Organization Hacks: Over 350 Simple Solutions to Organize Your Home in No Time!

by Carrie Higgins

Fix your cluttered cabinets, overflowing drawers, and messy living areas with these tips, tricks, and project ideas from Carrie Higgins, the organization expert of the Making Lemonade blog.Carrie Higgins has made it her mission to share fresh ideas for the home on her blog Making Lemonade. In this guide she has collected her best quick fixes, innovative hacks, and DIY solutions to keep your home looking beautiful, such -Using a ladder and a collection of S-hooks for additional pots and pans storage -Attaching a binder clip to your nightstand for your phone charger so the end never falls under the bed again -Using daylight saving time as a reminder to check the expiration date on the medications in your cabinet. And some of her more in-depth projects -DIY magnetic spice jars to keep spices on your fridge and near at hand -Easy-attach baskets for storing bath toys for the little ones -A foolproof travel packing grid for quick and easy getaways With Organization Hacks, you can get your house in order and turn your home from a hoarding nightmare into a clutter-free paradise!

Genres: Nonfiction, Personal Development, Reference, Self Help

225 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 5, 2017

Reviews

[Nore · Rating 2 out of 5]

A few interesting ideas, but a lot of her suggestions are 5-Minute Crafts tier garbage that will make your house look MacGuyver'd. Handy if you want a lot of ideas about how to cover every inside surface of your cabinets with velcro.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not much new material here. There are some projects, but mostly they seem like they would look like hacks (such as covering Pringles cans with scrapbook paper to make desk organizers and using a plastic 6 pack ring as a scarf organizer :/ ).

[Stephanie D · Rating 3 out of 5]

Of all the tips in the book, maybe 10 were new for me if that. I did like some of the project ideas it offered and other ways to use common items such as a ladder.

[Kathrynn · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wasn’t overly impressed, as a self professed organization junkie, there were no really new ideas.

[Misty · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's... okay. I'm always down for hacks, but there are also some "upcycling" hacks that just don't really work. For example: using a front-loading paper tray from a printer to use as an under-shelf shelf and attach it by using zip ties. WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS.

[Bassel · Rating 2 out of 5]

It would have been a great advantage for the book to add some photos or illustrations for the ideas listed instead of just plain text.

[Doris Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Written by Carrie Higgins, creator of "Making Lemonade Blog". The author of this book is very creative and makes one want to visit her home to see how she has used her suggested solutions for organizing your house. Glue gun in hand she must traverse the whole of her house.

Her suggestions are doable and not expensive. You need just time, but her suggestions should not take hours of your time.

A great resource for those who are looking around their homes and thinking "how can I get this organized".

[Edie Lee · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’ve read hack books before and found them worthwhile. This one was not. Either the tips were suggestions found in other self-help manuals, previously implemented, or impractical. Some of the solutions sounded downright tacky.

All told, I only found a few of the ideas worth trying.

[Carol Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easy read, great ideas


I enjoyed reading this book, it flowed from room to room, then general topics, gave alot of ideas for organizing and creating amazing spaces.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

Reminds me of those weird 5 minute crafts videos where they'd do like 20 stupid, impractical crafts in 5 minutes that used to drive reviewers nuts. All of her craft projects are like those art projects you'd do with kids. A lot of the 'hacks' are cheap fixes, things that assume you have lots of space in your house, and/or lots of money to waste resources.

Got a small bedroom? Put your dresser in your closet. Okay, but my closet is so small the dresser won't fit because the whole house is f**king small. I can't fit a dresser or a bookcase or a wall of pegs because it's so small clothes don't fit. DIY that!

Gather all your coffee cr*p around your coffee maker on a tray. Uhhhh so it can sit in my sink?

Use a tin can to make a utensil holder....honestly, these are crafts I would do with a kid, not to make my home more livable.

Zip tie a soft shoe rack thing or basket onto a shelf in your pantry to make more room for stuff in your pantry. Only works if you have wired racks and an actual pantry.

Use a front-loading paper tray from a printer t as an under-shelf type shelf. Attach it by using zip ties. One, use that on my printer and don't have a spare. Two, why are we zip tying sh*t? Three, what on earth can this actually hold?

Put your toothpaste in a drawer, things should not be on the counter...I have two small drawers, so no.

Make your own dividers with foam center craft paper and hot glue....

