When we moved into the house on Literary Lane five years ago I had envisioned storing my jewelry on top of my dresser in open displays and on cute, quirky dishes and bowls. Everything in front of me. So boho, so freeform! Something like this but without the chippy looking dresser:
And after 5 days my lovely display looked like this, which is how it pretty much remained until last month.
For Christmas I pinned a modular jewelry box system to my wishlist — by the way if your people are gifty and you are tired of giving 2 gift ideas to each person and keeping track of who you gave what to so you don’t get duplicates I highly suggest creating a wish list board on Pinterest, sending the link to everyone and let them fight amongst themselves — and, okay I didn’t get it so that was a big old derail.
After Christmas I bought a Stackers jewelry box set from The Container Store (not an ad, not affiliate, just something I like) and loooooook at what I did!
It was a good 4 hour job going through that pile and discarding trash, returning the laundry balls to the dryer, sorting through the jewelry that was broken or had that robot-feet stinkiness going on. The earring displays, some of the non-broken jewelry that I didn’t wear anymore, and some of the quirky dishes went to Goodwill. The rest of the dishes went to the craft room. Broken things went into the trash.
The first level has my rings and the jewelry I wear the most, including my Wonder Woman cuff, because I am a grown woman.
The second level. Before you think I’m a long-lost Astor or Carnegie, all of those diamond stud earrings are CZs from QVC. The tiny elephants were purchased from the Lucy the Elephant gift shop in Margate.
Third level: more earrings. I gave away quite a bunch and only miss one pair terribly – my World of Warcraft Horde logo earrings that I never wear. They’re on the earring display on the left side of the first photo on this post. Maybe I can go to a Goodwill and buy them back. The turquoise leaves (first column, third row) have never been worn – they were one of the last things I bought before the pandemic roared into action.
The final level is deep enough to hold bangle bracelets and chunky necklaces. And a tiny Disney princess tiara because I’m me.
And this is what I’ve become now – somebody who swoons at a place for everything and everything in its place. I’m already so much happier with this solution. Those quirky bowls and displays were very cute but accumulated dust quickly and who wants to dust earrings? NOT I.
I waited a month before posting to see how I kept up with it. This is what the dresser looked like this week:
Not bad! I still don’t have storage for headbands so most of them live in the bathroom. And the dryer balls always seem to end up here as well until I take the next load of laundry out. But I’m pleased with how I managed to keep up with it.
Next in pandemic organization land, I have a giant supply closet to pull together and a pantry that is always cluttered. Exciting stuff, huh?
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Since the pandemic started I have been painting, removing carpet, organizing, and getting rid of all kinds of stuff I’ve been hoarding forever…..It’s been a good time to get this done, since other options aren’t available!
It’s a good time to get it done, because once this is behind us I can’t imagine doing another chore again because I will be out of the house.
This is kinda inspiring. I have dozens of lapel pins and no box, just lots of cardboard slats that don’t really stack on top of each other…but perhaps I should buy a box.
Amazon has similar boxes with a (plastic) windowed lid – that might work for your pins,
I got a large jewelry cabinet for Christmas and I am loving my new jewelry system too! Though I didn’t realize just how much jewelry I had accumulated until I tried to fit it all in one place.
It’s so easy to pick up some earrings here and there and then end up overloaded!