Help with storage /keep and not to keep.

[Housechallenge]

Hi im looking for some suggestions on how I can store things better in my house.

Some things I say probably seem silly but I need to mention them to make sure things work for me.

Tools. I have a toolbox that's around 24 inch wide . 14inch tall and 12ich wide. I have a jigsaw. Cordless drill/driver. A cabled drill. Hammer . Plus screw drivers , screws. Several tubes of adhesive. Chulk tubes . Couple of them tube gun things. And random crap like hooks. Wall plugs etc.

So time i put say a drill in most of the room is taken. Because of the shape of it. It takes up quite bit of room . But the room left means other stuff that gos in just sort of falls and get tangled /caught up. I then struggle to get what I need and my arms ache really quickly just takeing stuff out . I find thngs like jigsaw ,drill,hammer heavy. Depending on how im moving my arms. I them get to achey and then end up dumping it where ever. And get myself in a mess. And ut has a knock on effect . I know this sounds so stupid but I want to find away that I can store these sort of things and I can access them easily. They will be kept in my house.

Then in general with all things in the house from stuff down to paper work . How fo you know what you need and what you don't hiw do you decide what to keep and what not to?

Do you have a garage, utility room or understairs cupboard? You could hang tools from the wall and have some jars or pots on shelves for storing things like hooks.

Or get a more complex tool box / chest with different compartments or drawers.

Tools in garage/shed.
Hand tools in toolbox(es!), larger items & consumables on shelves or in cupboards.
Have a smaller (comprehensive) kit which lives in the house and is therefore always to hand and not damp/dirty/dusty etc. Lives in store room.

Most paperwork is in an Ikea filing cabinet and the remainder in a bookcase, in the study.
Starts off in a pile on my desk and then I decide it is time for a sort through and everything gets filed into the corresponding folder.
More comprehensive paperwork (too much for the hanging folders) is kept in box files.
V.important paperwork is in a firesafe.

Every now & again (annually?) I check the files and shred anything which is definitely not required any more.
Only the other day I got rid of the paperwork from when I started work (over 40yrs ago) and my progression through the company. Kept pension paperwork etc but job related stuff, all gone.

I have a cupboard under my stairs. And a large cupboard upstairs. I don't really want to use the upstairs one . It has the water tank in there it gets warm so I use that dry clothes. Store towels and blankets .

No garage. I might sort under the stairs and work it out from there

tools are kept in a small downstairs cupboard. Drill and bits are in a tool bag. Hammer, screwdrivers and Allan keys in a toolbox, pliers, wrenches in tool box.
paperwork is in a file I literally keep all birth certificates together with passports, section for educational training certificates, section for most recent bills (council tax, water, electricity etc

I feel your pain with the tools. I keep stuff like screw and hooks in labelled biscuit tins or takeaway containers. That way I can take the whole receptacle to where it needs to be. Drill, screwdrivers etc live in the cases they came in. I wouldn’t put them in a toolbox. But generally I’d keep ‘like’ things together, so all painting things, all sanding things, all filling things.

With other stuff it’s really about figuring what makes sense to you, for example you could file everything purely by date rather than topic.

The other thing that works (and I did this at work and it works like a charm) is just put things where they fit and can easily be got in and out, and then label it. So say a drawer at work with pencils, staples, sellotape and batteries, for example, if you stick a label on it, people will use it incredibly efficiently. It simply saves thinking. I only wish our head of operations, the most untidy woman in the universe, would catch on and do this in other bits of the building!

Yeah tools etc are a pain . It seems like it should be simple but it doesn't feel like it. Im sorting out a cupboard now . Maybe once its of cleared out I with work it out . And yes lables its only me . But I think I need them.