inspiration from o magazine

I was so excited when I pulled the March 2012 issue of O: The Oprah Magazine out of my mailbox. There was a huge banner emblazoned across the front cover that said, “De-clutter Your Life! How to tame your mess, calm your mind, lighten your load”. Sign me up! In fact, I was so excited by this issue that I abandoned my usual OCD magazine-reading process in which I start at the very beginning and read the whole issue in order to the very end (often in multiple sittings, but almost always in order). I flipped right to the article by my guru, Peter Walsh, entitled 7 Secrets of a Master Organizer. In the article, Peter takes the reader into his vacation home and shows seven ways that he increases storage in small spaces and eliminates clutter. He has such great ideas! I was immediately inspired to try out tip #2: focus your fridge. Since we have been cooking more at home, our refrigerator easily gets cluttered with leftovers, half-used products, etc. And even though I regularly re-organize it, it never seems to “take”. Peter’s method, using Fridge Binz, seemed like something that might make the difference for our frig. I was eager to give it a try.

the fridge before

First, I ordered the Fridge Binz from Container Store, using their click and pick-up system (which is a fabulous time-saver, by the way). Once I had the bins, I tackled the frig. I took everything out and cleaned the shelves, walls, and bins. Then I decided to re-evaluate the shelf set-up. I had never really changed that up in the ten years + we had been using this refrigerator. I thought about what typically gets “lost” and goes uneaten. I also thought about what O would like to have easier access too, since he wants to be a “big boy” and do everything for himself. I decided to put the stuff that easily gets lost or goes bad closer to person opening the fridge and the stuff we always use up (yogurt, water, beer) lower in the fridge and farther from you when you open the door. This required me to re-arrange the placement of some of the shelves and to eliminate one shelf all together. After I put everything back in, I thought that it might be best to actually label the shelves and bins this time around (plus I always look for an excuse to use my label maker). Voila! Here is the finished product. And it is really working well. Thanks to a little inspiration from Oprah and Peter!

the fridge after

my fridge binz