How do you organize your stuff?

[dixiedragon]

I am trying to get my soaping stuff organized. I keep thinking of better ways to organize...then I end up going back to apply my new idea....lol.

Right now I am waffling between dividing my molds between silicone molds and other molds...or putting all holiday molds - plastic and silicone - together.

 

[mx5inpenn]

Organize? We can do that?

Just joking, but really, I can't keep the soap stuff organized for anything. I try, but it goes right back to mixed up by the 2nd or 3rd batch.

I do manage to keep my micas and FO together, a small plastic tote for each that fits in the cupboard. The micas are stored in old baby food jars. The molds are on a shelf, but there is no rhyme or reason. All the utensils are in a bucket. Oils are mostly organized I suppose, I put the new stuff behind the older stuff when I get it and use a sharpie to date them just in case.

 

[toxikon]

I wish I had a dedicated soaping room! We do have a spare room upstairs full of junk, so maybe eventually I will clean it out, buy shelves and make it a dedicated soap room. Until then... some soaps are curing in my bedroom, most supplies/molds are overflowing from a large tupperware bin on my kitchen floor, and a few oils are hiding in a cabinet in the laundry room.

 

[Susie]

I keep my base oils under the sink in the kitchen (except the 25# pail of lard that I just bought, it is living in a spare room. I have the rest of my equipment and supplies on a rolling cart that I wheel to the kitchen when I need to soap. I keep my FOs and EOs in totes with latchable lids. My micas are in a clear plastic shoe box on the cart.

I scooped out enough lard from the pail to make 2-3 batches of soap. I am about to order castor oil in a 1 gallon container, and coconut oil in a pail. I am going to have to figure out where to have them live when not being used.

 

[GreenAcreHomestead]

We're planning to empty a 1/2 full storage shed on our land to convert into a dedicated soaping location, but you know how plans go... :crazy: It's an 8x16 with 12' ceiling, so there's loft space. We'll have to insulate it and probably run a water line down there with a heater, but it's adjacent to our woodworking shop so that would be nice to have.

For now, we have a few spaces in our home dedicated to soaping:

*Raw Material Storage - Laundry room area--shelves above washer and wall mounted hangers for soap cutter, etc.
*Curing Space - (new) Wall mounted shelf to hold about 200 bars. We're going to add another in the next week or so. See image below of our soap shelf.
*Product Storage - Anywhere we can. LOL Mostly in a built-in china cabinet in the dinning room--not used much anyway.

 

[lenarenee]

Organize? We can do that?

Just joking, but really, I can't keep the soap stuff organized for anything. I try, but it goes right back to mixed up by the 2nd or 3rd batch.

I do manage to keep my micas and FO together, a small plastic tote for each that fits in the cupboard. The micas are stored in old baby food jars. The molds are on a shelf, but there is no rhyme or reason. All the utensils are in a bucket. Oils are mostly organized I suppose, I put the new stuff behind the older stuff when I get it and use a sharpie to date them just in case.

^^^^This is ME!

Actually, other than the micas and fo's, I don't feel the need to organize. We have a small closet with shelves in the garage where every goes....provided I lug it back there when I'm' don't soaping.

I once tried to organize micas into two crates - warm colors and cool colors. Seemed sensible and easy, right? It's a challenge to keep them that way because my brain just doesn't see the need to use up 3 good seconds of time to stick them back in the right place.

 

[dixiedragon]

My stuff is in the basement, which means a bunch of trips up and down stairs. So I try to group stuff together to minimize trips - I try to put my stickblender and my silicone stirring spoons inside my soap pot once I clean it. Etc. I try to remember to put my dividers back with my mold.

 

[Steve85569]

I have been allowed to take over two floor to ceiling cabinets downstairs to store things in. It's almost enough room for the molds and raw materials. I get half of a storage rack in the next room for curing soap on.

It's my fault that I don't have more room for my soaping things. I have other hobbies that also take up space.

 

[lenarenee]

Drooling over that - it's like a work of art when filled with lines of soap.

We're planning to empty a 1/2 full storage shed on our land to convert into a dedicated soaping location, but you know how plans go... :crazy: It's an 8x16 with 12' ceiling, so there's loft space. We'll have to insulate it and probably run a water line down there with a heater, but it's adjacent to our woodworking shop so that would be nice to have.

For now, we have a few spaces in our home dedicated to soaping:

*Raw Material Storage - Laundry room area--shelves above washer and wall mounted hangers for soap cutter, etc.
*Curing Space - (new) Wall mounted shelf to hold about 200 bars. We're going to add another in the next week or so. See image below of our soap shelf.
*Product Storage - Anywhere we can. LOL Mostly in a built-in china cabinet in the dinning room--not used much anyway.

 

[Gerry]

It's my fault that I don't have more room for my soaping things. I have other hobbies that also take up space.

