Finding space to work from home can be difficult, especially if you don’t have a dedicated home office. I frequently joke that I work from my sofa or my dining room table, which is true. It’s not unusual for me to be working on my laptop at the table right next to my homeschooling children.
Even without a dedicated home office, it’s important for me to organize my work space. After all, I have to keep track of paperwork, organize products for review, and take photos for my blog. Fortunately organizing these things takes neither lots of space nor lots of money.
Here are a few supplies that come in handy.
- Stacking letter bins
- Plastic storage bins
- Baskets
- Containers for paper clips and other small items
- A small bookshelf
In our dining room I have four small bookshelves, one for me and each of the kids. It’s where I organize my work supplies and the kids keep their homeschool supplies.
On my shelf, I keep the Homework Supply Basket, mostly because I want the kids to know the supplies in the homework basket need to be returned to the homework basket. Plus, I use the scissors a lot.
Next to the homework basket is a stack of four letter bins. They are labeled inbox, outbox, to read, and hold. All incoming mail goes into the inbox, and all outgoing mail goes into the outbox. Things I need to read or review go to the “to read” box, and anything I need to hold for a short period of time (like my daughter’s French worksheets to turn in at the end of the quarter) goes into the hold bin.
Any paper that doesn’t belong in one of those bins gets recycled, shredded, or filed. I make it a point to go through those bins at least once a week.
On the top shelf of the bookcase, I keep three plastic shoeboxes. The first contains my camera, videocamera, small tripod, extra SD cards, and USB drives. Anything I need to take photos for my blog is stored here for quick access.
Another bin keeps my personal labeler, extra cartridges, and extra batteries. I use this little tool a lot.
The third bin holds miscellaneous office supplies: Post it notes, paper clips, pens, highlighters, and other things of that nature.
The middle shelf on my bookcase holds my household notebook, which contains my Motivated Moms Chore List. It also holds my blogging planner and all books I need to read for review. As you can see, I have a few reviews coming up!
Finally, on the bottom shelf I keep a larger bin that holds any products I have to review. I often receive odd shaped packages that don’t neatly stack on the bookshelf. These all go into the review bin.
As a work at home mom, your office needs may be slightly different than mine, but with a small bookcase and a few bins or decorative baskets, you really can organize a dedicated workspace to help you work more efficiently.
If you work from home, how do you organize your work supplies?
Hello Lynnae! My house is so tiny I’ve resorted to putting everything in bins and baskets. Unfortunately, I am not very organized, I just kind of throw things in baskets. Fortunately, my fiance is organized so she’s always coming behind me and creating labels and organizing what I thought was organized, lol.
Haha! Glad your fiance keeps you on the right track!
Hi Lynnae! Despite my current living situation, I have a home office of sorts. I’m lucky to have a desk where I can keep things like pens and scissors in glass containers on top of my desk, and the desk has a couple of “cubby holes” where I can I keep binders for my current courses. I used to have a bookshelf where I would keep my binders from previous courses so that I would have them on hand if I needed the notes for a current class. Unfortunately, with space being limited, I now have one small shelf where I can keep those binders. It’s not very organized, but I can at least access notes or lectures from previous classes.
Jason, I was watching a season 1 episode of Bones where the two main characters, Dr. Temperance Brennan and Agent Seeley Booth were searching a male murder victim’s room for a music CD in a bookcase full of music CDs. Dr. Brennan mentioned that women tend to be more organized than men because females tend to alphabetize and categorize objects whereas men were disorganized. Agent Booth argued that men are organized by saying that men tend to put “the good stuff” on the top shelf and to the left while putting the “crap” on the bottom shelf and to the right. The funny thing is… I’ve observed that Mike, my life partner, organizes his pc and console games in a similar manner. So you are organized; just not from a female perspective, which we both know is the perspective that really matters.
That’s funny. I’m going to have to visit my husband at work to see how he organizes his work stuff. Wonder if he puts it on the top left?
I too have no home office…no dedicated homeschool room…not even a dining room! We just have two bedrooms, a large-ish kitchen, and a small living room. I love how simple you make organization seem! I’ve been learning to be more organized by reading blogs, checking out books from the library, and good old fashioned trial-and-error! Thanks for sharing how you do it so others can be inspired!
Glad I could help! We have more space now than we used to, which I appreciate. However, when we lived in our small duplex, I learned that clear boxes and a hand held labeler are an organizer’s best friends!