Where to Add Extra Storage Spaces

Storage and organization are extremely important in trying to have a life that is not cluttered, especially with so many children.  Having a lot of children means we have a lot of things. Each person needs a bed, clothes, shoes, toys, and just things.  Every Christmas and birthday everyone is always getting more things. Multiply that by 12 and that is a lot of things. What do we do with all these things? In the past I would keep it all, just incase I needed it someday, but I learned several children and years ago that was not going to work. We have to be constantly rotating stuff. When something comes in, something should go out. I have a  box that I call are “Get Rid of Box”. So when clothes are out grown or I find something that just seems to be no longer needed, used, or wanted, we add it to the box. We have a couple of spots that we store these items until we have our garage sale or are able to donate them. We also have to store Christmas decorations, luggage, and many other things that are not used on a regular basis.  One spot is in the attic and the other is a large shelf above the garage door.
This is the shelf that we use in the garage.
 

Here are the attic stairs we added, so there is now easy access to our new storage area in our hallway.

The stairs pull down…
 
…and then unfold.

This is what the attic looked like before we put in the flooring.
         
First we cleared off as much of the insulation as possible with a broom, so the floor joists where visible.
We then added 2x2s in the opposite direction of the joists. We should have used 2x6 boards so we could have added extra insulation and would not have had to cut around the electrical conduit.    We swept the insulation back, to fill the spaces between the 2x2s.The floor boards were then attached to the 2x2s. The boards were FREE! (That is always nice.) We used some large 4x8 particle boards, that we received from a friend, and other scrap wood we had been collecting for this project.

We now have the attic quite full with all sorts of things. This gives us more room in our living spaces. I tried to give each section a label so we could easily find the items when we need them.

Here is our luggage…  
    
…and our Christmas decor.
 
As you could see, this has added much needed storage!

Could you use extra storage? What do you think about our added storage?
Do you have storage ideas you would like to share? Add your link.

Parents of a Dozen