Oh I know it. I have 2 rooms, 1 basement large area that houses two other hobbies, and another hobby in another dedicated small room. My soap curing and storage area is in my home office room upstairs. Smells good when I work though. Hahaha!

So may I ask what those other hobbies are?

 

[cmzaha]

I would love to organize everything. But I noticed today after picking up a carload of supplies from a soaping friend that has quit, that I have a tremoundous amount of supplies. My service has a free standing cabinet with 5 filled shelves of fo's and eo's. The 5 rack stainless rack houses some of my oils and emulsifiers. Since my girls are not invited to move back home I took over their bedroom, another free standing closet /cabinet filled to the gills with more fo's, eo's and many other supplies, another 5 shelf rack storing my 5 gallon buckets of oils, molds, salts, etc. Another small rack on a cabinet that houses my labeling supplies, the rack hold my finished lotions and testers. The un-used bathroom houses my micro and another rack to hold gallon bottles of oils, then we get to the 2 under my house storage rooms, chuck full of containers of jars, bottles etc. But everything is labeled so I suppose that is good...then we get to the downstairs that has a curing rack in one half of the room, it is a very large room, more buckets in the room I used to consider my sewing room it is on the side of my staircase. LOL, hubby is lucky I do not have any racks under the stairs but I am to old to crawl under there anymore. All my colorants are in a plastic 4 drawer case sitting on my printer cabinet. lol, but nothing is on the floor

 

[reinbeau]

My living room is totally consumed with soapmaking supplies, as is a room in my cellar. Right now my son is working on that room, he's ripping the old stuff out and going to build me a new room. Then I'm going to Ikea for cabinets - lots of cabinets!!

 

[cmzaha]

My living room is totally consumed with soapmaking supplies, as is a room in my cellar. Right now my son is working on that room, he's ripping the old stuff out and going to build me a new room. Then I'm going to Ikea for cabinets - lots of cabinets!!

Cabinets and Stainless steel shelving are wonderful!

 

[amd]

Just after Thanksgiving I moved my soap lab out of the dining room and into my bedroom. Sounds strange, but the fiancée and I were able to reorganize the bedroom to that I have a separate sleeping space from the soap lab.

So... in that room, I have one wall of shelves in the closet where I keep my base oils, small totes filled with fragrance/essential oils, and other miscellaneous ingredients (clays, salts, bubble scoop ingredients, unused NaOH, KOH, etc).
I have 5 bakers rack type trays on a side table for curing soap, and under that table I have the boxes filled with packaged product.
I use my 6 ft show table as my work bench.
On my "work bench" I have a two tiered shelf that I keep my mixing bowls, spatulas, and other tools/dishes/pitchers that I use every time I make soap. I also keep one container of NaOH, kaolin clay, sodium lactate, and tussah silk (which go in every recipe), a pile of clean rags, and a mason jar with pens and scissors (for in process note taking, cutting open my color mixing bags, etc.). This gives me about 4' of space to make soap in, which means I have to be super organized before and during the process!
Under the table is where I store extra PPE, stickblenders, clean rags, the trash can, the box with the dirty rags waiting to go to the wash, etc.
I destashed my book collection so that I could use one of my book shelves for my wooden molds, impulse sealer and heat gun, jugs of water, aloe vera juice, coconut milk, and my masterbatched oil buckets.
And last of all I picked up two storage sets from a neighbor when she moved - she said she got them at Ikea. They look kind of like this: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/S19876454/
One is about the same number of drawers shown. I keep all of my silicone molds, fondant mats, packaging material (shrink wrap bags, labels, etc) and notebooks in that one. The other one is taller, about six drawers ... that's where I keep my odds and ends tools (extra spoons, skewers, cups and mixing dishes, thermometer), and my colors (one drawer for micas and one for oxides/natural colorants), and anything else I use for embellishments (candy sprinkles for cupcakes and such). I keep my cutter and my rebatch crockpot on top of these drawers. I also use dollar store baskets to keep things organized inside the drawers - for things like mica containers, etc.

 

[redhead1226]

This is what happens when you need rehab! Yes, organized but out of room. I think I have enough supplies to make 7000 bars of soap and everything I need for my endless craft addiction! My kids move out and my supplies moved in 7 years ago to one of their rooms. Now I have 2 more extra empty rooms so I hope that I don't start invading another one.

 

[needadietcoke]

I'm lucky to have a great space in my laundry room. I keep molds and M/P in tubs in the closet and other ingredients on the shelves in that same closet and in the cabinets under the counter. I bought a cute shelving unit at Hobby Lobby that holds up to 8 oz bottles of EO's and FO's and gets them up out of the way. I bought extra 4 oz jars so that all my colorants and additives fit in a drawer. Can I be organized? Yes. But it is often a mess!!!!