IKEA ALEX Organization [Small Space #5]

Today is all about what I included in each drawer of my ALEX furniture piece made by IKEA.

Drawer #1: Face

Drawer #2: Eyes

Drawer #3: Lips

Drawer #4: Nails

Drawer #5: Make Up Bags

Drawer #6: Hair products

Drawer #7: Extra Jewelry Storage

Drawer Eight & Nine are empty so far.

 I told you the ALEX line for IKEA is AMAZING and is perfect for people who live in small spaces.

What can I put in drawer 8 & 9?
How do you organize all of your beauty product clutter?

Tell me below!

This unfortunately concludes this Small Space series. It has been real and it has been fun. Back to clothes.

Beauty Organization [Small Space #4]

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Hello there beautiful people,
Today continues the Small Space series with post #3. Let’s talk about inspiration to organize all of the beauty clutter. Earlier this year, I traveled to a bigger city to go to IKEA for the first time. I was beyond excited to explore the many floors and experience the full IKEA shopping experience. It is mind-blowing how innovative and space conscious IKEA is. The furniture is built for small spaces; which is why I had to include this trip and what I bought in the series. I bought a few little things because everything is so considerably cheap, but I was the most excited the ALEX storage system that I bought.
ALEX is a popular furniture line of IKEA’S because of all of the storage it provides.

Pictured below is the ALEX piece that I bought:

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This particular ALEX piece has 9 drawers and is tall and skinny so it works perfect for small spaces.
I bought this item in March and haven’t even taken it out of the box until this past weekend.
Why you ask…
1. The box it came in was entirely too heavy for me to lift.
2. IKEA furniture comes in a zillion pieces and honestly intimidates me.
3. My boyfriend attempted to put together a bookcase I bought from IKEA and ended up putting the shelves on backwards so I was not going to ask him.
4. Since I moved into this apartment, I had no clue where I was going to set it up.
Well, my mom came to visit this past weekend and she finally convinced me to dive in and try to piece it together, piece by little piece. So, we did and I have to mention that it looks just like the picture! WOO HOO, SO SO PROUD!
I was going to include pictures of how I organized each drawer but this post is already so long.
Stay tuned for pictures of each drawer in Small Space #4: IKEA ALEX ORGANIZATION tomorrow!

Have you tried IKEA furniture? What are your thoughts on it? Also, do you have a funny story about attempting to build IKEA furniture? I would love to hear.

Tell me in the comments!

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Small Space #3: Solutions

I have a space solution to discuss: My boyfriend has wayyyyy too many hats so I picked up this coat tree from Kirklands and transformed it to a hat organization tool. I think it turned out pretty great and am pretty proud of myself for seeing hat organization in a coat hanger! 

The next solution I want to mention is too organize all of my shoes. Including: flats, boots, sneakers, heels, and whatever else. I picked these plastic drawers up from Target or Wal Mart (I don't remember). Either way, I had them stuffed with computer paper, pens and pencils, and other office supplies. I think they fit in much better in the closet and helps with my shoe hoarding problem.

There are a few problem areas in my closet, as you can see. The question is what can I do to fix these unorganized and overflowed parts of the closet? My jeans are an obvious struggle and with the weather getting cooler day by day, I need some organization. What do you suggest?

By the way, I had an unexpected death in the family, an overload of unavoidable work, and my mom came to visit all in one weekend, So I apologize about being gone for a few days, but I am back. 

The Small space series will be extended through the next week then I have an upcoming giveaway! Yay! 

Stay Tuned!

Small Space #2

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I have so much I want to blog about other than small space tricks but as promised, here ya go…Small Space #2.

According to Five Style Tricks to Open Up Your Small Space from Apartment Therapy, there is five things that make your small space appear more open. My apartment only has one of the five things mentioned in the article and that is white walls. Apparently, white walls make smaller spaces look bigger, who knew? Okay, so check to white walls.

Now I only have to add built in storage, deeper bookshelves, more height, and more light. One thing that is hilarious about my old school apartment (not really funny at all) is that there is no ceiling fans or over head lights EXCEPT in the kitchen, dining room, bathrooms, and the master closet. See what I mean about it not being funny, at all? How old school is that? Well, needless to say I DEFINITELY need more lighting.

Which of the five things does your small space lack? What other tips would you add to open up a small space? Also, does anyone have any lighting secrets? I need more lights but don’t want bulky lamps or the stand up kind and adding ceiling fans is out of the question because I am a renter.

Any input is appreciated, Thanks!

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Small Space #1

Happy Monday! Today [as promised] is the first Small Space post. To access the full story behind the Small Space series, check out the post before this one.

The first thing to keep in mind when decorating a small space is multipurpose. Look for furniture that can be doubled as something else, like the example below: This piece not only doubles as a perfume stand and bookshelf, but triples as a little bit of shoe storage also!

Utilizing one piece of furniture for multiple reasons really accentuates the ‘small’ in small space.

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Next, who does not love IKEA furniture? The innovation demonstrated in IKEA’s furniture is amazing and literally built for small spaces so check out this Expedit storage below:

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Third…two words…floating shelves. Yes, these can be found at IKEA also. Living in a small space makes a person want to decorate every inch of their apartment to make it seem not so…small. Floating shelves is the perfect way to stylishly store and organize all of that “stuff.”

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Another take on storing “stuff” is more innovative and genius than stylish and decorative. Below is an example of behind the door shelving which can be used to hide some clutter:

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Basically, you do not necessarily have to get rid of all your belongings when moving somewhere smaller; just learn how to effectively and sometimes stylishly store everything!

So, how do you effectively store all the “stuff” or clutter? How has moving from a large space to a small one impacted your life and cleanliness?  Leave responses below!

Small Space- Series

Sundays are meant for laundry, pinterest researching, playing xbox, homework, dog walking, catching up on my favorite blogs, editing pictures, and overall getting ready to tackle the upcoming week’s activities. As I was cleaning the extra bedroom, I came across many troubled areas that need organizing. So what do I do? Blog about it.

Lately, I have been on a mission to clean and organize our apartment-top to bottom because I am so tired of random things being out of place and are not accessible when I need them. I have been pinning cleaning tips and organization ideas under my CLEAN board on Pinterest but decided (between sips 0f Full Throttle) that I need a ‘Small Space’ board. As some of you know I used to live in a 3 bedroom house with 2 roommates, but now my boyfriend and I moved to the city and the apartment is a lot smaller than what I am used to. Something you might not know is that I have moved 5 different times in the last 5 years. I’m a wanderer, I can’t help it. During that “wandering” I acquired quite a bit of stuff. Between relatives dumping their hand-me-downs on me and my mom’s compulsive buying syndrome, my tiny apartment looks like an overstuffed thrift store. Follow me as I organize and get rid of the “stuff” overtaking my apartment and life through this ‘Small Space Series’. One major thing that brought on this series is this blog. Right now I have no decent place to take pictures for it because of all of the junk; it’s absurd. So this weekend began my binge cleaning and organizing spree. I tackled the extra bedroom first and started working on my closet, where the real problem exists. I wish I would have taken a BEFORE picture to demonstrate how much junk was actually there.

Tomorrow (usually Mention Monday) will be Small Space series post #1 with pictures explaining my progress and where I found inspiration. I will be blogging everyday this week with Small Space series posts so get ready!

What are your thoughts on this post series? Do you have any tips to add? Comment the tips below and I will feature the best ones.

Happy cleaning and organizing!