RV ORGANIZATION - Airstream Organizing with Container Store Products!

Look who's here! Good, we are happy you are here. Are you guys ready for this? Ready as we're ever going to be. Before we dive into this Airstream organizing extravaganza, I have to introduce Xiomara. Military wife and mom, full-time Airstream dweller, and professional organizer to the rich and famous, she's basically superwoman and how she doesn't already have an HGTV show blows my mind. But this week in San Diego, she's getting us organized and the results have honestly been life-changing. So I brought you my favorite goodies because I know you guys love local stuff. These look incredible. Powered by local deliciousness, we were ready to get to work. Xiomara started by simply listening and learning to how we use our space in the Airstream. What was working, what wasn't, that way she could create a list of organizational supplies we needed and we could go shopping. The first tip is when it's overwhelming you and it's not practical, before you even touch it, snap a picture. Okay. Right, because then you can sit down and analyze what is it that's bothering me. Sure. And then you can break it down from there. Okay, that makes sense. Right. And then also we can get a container for this beauty. That's what you would call that? Yeah. This is Daniel's disorganization that drives me mad. It's okay, we're going to find a solution that you're going to fall in love with. Okay. Okay, okay. So then after that, the other thing is that we have to measure. Okay. Because you don't want to go and just kind of like eyeball it. Right. And then it doesn't work and then you get stressed out and you're wasting your time and you know. If you own an Airstream or you've ever been inside of one, you know that the curves on the outside get tricky inside. So we measured spaces taking that into consideration. After writing them down on sticky notes, we took a quick picture of each space so that we could reference it if we needed it. Next up, pantry cabinets. But one of our organizing goals was to make dedicated space for our work stuff so it wouldn't live on the dinette 24-7. CMR explained that daily use items should always be kept at eye level for quick and easy access, so she suggested we use these cabinets for work instead. But first, she had a challenging question. Now who has the most stuff for work? Who has the most stuff for work? Um. I probably have more work stuff than Daniel does. Okay. Apparently a big part of living an organized life is being honest with yourself about your stuff use and its consumption. Next up on the organizational list was where we store our kitchen stuff. CMR was convinced that we could organize this space to include everything you see here and all of our pantry items for the other side. I wasn't so sure, but I figured I'd let her give it a try. This one kind of was there. Yes. Okay. Now this one. And no. Because ideally it would be for them to go this way. At this point, I'm already convinced I have no organizational skills and everything should change. But CMR didn't agree. If I open something and I ask you, does it work? Okay, we're going to close it and we're going to leave it at that. Usually what happens, people in the momentum, they go and get so excited that they overbuy and they start changing what works. Don't change what works because it's going to frustrate you in the long run. You want to change only what's not working and leave the rest. Let's see. You think it's organized and then you see it when an organizer is here and you realize it's not very organized. It's not bad. You know, just need a little refresher. Look at that. As soon as the Amara opened the fridge, she asked the last time I cleaned it was. I lied and said maybe three months, but I'll be honest with you. I had no idea how long it had been. Before you go out and do groceries, take everything out, clean your fridge, do an inventory, and then go buy groceries. It also makes you more aware of your consumption. Yes. Which is so important. Yes. So when you create homes for things and you stop overbuying. With our space evaluated, photos taken, and measurements made, it was time to head to the store to buy all the things we needed to bring our dreams of an organized Airstream life into reality. As soon as we arrived and started looking at the seemingly endless options for containers, I was so thankful to see Amara was here with us. Her delightful hubby, Frank, also joined us at the store. He's the go-to handyman for Lily's organizing, and he's basically a genius at building and fixing things. If you've ever shopped for containers before, you know it didn't take long for our cart to really stack up, but seeing Amara made it clear that not all of these would work. The goal is to try them in the space, see what works, what doesn't, and then return the no-gos. It's all about creating a But with two carts full, it was time to check out, and after a quick grocery run for a few essentials, it was time to head back to the Airstream and get some rest before we get up and tackle the next round of our organizational project first thing in the morning. It's day two of organizing the Airstream. Now that all of the shopping has been completed, now the real work begins. The first thing we're going to do is your fridge and your pantry, right? And then after that, we can go ahead and move on to the closet. Ready? Yes. Step one with cleaning out the refrigerator, Cece is pulling everything out in my refrigerator, aka airing my dirty laundry, and forcing me to determine if A, am I going to, if it's like almost empty, I need to either use it the next week or just throw it away because I shouldn't let things sit in my space that I'm just, that are just taking up space. But this is harder than it looks, so when I decide that it is something that should stay, I'm going to move it over to this side, and if it shouldn't stay, I'm throwing it away. Obviously, Daniel's local beer collection is on this side of the Airstream. One thing I love about Lily's organizing is that it's truly a family affair. Even