I couldn’t pass this up ….

Nothing to wear? Shop your closet
By Susan Wagner, 8:56 am, Tue 13 Feb 2007

There is nothing more frustrating than standing in front of a closet full of clothes and thinking, "I have NOTHING to WEAR." Admit it–you do it. So do I. Our solution, most often, is one of two things: we either wear the same things all the time, or we shop for more things. Either way, we still find ourselves looking at our wardrobes without any idea what to put on.

Today we're going to break the cycle. Let's talk about how to shop your closet.

You will need three boxes (or bags), one marked DONATE, one marked STORAGE, and one marked ALTERATIONS, a full-length mirror, an hour or so of interrupted time, and a friend whose style sense you trust and admire.

Nothing to wear? Shop your closet | BlogHer.

- its not really knitting related but file it under the “Organizational Tools” category.

After I moved to this apartment in Sept 2005, the closet and bedroom were kinda avoided as to organizing. … other than installing shelves in the very high up ceiling storage space (with sliding doors) that can only be reached with a step ladder and buying two more chest of drawers and creating a “dressing area/closet” under the loft bed – and a bit of cursory unpacking…. well I kinda left it til sometime .. ahem late summer and early fall of 06.   

Anyway, I did some cursory initial weeding of clothes and sent six boxes to Village Sister’s attic the winter before so that I could get to the piano (as they were in the music room).  So when I finally got around to the bedroom – it was the second to last room to finish – I took everything out of the upper shelves – mainly boxes of sweaters and then the rest of the sweaters that were in one of the chests…and took them to the music room (its right next door) and sorted them all out – cotton ls, cotton ss, wool ls, etc.  cardigans, pullovers, etc.  and then sorted out which to put in the chest (like crewneck wool and cotton sweaters which i wear instead of blouses) and casual type sweaters to wear around the house, etc.  And the more dressy, sweaters and bulkier sweaters, handknits, etc were stored in plastic bags with zippers (and yes the air can get in) and labels on the fronts (usually two per bag).

Then the sweaters for the season (winter was coming so the wool)and ones that i like were stacked on the shelves right above the hanging rods (below the closed sliding door shelves) and then the rest were stacked behind the sliding doors.  

This whole project took a few weeks to do – as I washed every sweater .  The laundry facilities in my previous apt were four floors down and back and I tended to hand wash a lot instead.  And the storage was so tight in that apt that some of the sweaters hadnt been worn in ages … so a good wash was needed by all! 

Its been an experience rediscovering these sweaters – some have such memories that its amazing when I take them out to wear as the memories flood over me– a sweater that I wore pretty much exclusively one winter when dating a certain fellow in Chicago – a walk in Lincoln Park, a meal at a German restaurant, meeting for the first time face to face at the Chicago airport – come flooding back when I take it out to wear … and then I create new memories. 

Now, where was I … oh yes, the blog article. – read it – it gives a good plan for realistically dealing with your closet and clothes.  Soon to be put in place here at Southern Gal’s  Closet.