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Do you know how there’s always a room in our homes that becomes a dumping ground? Everything that has no home or things that should be in that room end up on the floor, no structure, nor the time to get the “dumping room” organized. 

In this month’s blog post, I’m sharing our own dumping ground transformation.  We have been in this house for 7 months and while we have been creating organization systems in our house and tackling DIY house projects (check out the Mudroom and Powder Room posts) the home office became a total mess.  Yes, friend! Even professional organizers have messes of their own and since we have been getting to know each other for quite some time already, we feel comfortable sharing our mess with you. 

Our home office needed the Sort Toss Repeat system to become accessible, beautiful, and functional.  For this space, we decided to treat it as if we were working with a client because as you can see from the before photo, this room needed the help of a professional. 

We began by setting the goal for this room, which was to create a home office that feels bright and creative in order for us to help our clients achieve their very own organizational goals. Then we set a budget and shopped our own home for things we already had.  For this project what we mainly needed was furniture because this is actually the first home office we have ever had.  While designing and space planning for the room, we kept in mind that this room needed to be functional not for just one person but for the entire family.  Mr. Sort Toss Repeat is a video game enthusiast and also needed a place where he can play his favorite video games, so keeping this in mind was necessary as we planned for space.

After setting our goal and agreement on a design and the best use of space, we started shopping around for furniture.  It was important for us to buy furniture that was functional and had plenty of storage.  Trying to find office furniture during a global pandemic is not as easy as we thought, it turned out that most of the furniture we wanted, was sold out and had backorder dates of months.  We were a little bit discouraged that most of the furniture couldn’t be purchased within reasonable time.  

We went back to the research process and while we were researching for desks options, we received an email from our friends at Flexispot introducing and offering their highly rated Height Adjustable Desks.  This was such a great surprise because I'm very familiar with ergonomic products.  Part of my previous job, before becoming a professional organizer was to conduct work-space assessments and recommended ergonomic accommodations solutions in order for employees to perform their jobs in an ergonomic environment.  Incorporating a sit-to-stand workstation in the new office space was the right choice.   

Here is the list of products we used to make the new office space accessible, beautiful and functional. 

• Flexispot sent us the Electric Stand up Desk Workstation in white and it couldn’t have been more perfect for the space and aesthetic goal we were going for.   

• Grey Velvet Office Chair from Amazon is comfortable and stylish. 

• For storage, we found the HAUGA storage solution from IKEA for each side of the desk. To the left is the HAUGA cabinet with doors where the printer fits in perfectly.  Behind the doors are the medium and large soft pink bins with handles as well as medium and large multipurpose bins.  To the right of the stand is the HAUGA chest with drawers which is perfect for the Cricut Explore Air2 office supplies, our cameras, and books. The IKEA HAUGA storage solutions were a total win for this space, they have the right amount of storage.  

• Because every office needs a paper organization system the Triple File Folder Organizer is excellent for keeping our office paperwork under control. 

• Speaking of cables, I totally dislike cables all over the floor so to conceal the power surge protector we got the Cable Management Box from Amazon.  Labeling each cord helps a lot to know what cable cord is for.

• For the office décor we decided to keep it minimal, the Flower Girl Picture or PJÄTTERYD from IKEA was the perfect size to cover the electrical panel on the wall.  Some greenery to purify the air, home organizing books, a candle and a small Eiffel Tower for decoration.

Once we had everything we needed to start this project, we got to work and applied the Sort Toss Repeat system to make the office accessible, beautiful, and functional! 

SORT. Bring it all out and sort likes with likes, create categories for easy access and space maximization.  Sort to design storage solutions and create systems based on your lifestyle. 

TOSS.  You get to choose what to toss.  If something is expired or no longer serving a purpose it will be up to you to toss or keep.  Recommendations are always made; however, the ultimate decision resides with you and your organizing journey.  It is important to properly and responsibly toss unwanted items, by donating, recycling, selling or re-gifting. 

REPEAT.  This system is applicable in any space of your home and an essential step before organizing a space. Organizing is a skill you can learn and a lifestyle worth adapting in order to live your best life surrounded by the things you love.  

How did we do friend? I hope you enjoyed this month’s blog post and are getting the inspiration to tackle your own projects.  When you are ready to start your own organizing project and don’t know where to start, we are offering complimentary video call consults to all our readers.

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Until next month,

STR