Tips For Organizing Your Bathroom

What You Do:

Step 1: Throw it away. Any time you attempt to organize any aspect of your life, you must come to terms with the possibility of throwing things away. This may be even more difficult when organizing your bathroom (especially for women). Toiletries and makeup can be expensive. But you may find your sanity is worth more than the half empty bottles of foundation that don’t match your skin tone.

• Throw away anything past its expiration date. If you’ve got expired medicine, don’t flush it down the toilet because the chemicals can leak into the public water supply. Toss it into a small bag, then double bag it and toss into a larger garbage bag, away from children and pets.

• If something doesn’t have an expiration date, throw it away if it has an odd odor, or if you can’t remember when you bought it…or the last time you used it.

• Throw away anything that has rust or corrosion, like clippers, eye-pencil sharpeners, etc.

• If you have make-up you’ve never used because you didn’t like the colors for example, donate it to a high school theater department.

Step 2: Organize the medicine cabinet. Your medicine cabinet (the one above your sink, if you have one) should have shelves. This makes life especially easier if you share a house or apartment with others and would like to have your own shelf for your own items.

• In your medicine cabinet, neatly arrange your toothbrush, toothpaste, dental floss, and any other items you grab for in the morning such as cotton swabs, your favorite eye cream, aspirin for that hangover, and the bottle of vitamins you take in the morning.

• Only put the items you USE on a daily basis in the medicine cabinet. This is your easy access cabinet to help make your life a lot easier when you’re rushing to get ready in the morning; it’s everything at arms’ reach but arranged neatly in a row.

Step 3: Organize the Drawers. Take everything out of every drawer and/or shelf and clean each before putting anything back.

• Make two piles or use boxes to separate everything. Start with one pile/box for things you want to keep and another for throw-aways.

• Plastic drawer separators can be a big help. The same type of organizers you use for silverware can also prove helpful for your hair ties and clips.

• If you want to be an organization superstar, you can also organize your makeup by frequency of use.

• Keep the special, evening eye shadows in the back and the more often used shades in the front.

• Fellas, if you’re stockpiling old cologne bottles with one squirt of your favorite scent, toss them; let it go.

Step 4: Stick remaining items to the wall. If counter top space is limited and you don’t have a medicine cabinet, you can secure items such as your hair brush, hand-held mirror, electric toothbrushes, anything with a flat surface to the wall (courtesy-Debbie De Spirt). You can buy Velcro® with sticky sides fairly cheap at most home improvement stores. One to try: 3M Dual Lock Re-closable Velcro.

Step 5: Organize shelves. If you have exposed shelving, buy matching containers that fit on them. Have fun with color blocking or keep things simple with some tasteful wicker baskets.

• If you don’t have shelves you can purchase chic or fun mobile shelves at any store with a housewares section.

• If you’re on a budget, try Target. They have reasonable priced sets that don’t look cheap! Shelves and baskets assist with hiding your products and keeps them organized, separate and out of your way.

Step 6: Organize shower and tub. Keep your shower nice and clean by purchasing hanging organizers/caddies.

• Most organizers hang neatly over the shower head but you can also hang them from a hook at the back of your shower. Command® Strips and Hooks hold on most surfaces and won’t damage your walls when you’re ready to remove the hooks.

• Try to keep shampoo, shower gel, and other bottles off the flat surfaces in the shower. This provides a party place for mold and fungus to hang out. Also, you’ll need to replace your shower organizer about once a year. They can get moldy too.

Step 7: Reduce mildew. Try not to let wet towels accumulate on the bathroom floor. Keep a separate laundry hamper or basket near your shower for dirty laundry.

• Decorate your bathroom with matching hampers and waste baskets.

• A matching liquid soap dispenser will cut down on messy soap residue. But if you still want to use bar soap, find a cute holder, don’t just leave it on your counter-tops. Not only is it unsightly, but it can also discolor your counter-top.

Step 8: Organize the cabinet or area under your sink. Keep cleaning products under the sink or any other place away from makeup or other toiletries. If something should leak you don’t want it all over your beauty or hygiene products. If there isn’t space in the bathroom, keep them under the kitchen sink.

Step 9: Tend to that spare cabinet. If you’ve got another bathroom cabinet or larger medicine cabinet,  now would be a great time to empty it out, dust it entirely and line the bottom with waterproof shelf liner or contact paper.

• Divide the cabinet into three sections with three plastic transparent bins (small enough to fit under the sink and large enough to fit what you need them to fit).

• You need one section to keep your spare toilet paper, stacked neatly inside first transparent the box and easy to reach for when you need it.

• You need another section will be for you to place a box filled with your extra toothpaste, wrapped bars of soap, toothbrushes, razors, and any other item you use to groom yourself. A final section will be a box filled with your lotions, creams, makeup items and any other cosmetic products.

• The reason for the plastic boxes is to prevent your toiletries from getting wet in case your sink leaks or your bathroom floods.

• A word to the wise: don’t keep unnecessary items you don’t use under the sink. You’ll probably forget about them anyway.

TIP: Remember, some guests like to go through your cabinets. Keep all medications or anything your nosy friend might want to snoop through in a different location, like a second bathroom or cabinet elsewhere in the house. if you have children and/or pets make sure all of your medication, cleaning supplies and other harmful products are out of their reach or in a child/pet proof cabinet. Your private space isn’t always so private.

Have you followed all the steps yet? If not, go back and see what you’ve missed. Trust us, if you organize your bathroom once and for all, your bubble baths and showers will be much more relaxing because you won’t have to look at all the clutter lying around! Your guests will be impressed and relaxed, too.