Junk is defined as discarded things, or things regarded as worthless or causing clutter. A lot of people shove these types of items into a drawer that is referred to as the ‘junk drawer’.

Do you have a junk drawer in your home or office? It might be in the kitchen, dining room, bedroom, office, or bathroom. When I was a kid, my family’s junk drawer was in the kitchen next to the silverware drawer. Our junk drawer contained everything but the kitchen sink. Well, not everything.; only things that fit. If you looked really closely inside, you’d find a flashlight with burned out batteries, rubber bands, loose coins, books of matches, a screw driver, a role of masking tape, pens and pencils, paper coin rolls, metal screws, cup hooks, loose pieces of string, baggie ties, a used nail file, faded scraps of paper, keys that didn’t fit any locks, old used AA batteries, dog rabies tags, a broken wrist watch, and much more. Mostly junk.

If you have a fair amount of clutter in your home, and just can’t seem to take major action, try organizing just your junk drawer. As this is a small project, it shouldn’t be overwhelming and won’t take too long to do.

First spread some newspaper or put an old tablecloth on a table. Empty the drawer onto the table. Sort the items into three piles. Pile # 1 – items to keep in the drawer, Pile # 2 – items to move to another place in the house where they belong, Pile # 3 – items to donate. As you sort, throw out the real junk. You may want to buy a divider to organize the items that go back in the drawer. Make a point of following through with the ‘move items to another place’ and ‘donate items’ as soon as possible so you don’t create another junk pile or junk drawer.

I’d be curious to know if you have a junk drawer now, or if your family had one when you were younger. Have you taken steps to purge and organize the drawer? Follow the steps I recommended and change your junk drawer into a ‘useful drawer’.