Cardboard boxes are so easy to acquire for free. Apart from boxes we’ve collected from buying products packaged in them, we’ve also gotten them from local supermarkets, hardware stores and bottle shops. Sometimes these places have an area where they leave boxes for anyone to take. Other times I’ve just asked at the customer service desk and they have usually been happy to set some aside for me collect later.
Here are three ways I’ve put these to use for creating effective household storage solutions.
Under-couch storage
These were the boxes from trays of cherry tomato and strawberry punnets which I picked up from a local fruit and veg shop. They fit nicely under our couches and house our cloth nappies, wipes and other miscellaneous items. You could also use these for under-bed storage, or if your bed base is tall enough you could use larger boxes with or without lids.
Book shelf compartments
Storing the kids’ books neatly on this set of shelves had been a bit of a battle. With all their books fitting on one long shelf, they would often end up shoved back in fairly sloppily, in no particular order and require some digging to find any particular one. I had been dreaming of cube shelving, so that there would be multiple small compartments which the books could be divided between according to categories. But a lack of funds for such a thing managed to drive me to this idea, which has actually ended up working absolutely fine! I simply got three wine boxes, taped the top shut and chopped the sides off them and voila! One shelf divided into 4 compartments – 3 boxes and the space left on the end where I couldn’t fit another wine box. One each for Enid Blyton, classic literature and readers, religious books and a miscellaneous section for the rest of the books that didn’t fit in one of the other categories. The kids learned the system immediately and now return books to the correct section when packing up. Problem solved!
Drawer dividers
Another one to help the kids put their own stuff away neatly. This one is in one of my son’s clothes drawers and he’s got one box for socks and another for singlets and undies. My daughter has one for each of socks, undies and hair ties and accessories. They aren’t capable of arranging things neatly in their drawers, but they can easily dump items in a box.
Originally posted 2016-12-26 15:00:48.