The Secretary - A Solution for Grand Central

I am recently giving in to the fact that, if my organizing system is not designed around the way my family actually lives, it is most likely not going to work. For example, we have a designated home office upstairs complete with file cabinet, bookshelves, supplies etc. Nonetheless, we have a collection of mail, school supplies, an electric pencil sharpener, not to mention everything ever invented that needs to be charged scattered around our kitchen. The fact is, my husband and I often prefer to be on our laptops downstairs, and the likelihood of any of us developing the habit of running the mail up a flight of stairs to be sorted every day is,.... well, it's not going to happen. Enter the Secretary.

We had one of these when I was little, but it was more of a decorative piece that anything. This modern version comes with an electrical strip in the bottom cabinets so phones and laptops can be charged on the desk without the unsightly wires. That fed the OCD monster just a little, I'll admit. Now we have a designated place for a lot of odds and ends that just landed in the kitchen. We have three slots for the mail: H-Holly, B-Bills, and R-Rod. Magazines go into a basket in the living room to be read (hopefully, last month's edition can be purged at the same time), and everything else is recycled.

Camera and stationery are kept in the lower cabinets, along with a folder I don't want upstairs because I need to get to it ASAP. It holds all the advertisements I've collected over the past 2 months on summer camps for the boys, and I need to get them booked!

The best part about the new system is that I've reclaimed some valuable kitchen real estate. Two prime counters and one large drawer, to be exact.

Prime Counter,

Prime counter,

Large drawer. I chose to use it for our knives so that no one has to risk his or her fingers groping around for a coffee spoon in the morning. (Ahem.) Oh yes, and I'm sure it's a child safety thing, too. And too bad I did not think to replace the ugly drawer paper while I was at it. Baby steps.

Speaking of baby steps, there is still one area of the kitchen not yet reclaimed by any system. It's my hubby's favorite "laptop spot" at the bar.

Not reclaimed.

"Do one thing every day that scares you." - Eleanor Roosevelt