry

●     One of the most useful things you can add to your pantry are rollout trays. Use them for storing items that don’t take up the full depth of your shelves, like cans, jars, bottles, and small boxes. By keeping these items on rollouts you’ll have great access and visibility of all your stuff, without having to leave a lot of room between the shelves to allow access to the items in back---or worse, the items in back just sit until one day when you need them for a recipe, you go to the trouble of digging them out only to find that they’re expired!

○     Make use of the space on the back of the door - this applies to closets with swing type (hinged) door(s).

■     Use shallow wire racks that mount to the back of the door to hold shallow items such as spices, cans, and jars that might otherwise get buried on a shelf.

■     Add a bulletin board on the back of the door to post a paperwork related to upcoming events, coupons you plan to use, etc.

Foyer/Mud closets

●     Add 50% more hanging space by splitting the hanging into half long hang (for long coats) and half double hang (for shorter jackets)

●     Use the back of the door(s) for hooks or a mirror to make it easy to give yourself a once over before leaving the house in the morning.

Laundry room

●     Mount a hanging rod above the dryer so that you can hang clothing right as it comes out of the dryer.

●     Place shelves or a cabinet above the washer to store detergent, fabric softener, stain remover, etc.

●     If this is the area that you do your ironing, hang your ironing board on the door or a wall that isn’t suitable for something deeper.

●     If you have a laundry tub (i.e. utility sink), mount a rod above that as well to provide a convenient place to drip dry garments over the sink.

General

●     Make a new rule (This goes for everyone, and every closet in the house!): From now on, every time you get a new item goes into a closet, an older item that you no longer use comes out...you're not allowed to put the new item away until an old one is removed (I suggest donating them to good will, and be sure to get a receipt so that you can write it off at efile tax time).

Images courtesy of  Bhg.com // Petagazine.com // Womansday.com //Secondchancetodream.com// Wayfair.com // Rubbermaid.com

How are you staying organized in 2015? Leave your comments below!