Now if this was advertised as a organization book focusing on upcycling I don't think I would have been as annoyed. But as it is, these are mostly things a google search would pop up under some key keywords.

[Ash · Rating 4 out of 5]

I saw this book in a section dedicated to books on minimalism in Powell’s (world’s biggest bookstore) when I visited it few weeks back. The book has plenty of interesting ideas and hacks to organize. My only grouse is that it has absolutely NO pictures. Sometimes you have no idea what the author is even talking about. Some of the ideas won’t work as we need a picture to accompany the text in order to understand what the author is even saying.
Otherwise a great collection of ideas for storage and home organization.

[Wizard · Rating 2 out of 5]

3.5/10

Some of the ideas are original and overall good but I felt like a lot of solutions were repetitive, and underwhelming. Some didn't even seem like they would work in practicality, or example, using duct tape to hold curtain hooks together to create a scarf holder. Wouldn't zip ties hold much longer?

Also, some of the aesthetics of some ideas seem like they wouldn't look super great. Some of the ones that would look nice are permanent, so if you rent and can't modify your areas permanently, this may offer few solutions to implement.

[Hoan · Rating 1 out of 5]

I love organizing and I was hoping to find unique "hacks." Well I think this book is more for the beginner organizer or someone who is truly messy because there weren't many ideas that have not already obvious or used in other books or shows widely. Unfortunately, not super helpful. It could've been more inspiring if there were pictures with each hack. I give it a one star because there were maybe one or two ideas I found useful and unique.

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

I gave it four stars but if you are on Pinterest or follow a few blogs, it contains mostly repeats of what I already knew. That's not to say I didn't pick up a few hints I could use. Fast read and you can pick up anywhere in the book that interests you. I would have liked more pictures (that sounds so shallow).

[Andrea · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice book with lots of east tips, a few more complex ideas that would require some level of DIY skills. I found a couple of really good ideas. I am in the process of making a custom trunk organizer by hot gluing square bins together! After looking for a pre-made unit I feel so dumb for not thinking of this myself.

[Clarice · Rating 3 out of 5]

Having read a lot of organizational type books this didn’t offer much new info but I did pick up a couple of things here and there. I was disappointed that it didn’t have actual pictures but instead little drawings. I mostly reserved this from my local library for visual inspiration.

[Linda C · Rating 3 out of 5]

Simple listing of ways to organize, divided by area of the home, after a short section on how to start and keep motivated. Each section also had a couple of diy projects. The last sections dealt with moving, travel and holiday storage. Quick read with a few, new to me, useful ideas.

[Kristine · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book contains some really good organization tips. However, the DIY projects are really.... cheesy (e.g. no, I don’t want a used Pringles can on my desk no matter how much scrapbook paper and washi tape you cover it with).

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book contains some good ideas, but I wouldn't say anything was revolutionary. If organization interests you, borrow a copy of this book. As a side note - no photos (only monotone illustrations) are included in this book with the exception of the cover.

[K. L. · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is not how I learn, with a few how-to illustrations on a mere handful of projects ideas, and the rest of the book all ideas are described in text.

There are some okay ideas in here. Some are common sense; others, while they work, might seem like you're decorating with upcycled garbage or clutter.

[Krista · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were some good ideas but not many new ones.
I guess my question is, how you can use some of these hacks without your house looking cluttered?! Plus, spending less and just not filling your house up helps to cut back on clutter in general.

[Ashley F · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was such a disappointment. Anyone can google organization tips and list them in a book. Nothing new here.

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful book full of great ideas!

[Elizabeth Meadows · Rating 5 out of 5]

great organization hacks. many i've discovered on my own over the years, but many more i'd never thought of.

[Julie · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars

[Laurice · Rating 3 out of 5]

Provided a lot of good tips, but I just couldn’t get into it with the lack of imagery in the book.

[Michelle Stewart · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted pictures to go with the text.

[Romany · Rating 3 out of 5]

Compiles many popular Pinterest suggestions.

[Patrice Daskas · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nothing new, kind of same old same old on how to organize. Did like the pictures. Recommend watching their Netflix show.

[Stacey Hatfield · Rating 5 out of 5]

Make this book your go to manual for organizing your home.

I love the idea ways to organize your home. But first you have to clear out clutter so the system can work.