Make a Desktop Organizer With Dollar Store Buckets

My son’s crafting table was a disorganized mess. Crayons, pencils, scissors, and supplies everywhere. I needed away to corral them.

Habitat Restore and Dollar Tree to the rescue.

Here’s all you  need to create your own desktop organizer:

• a piece of wood or a salvaged drawer front (I got mine for $1 at the local Habitat Restore)
• assorted dollar store buckets (You can also find these at Target in the Dollar Spot)
• E6000 glue
• Toothpicks (to apply the glue)
• Alcohol for cleanup (if you’re a messy gluer)

My drawer front was already painted when I bought it, so I didn’t have to do any prep work at all. If you’re using a 2X4 or another piece of unfinished wood, I recommend you sand , paint and seal it first.

Before you start gluing, make sure you arrange your buckets on your wood so they fit. You can trace around them, if you like, so you know exactly where to place then. But I just eyeballed it.

Next, apply a thin strip of glue around the bottom rim of a bucket. (Check out the dinosaur in the background. You’ll find them everywhere around our house, and I should probably start a scavenger hunt to see how many you can find in my blog photos!) As you can see from this photo, I didn’t bother taking the price tag off the bottom of my bucket.

Secure your buckets to your wooden drawer front, allowing a few minutes of drying time before adding the next bucket.

Repeat until you’ve glued down all four buckets (or however many you need to fill up your piece of wood). Use alcohol to clean up any glue strings.

Voila, you’re done. Now, go find a mess to organize.

These bucket organizers are great for storing crayons, scissors, pens and pencils, hair bows, hair brushes, dinosaurs, Legos, necklaces, marbles, Army men — pretty much anything your little ones collect and leave strewn all over their rooms and bathrooms.

Warning: presence of an organizer does not guarantee that your kids will use it.

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