Stop Squandering Space - Visually Accessible Under-Shelf Storage

In a central spot in every kitchen in every house we've ever owned we have what we disparagingly call a "junk drawer".  The junk drawer is a wonderful invention...with it we can make fast-work of clearing our counters by scooping into it the miscellaneous clutter (e.g. craft materials, office supplies, writing implements, phone chargers, batteries etc.) that we might use "some day".  Somehow, at the time, the stuff seems too good to throw away so it goes into the junk drawer which does an admirable job of hiding the clutter...temporarily.

Unfortunately, the benefits are only short term.  When you open the junk drawer (if you can open it that is) to find something, you encounter a visual cacophony of colors, a flood of flotsam, and jumble of jetsam, that irritates the eyes, and muddles the mind!  I find myself pawing through the pile in a sort of stupor.  I'll call out for help and the conversation goes something like this:

• Me - "Honey have you seen the glue-stick?"  
• Linda - "Have you looked in the junk drawer?"
• Me - "I'm standing at the junk drawer looking but I don't see it!"
• Linda - "I know it's there"
• Me - "I'm sorry honey, I can't see it, will you come look for me?"

She patiently walks to the kitchen, glances at the drawer, says "there it is", reaches through the tawdry tangle, and emerges with the elusive glue-stick.  How does she do it?  There is actually a biological reason for this.  Experts on the human brain have noted that men and women are NOT created equal.  Oh, we have equal rights, and deserve equal pay for equal work and all, but women's brains are built better for multi-tasking than men's.  We men are wired to focus on one thing at a time, leaving us unprepared to swiftly sort through the startling stimuli of a scramble of stuff.

Anthropologists conjecture that this was due to a natural evolutionary pattern where early man (being a big brutish lug and lacking the innate social skills required for complex tasks such as calming a two-year-old) was sent by early woman to kill something for food.  Now that was something a man could handle!  The mastodon might be large and deadly, but picking him out was easy (a mastodon stands out because he's not normally all tangled up in bunch of random phone chargers and string), and when when the beast rudely-resisted becoming dinner it was actually advantageous to be able to focus on only one big thing at a time!  A woman's brain, on the other hand, needed to be able to cope with the complexity of 100 things coming at her all at once (e.g. "please stop poking your sister with a stick--come to think of it go help your father", "no baby--the pretty fire is not a toy", "whoa--how did you get dirt in THERE?", "dang I've got a tear in my new sabre-skin skirt!" etc.).  Men's one-track brains suited them well in their ancient role as hunters, but left them utterly unprepared for the dealing with the modern junk-drawer!

Once again, my wonderful, organized wife came to the rescue.  She noticed that at the back of the hall closet (which she decided to convert into sewing-storage) there was unused space UNDER the shelf BEHIND the hangers.  Not about to let perfectly good storage be squandered she decided to sort through and organize the junk drawers (yes, they had expanded from one to many) and make use of perfectly-practical, wantonly-wasted space in our closet.  While she sorted and organized she gave me the task of screwing-up (I'm good at that) the canning jar lids to the underside of the closet shelf so her canning jars full of orderly and useful stuff could hang there unobtrusively.

Here is how to make your own visually accessible, simple under-shelf storage:

Equipment needed:

• Canning Jars
• Lids
• Rings
• Wood Screws - short enough to not go all the way through the shelf-board
• Awl or a Nail to punch holes in the lids
• Hammer
• Screwdriver or Drill with a Screwdriver Bit

Start by spacing the bottles side-by-side in the bottom of the closet with at least an inch between them--this will let you know how many you can fit.  Get used lids and rings to fit each one.  On a cutting board punch a hole in the center of each lid.  Put the lid into a ring and screw it into place on the underside of the shelf.  Now simply fill your jars with whatever you are storing (e.g. could be nicknacks, spices, notions, craft supplies etc.) and screw them into rings to hang them.  The transparent jars make it easy to see what's inside so no labels are required.  Even I can find what I'm looking for with just a glance.  The now-emptied junk drawers (kitchen drawer space is precious) were put to better use.

Try it.  It's fun, easy, and you'll save time and grief finding what you're looking for!