movin' on up

Fellow apartment dwellers will feel my pain on this — a serious lack of space. Our two-bedroom place is a whole 772 square feet. You add two people and two cats to the mix, and living space is at a minimum.

So, to tackle this issue, I surveyed our apartment to decide what is necessary, what has to take up floor space and what doesn't.

Problem area #1: Walk-in storage closet

What to do about a lack of floor space? Move it on up. If you're not already using 3M hooks, you should be. They're like magic.

I also used them to move the mop and broom from the floor to the wall to free up space.

Problem area #2: Master bedroom closet

The floor was once cluttered with purses, totes and luggage, not to mention other things that happened to be shoved in there when I only had time for a 10-second tidy. Not anymore! I packed all of the must-keep bags into one another and put the consolidated, single suitcase in the spare bedroom closet in exchange for our deluxe hamper. I don't know why we ever stored our hamper in a room other than the one we undress in. That was just plain inefficient. Now, surprise(!), we gather less dirty laundry on the floor.

Problem area #3: Spare bedroom

The main issue in this space is our lack of discipline when it comes to staying neat, tidy and organized. When company comes over unexpectedly, miscellaneous items get stashed behind door No. 2 and sometimes sit untouched for days weeks.

Plus, I unceremoniously dumped all of my craft supplies on the floor, reorganized and purged, and placed them all in a neatly labeled drawer in the top of the closet.

Am I sick and twisted to be not-so-secretly in love with how structured this is?