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Show WOMAN'S WORLD Proper Storage Space Provides For Efficient Housekeeping By Ertta Haley Durable Curtain 11 ii t 1 TOES picking up your house before cleaning consume more time ttian the actual effort to scrub and polish? If you must say "yes' to this question, then you're probably not making proper use of space for storage. Adding storage space to your home does not involve putting in an extra room, or making a basement base-ment or attic, or any such majoi work. It's making good use of space you already have, and much of this can be done with simple carpentry. "A place for everything" is becoming be-coming one of the most important phases of building and homemak ing. When you have a place for everything, this means that with everything in place, you have not only neatness and orderliness, but with little effort. When you have to shift things from crowded drawer;' and shelves shel-ves constantly or try to put stacks of things somewhere, out of the way, it may mean that you are accumulating too many things. However, it may also mean that you simply do not have adequate storage facilities for your possessions. posses-sions. Check yourself on some of the common household problems: where does luggage go? What happens hap-pens to extra bedding? Where do you put your keys? Are extra dishes in the way? Can you find pots and pans and other cooking utensils easily? If your home does not now provide pro-vide easy answers to the above as well as any others of which you can think, start solving the problem prob-lem with proper storage. Many of the above difficulties can be answered with very simple fiiing These dainty-looking:, luxurious luxur-ious curtains with a lovely lace pattern are made of viny-lite viny-lite plastic film and require no laundering, ironing or stretching. stretch-ing. They are cleaned simply by wiping with a damp cloth, and will not fade, streak, crack or react to the weather. Use your empty walls . . and little work; other problems can be resolved with only slightly more work. Use BuiltIns For Storage Look around your home and see how much empty, unused wall space you have. Then look around at all the things you would like to put away. Put the two together and you come up with built-ins. Cupboards as welf as all sorts of devices can be installed into most of your rooms at little expense ex-pense and at great saving to not only your possessions but to your disposition as well. Add to this the great saving in actual housekeeping house-keeping and you have some idea what a small investment can do But just how does one go about deciding where and what the built-ins built-ins should be? This must be planned plan-ned for the uses and needs each home has, but some illustrations may offer help. For example, if linen storage is . your main problem, check the ' walls of your bedroom and see if they're being fully used. Or, what about a hall that joins two bedrooms bed-rooms or is at the entrance of a bedroom? Many of these walls can take several rows of shallow chests without crowding the room. If the room is larger, deeper chests can be used. These may be waist high or even higher depending upon don't, leave wall space that can be pressed into storage cases. If you have such a space in the bedroom, bed-room, and the bed or beds are set against this particular wall, place the cases right in back of the bed. Storage cases can be low, but as long as they come to the floor and run all the way across the wall, there will be much space provided. Use these for blankets, pillows, linens or seasonal items. In children's chil-dren's rooms, these types of cases are excellent for putting away toys. Tops of the cases can be used for radios, books and clocks. If desired, potted plants or interesting interest-ing collections of various hobbies can be displayed on them. No place for shoes in the bedroom, bed-room, or not enough room? If you have wall space above a heating vent, convert this into a small shoe closet. This can be done by slanting boards on which the shoes are placed, with horizontal molding strips attached to the boards to act as heel catchers holding the shoes to the tilted shelves. Do you have a kitchen and breakfast nook built together? It's not only smart looking but also space providing to construct a narrow nar-row counter between the two units. The counter itself may be used to hold serving items as well as food. Underneath the counter top, shelves or niches can be constructed to hold table accessories, appliances, appli-ances, telephone, etc. Wall space opposite the counter between breakfast nook and kitchen kitch-en might also be used for cabinet or shelf space. Create Orderliness In the Kitchen Cupboards are natural furnishings to the kitchen, but there are still a great many kitchens with bare wall space that could be put to excellent use. Cupboards can and should surround sur-round all the main working centers to house all needed tools. Not only is cupboard space essential, es-sential, but when organized like a file, it will increase in usefulness. Cupboards surrounding the range or cooking area can be shaped to hold pots and pans of all sizes, so that you can pick the one you want without extracting it from a nest of pans. Shaped partitions, often made of plywood, can be used for storing lids as well as shallow pans, trays and large platters. To be most efficient, ef-ficient, make the pa-titions removable remov-able so they can be taken out for easy cleaning, as well as for changing chang-ing the sizes of the particular "files" to take care of other pieces. Drawers near the kitchen sink can also be made sectional so that utensils like forks and knives, mixing mix-ing spoons, spatulas and pancake turners are not jumbled together in the drawer. Slotted holders placed in the drawers are excellent for knives, particularly, because they protect the cutting edge of the knife. Sliding trays placed in many deep kitchen drawers automatically eliminates confusion and at the same time makes ork quicker because be-cause you can pick out whichever piece you want quickly. The trays in deep drawers can also be partitioned to hold small equipment in its own place and thus cut down on jumbled drawers. Select Furniture For Storage Value While you try to stretch wall space to cover storage needs, don't forget that furniture can help you in the same way. Much of the new furniture fc?ing mice available is not only decorative, but it also has a great many storage fea'ures. In selecting an occasional table, do not just expect the top to be of use. See that its base is a cabinet or a shelf or two which can be used for sewing boxes, magazines or books. I IF- tor cupboard storage cases. how much space you need, as well as what will look right in the room in relation to its proportions and furnishings. If you have to save space, there are many ways in which to do it. For example, do not have knobs on the chests for the drawers. These take several inches. Cutouts at the drawer fronts eliminate knobs and make them smaller and neat-- neat-- . er. Thus, they can really be blended into the wall as though they were actually bu'lt in when the house was constructed. Iiow to I'se L'nseen Spuce for Storage Frequently you'll find that windows win-dows which do not come all the v. av to the flor. pnd most of them I |
