Small Home - Organizing and Decorating

[Sleepingbooty]

My best tip is to have your organizational items BE your decoration. For example, we use what's intended to be a formal living room as an office. But because it's open to our family room on one side and foyer on the other, I didn't want it to look cluttered an extremely office-y. I got floating shelves for the wall from Ikea, and then filled them with matching binders, magazine holders, and storage boxes/baskets that I found at Office Max. So, I used vertical wallspace as storage, plus it looks really cool, so it sort of serves as artwork. I find a lot of cool ideas in the Ikea catalog (look at it online if you don't have a store in your area); Europeans have smaller houses so they come up with lots of nifty storage ideas.

 

[LoveBWVVBR]

I think that the size of our house (1600 sq. ft.) is just perfect for us, and we're about to be a family of 4 plus one cat! Do you have a basement with that 1200 sq. ft.? If so, then it seems like it's a great size for you We are always doing work on our house because we want to make it the best that it can be for us. Have you read the design book called "The Not So Big House"? If not, check it out! It is based on the premise that people live better in well-designed smaller houses. I couldn't agree more!!

 

[Grumpy's Gal]

get the under the bed storage bins. Fit as many as you can under the bed. Store whatever you can there -- winter clothes, wrapping paper, xmas decorations etc. HANDY!