More Organization, More Labels (for FREE), More Ideas, More Crossing Fingers and Saying a Little Prayer!

 Thanks for all of the great feedback on my organization post! Yes, you read correctly, I do not have a classroom for all of this - but actually with that just said I have an interview on Monday morning. Normally I don't speak of these things until afterwards and if they have gone well, but if you have read any of my chapters on my life story then you know I need this. So if you could cross your fingers or say a little prayer or whatever it is you do when you are back in your classrooms on Monday morning I would appreciate that. 

Now, back to my organization - you saw me getting my classroom ready in my closet.  Here I am being organized in my own home - the home I moved into this past summer that I said was such a big deal, so of course I got down to business on decorating and organizing. I finally got to show it off this week and I felt so vindicated:

my living room

my bedroom - this is the wall across from my bed - the hoops of fabric I did on my own. The galvanized letter are from Anthropologie

These organizers are my pride and joy. They hang behind my bedroom door. I saw them on Pinterest and my mom helped me replicate it. I had a lot of fun doing it. I went to Lowe's found most of my pieces on my own in the plumbing aisle. I needed them to cut and thread the pipes for me. When they asked what I was using it for I laughed when i told them a jewelry hanger - and so did they, but doesn't it look good?! Loving the industrial look too. 

Below is my pantry. I must warn you this picture is old, and by old I mean a couple of weeks old. I had it open at one point during the evening and I looked at my friend and was like, I rearranged this since the last time you were here. She was like you are nuts. My other friend (who is married, and I am not) says "look how many spices you have that I don't!" 

I hung a command hook on the door for my aprons and lunch bags.

This apron was one of my end of the year teacher gifts from a few years ago from some awesome room moms. It reminds me of how fun this class was. 

And below this was another room that got lots of comments - the bathroom, weird I know, or is it weird to show you?

yep, so here I go again, OCD with the organization. I have a bin for contacts, sinus & cold, first aid, travel size shampoo, etc, toothpaste, razors, dental (I keep floss and toothbrushes in there), ointments, the open stacking bins on the right have haircare, the one below is soaps, etc, the little green one is nail polish, etc. 

what teacher isn't big on the germs?!

the organization above is self explanatory

and yes, people even spoke about the organization in my closet

stacking bins on the left - the top is purses and clutches, the bottom is socks. to the right are pull out drawers with shoes.

scarf organizer - from IKEA

I am still organizing the classroom too. A while back I posted some library labels. They were enough to organize through last school year - but here we go for this school year, unless I wind up in like 5th grade or something: 

1. The first thing I did was get all my categories in Alphabetical order. It looked something like this. I just put this in here so you could see it - this is not anything you cannot do nor is it formally typed.

Classroom Library

2. Then, I made the labels bigger, I color coded them (picture books, chapter books, non-fiction books), and I added a bin # to each label. These all will print on Avery shipping labels, 6 to a page 5164. Now your bin # may not be the same as mine, so if you actually do want to use mine (cause let's face it I think I'm only like the 1000th person to do some of these) and you need the word document, I am happy to email it to you.

Classroom Library Bin Labels

You will notice that I used the 'smiley monster font' which does not always use capital letters in the front, but again I am that OCD that I have changed the font for the beginning letter so that it is uppercase. After all, that is what I try to teach my students to do.

3. Stay tuned for the color coded bin # labels to match these that will go on the back of each book. For example, each Eric Carle book will have a small label on the back that says bin # 6 in blue. Those should be here soon. (man I have way too much time on my hands!)

4. You may have been wondering why I finally got to show off my new place this week. It was  for a Stella & Dot party. Have you heard of them? I am sure a lot of you have, but since a lot of my giveaways and deals have been for places that I try to introduce you to, I definitely wanted to share Stella & Dot with you. You can only buy through a rep. If you don't have one, my party is open for one more week (til August 6th, so you can just click on any of these links in this paragraph and then where it says "find your hostess" you just find my name: Sydney Cohn. Have fun. There are some great inexpensive and teachery (made that word up) pieces. For example, I love these:

and these

and this

I just can't decide in gold or silver, but it was a big seller that night. 

Can't wait to see how it looks hanging on my cool jewelry organizer.