Setting Up the New Desk

I promised in my previous post that I'd go through how I've organized the new desk area so here we go!

On top of the desk is yet another bit of this project inspired by Dawn's nice set-up. Martha Stewart has these great desktop accessories that come in a few colors (brown, robin's egg blue, and white) and are modular. I got one drawer, one tray, and the small item holder that has a lid. We have 4 rambunctious cats who are forever getting into my stuff, not to mention a little 15 month old gremlin who can climb anything so a lid was the selling feature to me :)

Here's an up close shot of the desk accessories. I may add something to the back of this but for now I wanted to leave it like this, I'm not sure if adding more would make it too tall for the space. In the small holder on top I originally put pencil lead, sticky tabs, clip tabs, and staples. Later I uncovered more office supplies when organizing the bookshelves so I switched these out and am now storing paperclips, push pins, clip tabs, and sticky tabs (going from left to right)

Underneath that I have my new coupon notebook (more on that later!) and in the bottom I have my address book and small planner. The drawer contains bill-paying things like checkbook, envelopes, stamps, and for some reason my rosary. I don't know, I thought it looked pretty and was easy to reach there but maybe I really meant that I need to pray more when paying the bills, haha!

*I do not recommend the drawer portion of this set by the way. Mine does not fully close without really pushing on it which is a bummer but I'm too lazy to return it.

In the right drawer of the desk I've got my pens/pencils in the basket at the front and highlighters/markers in the back. Then a few adorable photos my friend sent me from her wedding that my husband officiated at and my old coupon organizer. I no longer use it but it's so pretty I'm going to try to find a use for it somehow.

In the left drawer I have my label maker, hole punchers, ink cartridge, staplers, and more desk supplies. It's a good deal more full now than when I first took this picture but still organized and things are easy to find.

The right cabinet holds the computer tower and we plug everything into the extension cord that resides behind it. Two holes in the back allow for ventilation and a place to string the cords through.

The left cabinet houses my file box for homeschooling supplies and the 2 homeschooling binders I reference most in teaching T-rex. The file box contains our Handwriting Without Tears and Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading materials. The blue notebook is my not-so-top-secret project, the baby sleep e-book I'm slowly....very slowly...writing with the help of my friend Rhianna :)

So that concludes our tour of the new desk set-up! I'm still brainstorming ideas for a proper household filing system. My husband has fallen in love with this project...

but I'm leaning towards something less expensive like this...