the SmockLady

Or whatever number you want to assign it. I am certainly not the first person to come up with an organizational hack or even one like this, I’m sure. Actually, I saw a very similar hack in a magazine about two years ago.

I want to interrupt myself first to thank everyone for the polite conversation that is going on here and want it to continue it possible. If all has been said that wants to be said that is fine, too.

While I have been busily cleaning out our home school books and stash of stuff used and unused and not-so-used I realized I needed some more (read: better) means of organizing some of the non-book items. Mostly craft stuff and math manipulatives.

I could not afford what I really wanted to do, but I needed something that would work and would work well and would work quickly. So I bought some of those nifty little wire cubes. We first bought some when we only had two wee children and needed a way for the children to store their toys. At that time we had both Mog and Goro in one room of our three bedroom house and the third room was transformed into a play room. They had shared a room since Goro was born and he did not like having a room to himself. But stacking toys in the top of the closet to keep the floor open and clean and free of tripping and drawers (what was available to us at the time) just was not cutting it. The point was to find some way to allow the children to get their things easily by themselves. Shelves are the obvious idea, preferably low shelving.

My thought on furniture: I want nice furniture. Not so I can show it off or keep up with the Joneses, but because nice furniture, good furniture will last. I do not like buying something that is temporary, only needing to be replaced, spending more money in the long run, just to have something. Sometimes that is all we can do. I would rather do without and save to get what I want/need than buy for right now only to spend more later.

One day we were shopping at Sam’s Warehouse and came across these neat little wire cubes that could be put together in any little shape that we could imagine with these pieces. It came packaged with enough pieces to make a 3×2 cube set with an open front. These were about $12.00 each. We thought we would give them a shot. The playroom was decked out in primary colors and these sets were made in the primary colors. We bought two sets and loved them.

The only thing I found over time was that once put together they could easily pop out of the corner connectors if moved. So in other words, they held together well, but when I tried to relocate them without taking them apart, they sort of fell apart. No big deal. We set them where we wanted them and left them in place. We used these cubed shelves for about two years until we had the opportunity and the money to buy some good wooden shelves we loved. I eventually took the shelves apart and sold them at a garage sale.

I never really thought much about those shelves until we moved here to this house. We again found ourselves needing some toy/stuff storage for the children and not being able to really afford what we wanted. I looked for those cubed shelves again in some area stores to no avail. One day a bit over a year ago I found some, quite similar (different company) at Target. Woot! I was thrilled. Perfect.

I bought some white ones for the girls’ room. I bought two sets; that makes 12 cubes. Each girl has four cubbies for her things. I bought one set for the boys’ room; they each have three cubbies for their things. Bairno doesn’t get any of his own right now. I bought two sets for the den closet where they store their games and other family toys. This has helped us greatly in the storage arena.

Now if I can just get them to put their things away in those cubbies we’d be doing real good. :)

Back to the hack. Remember I needed some way to keep the non-book items stashed, easily gotten to and put away. The two problems with using the wire cubes:

1. some of the stuff was heavy and the cubes don’t do so good with a lot of weight
2. most of the stuff was small and much of the space would be wasted

I needed to be able to add some shelf separators so that the small things could be easily stacked without losing space. I wanted to be able to use the whole space not just the bottom of the cube.

Here’s what I did.

• I bought two boxes of cubes.
• I bought some heavy duty cable ties in matching color.
• I decided how I wanted my shelves to look (shape) and calculated how many pieces I would need and how many I would need to hack the additional shelves inside the cubbies.
• I built my cubes in the height and width desired (a backwards L shape in a 4×3 layout).
• I then proceeded to strengthen every connection/corner with the cable ties.



• I tightened them as tight as they would pull.
• I slid in the pieces I wanted to use for the “in-between” shelves, using the cable ties to hold them in place at each corner.
• Then I tightened those up as tight as they would go (maybe a bit too tight as it cause the outside pieces to bow in just a bit, but they are secure and can NOT be moved.
• Then I snipped off the leftover tabs.

Here’s the finished product waiting for me to finish organizing the stuff onto the shelves.

And a closer view of the shelf inserts held up by the cable ties.

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