How to Hide Your Miscellaneous Stuff

You know what I'm talking about. We all have them. Those places we put things, and hide them, because, well...its just too tedious to actually deal with it at that time, and you want your house to look neat & tidy.

OR...Those times, when you are picking up the house because someone is going to be popping over in about a half hour or you have to run out for the afternoon and just want to come home to a neat clean setting later? These are the times when piles happen.
I'm not talking just about junk drawers, although every house has those as well. (I admit, I have too many of them)  I'm talking about decorations that serve as storage for "miscellaneous" stuff.

Here are some examples of how I hide the stuff in our house, when picking up real quick. Then later when I have more time, I can go through it more tediously. but in the meantime, it hides my dirty secrets of piles. 


First, we have a very large TV that stands almost as tall and I am. And it tends to collect a lot of things that people put up there real quick. I got tired of it. So I hit Dollar General. They tend to have a lot of Cute boxes and stuff for storage.
As you can see, it just neatly sits on top of the TV looking cute, but when you look inside, its a bunch of different stuff from when I picked up the LR.

On my desk, I used to have a large, always falling over, pile of mail/bills here. So I got another box to match the TV one, and it hides all of the mail that I have set aside to either look at later, or to file away.
And since the boxes match, I can later use them on our LR shelf, if I decide to as well.

Speaking of the LR shelf, at the bottom we have this nice decorative box like container, sitting here to just jazz up the books a little.   But if you look inside, this is where I keep all of the girls school stuff like report cards or achievement awards. I do plan on getting a box for each of them to keep all these things, for them to browse through when they get older. but for now, this works & its in a generalized location.

Last but not least, is the shelf over my desk. Used to pile things up there and got tired of the way it looked. So last year, i got a few little baskets. I use them to hold lotion, ear buds, chargers, and pocket tissues for the girls to take to school.

Also, I utilize the picture frame too, to hide small objects like the extra pocket tissue packs.