Operation: Organization 2015 – Abby from Just a Girl And Her Blog’s Organized Office

We’re so happy to have Abby from Just a Girl and Her Blog guest posting today as part of Operation: Organization 2015.  She has a fabulous sense of style and we know that you’ll find her project inspiring.

As a reminder, please pin from Abby’s blog, and don’t forget to scroll down to the bottom to enter our giveaway for a set of three round gold monograms!

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Hey there, 11 Magnolia Lane readers! I’m Abby from Just a Girl and Her Blog, where I write about organization, home decor, creative ideas and random happy thoughts. 🙂 I’m so thrilled that Amy and Christy asked me to come visit with you all today!

When I started taking this whole blogging thing seriously, I realized that I was going to need a home office space to work, photograph projects, and store supplies. I took over the third bedroom in our house, but unfortunately the room wasn’t doing me much good because it looked like this:

Hello, hot mess! I knew my space needed a makeover stat, and along the way I came up with 5 essentials that truly helped me organize my home office.

1. Mix Accessible with Covert

When I set out to organize my home office space, I knew that I wanted to have all of my supplies readily accessible so that I didn’t have to go searching through tons of drawers and bins every time I needed something. I also knew that I didn’t want to revert back to the huge mess I had before, so I did a little mixture…

I ultimately decided on a blend of open shelving using bookshelves (to which we added crown molding to give them a more custom look) and a few baskets and bins to keep the clutter at bay. This allowed me to grab what I needed quickly and easily without having to set everything out in the open. This method also worked especially well because I was sure to…

2. Label, Label, Label!

I may be just a teensy bit obsessed with labeling. I think it helps keep things in their place and makes it easier to find what you need too! For the baskets and storage bins, I purchased silver bookplates and printed labels from my computer to fit inside.

For most of the smaller storage vessels on the shelves, I used my Silhouette Cameo cutting machine to cut words out of adhesive vinyl and adhered them to the jars and pails.

I can find what I need, and it looks pretty too! 🙂

3. Use Vertical Space

This room isn’t extremely large and I wanted it to serve a bunch of different functions, so I tried to maximize use of my vertical space as much as I could. Along with the tall bookshelves, my handy hubby installed a pegboard, which was the perfect spot to store my decoupage, paint, pens, pencils, and markers, and even ribbon!

 

These IKEA kitchen storage pieces were perfect for holding all of the paint! And speaking of that…

4. Corral Everything

If it can be corralled into a bin, dish, container, or other storage vessel, do it! This not only helped me keep like items together, but it also just made it look nice and neat! Instead of throwing everything in a drawer, I used a divider to separate the supplies so everything had a spot.

Paint brushes have their own vessel (which was actually made to be a vase), and even sweets have a little pail of their own. {Because duh! 😉 }

5. Ditch the Filing Cabinet

Finally, you may have noticed that there is no filing cabinet in the room. That would be because our house is completely paperless. Well, we have paper for the boys to color on and I use printables to keep me organized. But all of our bills, medical and insurance paperwork, receipts, and even Christmas cards and some artwork from our sons are scanned in and stored electronically (primarily in Evernote).

We do keep paper copies of the bare essentials like our social security cards, birth certificates, and marriage license, but everything else is electronic. This totally eliminates paper clutter and gives us more space to work because we’re not dealing with filing cabinets. Yippee! {If you’d like to know more about our paperless system, pop over and check out this post!}

 

I could go on and on because organization makes me giddy and I love to talk about it, but I’ll leave you with just my top 5 for now! 🙂 If you’re interested in seeing the full reveal of my Fabulously Feminine Home Office, you can do so here.

Thanks so much for the fabulous 11 Magnolia Lane ladies for having me and thank YOU for reading! I’d love to have you over for a visit to Just a Girl and Her Blog— hope to “see” you there!

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Abby, that is just a beautiful space–thanks so much for sharing it with our readers!  I am going to check out Evernote RIGHT NOW, because I hate filing and paper clutter!

Here is the line-up for Operation: Organization 2015:

January 16~ Mallory from Charming in Charlotte
January 19~ Becky from This is Happiness
January 21~ Abby from Just a Girl and her Blog
January 24~ Samantha from Simply Organized

January 26~ Amanda from Dixie Delights
January 27~Aniko from Place of My Taste
January 28~ Paige from The Pink Clutch
January 29~ Melissa from A Prudent Life
 

 You can follow all the Operation:Organization goings-on via Pinterest HERE and Instagram HERE.

  And…our January Pretty Preppy Party is open until next Thursday, so link up all your projects!     And here’s our giveaway for a set of three round gold monograms:  

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Thanks for stopping by!