Attacking the Clutter that
Takes Over a House
In this column, Managing Editor
Shanna O’Mara and Graphic
Designer Karen Rockafellow
will try out a new activity, trend
or challenge each month and
share their experiences – good
or bad – with readers. This
month, in the spirit of spring
cleaning and from the socially
distanced comfort of their
homes, they attacked the most
cluttered area in their houses.
BY SHANNA O’MARA
Clutter, the messy collection of stuff
(LEFT) Bed Bath & Beyond’s Copco 18-inch non-skid cabinet lazy Susan trays make organizing spice bottles a breeze.
(RIGHT) With products from HomeGoods and tips from Marie Kondo, Karen successfully organized her bathroom closet.
everyone loves to hate. Clutter takes up
valuable room in a house and looks less
than perfect when guests come over, but
clutter is usually the product of years of memories. I’m generally a minimalist and
am quick to toss things I don’t use on a day-to-day basis, but I have a key fault.
Though it’s easy for me to throw away that ticket stub from last week’s movie or the
itinerary from last summer’s cruise, I can’t say the same for items of my childhood.
So where does my clutter live? Unfortunately for my parents, at their house. But
before you judge me, I’m not the worst daughter in the world. I visit them almost
every week and try to throw away or take things I left behind when I moved out. This
is especially important since my childhood home was also my mother’s childhood
home and her mother’s home before that. My great grandfather, grandparents,
aunts, parents, sister and I have all lived there throughout the years. That means
there are four generations’ worth of stuff in that house.
Ignoring the basement full of my great grandfather’s dusty chests and yellowing
pictures from my grandparents’ wedding, this month I headed upstairs to
the closet my sister and I shared when we were young. It has long been cleared of
clothes and shoes, but random trinkets remain in the tiny room my mom now wants
to convert into a bathroom.
Our closet always had two switches on the wall – one for the light and one
for the fan. I never questioned why a closet had a fan, especially when thunderstorms
would roll in and I would sleep on the oor with my dogs who preferred
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the white noise. But since she mentioned it was originally meant to be
a bathroom, it has clicked. People don’t generally ventilate their closets.
Anyway, I admittedly spent more time looking through photo albums
and trying to turn on old toys than I did cleaning. But with an inde-
nite period of time ahead of me to work from home and get this room
cleared out, I vow to myself, my mom and the contractor waiting to rip
up the carpet that I will detach from these objects and apply the same
minimalistic approach I take in my own home to this messy, nostalgic,
cluttered, safe-from-the-storms closet bathroom.
BY KAREN ROCKAFELLOW
Two of the smallest areas in the house seem to bring me the most
stress when I need to go looking for something in them.
First, there’s the bottomless pit that is my spice shelf. This single
shelf is piled high with endless small bottles – some expired, some never
used, all of which come out each time I have to look for a particular
spice that always seems to be on the very bottom or in the very back.
Months ago, I purchased Copco 18-inch non-skid cabinet lazy Susan
trays from Bed Bath & Beyond, and they were perfect for organizing that
chaotic shelf. I previously had a tiered stand in the corner, which I still
use for smaller bottles, but these turn tables have made looking for a
spice or seasoning so easy.
My second eye sore was always the bathroom closet. It’s a narrow
closet but has tons of shelves – shelves that always have things thrown
on them, especially the things that didn’t have a home. Because half of
the items in there are used daily and the other half are used as needed
(like when someone is sick), I would often lose track of inventory and
buy extra things, not realizing somewhere in the mess I already had a
bottle – or three. And again, so many things expired before getting used.
During my Marie Kondo obsession (highly recommend the books), I
bought a ton of smaller organizational baskets and boxes from Home-
Goods. I couldn’t help myself but to tackle that closet and get rid of so
many unnecessary, expired, no-clue-where-they-came-from things. I was
then able to divide up the items remaining into groups that made more
sense and use the baskets to keep them in their places.
62 APRIL 2020 | TheJournalNJ.com HOME IMPROVEMENT GUIDE 2020
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