her son Daniel joined, despite having just arrived back in the U.S. the day before after being stationed in Europe with the Air Force for the last couple of years. We're getting things done, which is pretty addicting, but CMR says it's important to make organizing fun too. She says to turn on your favorite music, grab an adult beverage, or two, and make a party out of it. And you know she didn't have to tell D twice. Local brew from A.L. Smith. With the fridge officially clean, it was time to turn it into an organizational masterpiece. Frank set up the shelves at the right heights, containers were added, and finally labels, which I learned were super important so that everyone in the house easily knows what things go where. Oh my god, it's so beautiful. Now that my refrigerator is the most beautiful refrigerator you've ever seen, it's time to tackle the freezer because it's a little bit of a cluster. While CMR and I tackled that, the gentlemen set up tables, organized our new containers, and prepped for the next phase. Once I'm done with the freezer, the party's really going to start, and we're going to open every cabinet from the pantry this way, and we're taking every single thing out. We're about to start like deciding what stuff we're going to throw away and whatnot. Here it goes. We're pulling it all out and putting it on the tables. This is scary. Part of our goal is to get rid of at least 20% of our stuff because we figure that's approximately how much stuff we're not actually using on a regular basis. Space suck. Yes. More coffee. Before we knew it, we had two tables full of stuff that we'd pulled out of the airstring. The beauty of this is that you get an opportunity to basically move in again. Yeah. That's why it's good to like take everything completely out, go through your stuff and rethink if you actually have used it, if you need it, and then bring things back. Then we're going to create a system that's a little bit more functional. Sure. Especially now that you've been living in it for like eight months, so you kind of know, have a better idea of like, okay, this was not working here. Maybe we can put it over here. How do you feel? I'm excited. Okay. With all of our stuff outside, we cleaned the cabinets and then started adding the containers. That way it was going to be easy to see if things fit when we moved back into the airstream. I love these containers. Later what you can do is like, let's say everything that's here is for a special recipe. Sure. Like you can do Asian, Hispanic. Oh yeah. So that when you go cook the Asian food, you just take the whole thing, put it up here. That makes perfect sense. I tell people all the time, like for every minute you spend organizing, you save an hour. Yeah, I can so see that. Nobody regrets getting their house organized. Okay, Daniel. So now I gave you a new office space, so you can go ahead and start filling it up. Yes. While Daniel worked on his office space, it was time to put these nifty expandable drawer dividers in. This is going to be so awesome. And voila, before you knew it, this drawer and the one above it were actually functional space. And remember that space suck Frank mentioned earlier? There was a solution for that too. Goodbye, knife block. Hello, magnetic knife strip, which is held to the wall an essential tool for RV life organized or not. See Mara also showed us this crazy clever trick for coffee cups. She credits Stacy at tin can adventures for this one. But with the front half of the airstream starting to come together, we decided it was time to knock off for the day. After all, there's plenty of work to do on the back half tomorrow. This morning, we're starting with the bedroom. And as you can see, it's tiny, but it's a long way from organized. And if you think that's bad, check out our closet. I keep random stuff. Okay, go ahead and try to split those into these two and put it back and see how you like it. Okay, so this is like running stuff. I have so much running stuff. More. So do you want every morning? I'm done. That's the goal? Yeah. Okay. Ukulele. Yeah, that's it. That's it. We're going to put that one under the bed, right? Yeah. Yeah, we can put this under the bed. Obviously, you're not going to have pink. I just want to see if you like it. This comes in different colors. Literally before it was like, yeah. With our above the bed storage plan, it was time for two things. First, remove the closet doors to begin working there. Here she goes. And second, to pull all the stuff out just like we did up front. I'm shocked at how much unused spacer is behind the hanging clothes. I'm going to find some dead animals, bodies. That's not mine. Those aren't mine. That's all Lauren's, right? So Cece, on a scale of one to 10, how bad is this closet? Well, the thing is that I never think nothing is bad. It just needs to have a functional space. So it doesn't have a functional space right now. This is actually terrible. No, I'm joking. I'm not a fan of this one because with time, this starts bending down. It doesn't matter which one you buy or how much high quality because this has only been here, what, four months? And look how it is having that. What I dislike about this is that when you have shoes in here, right, let's just say like this, you know it's like an earthquake back here, right? So then yeah, yeah, every time. And then we get to the location and there's shoes all over the bottom. They just, they start here. Because they're not contained. No, they start here and then they come right out. That would actually be nice. This is one of my least favorite organizing items. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Closets officially cleared. Learn your room in here. Hey, it's not break time to work, okay? It's not nap time. Yep, that's right. Let's go. Time to work. Slave driver. Yep, that's right. Now we're going to see how many shoes you have and how many shoes you really use. Okay. I found a few more pairs of shoes. I have lots of running shoes, probably more than the average person. I run a lot. It's not my fault. So determined. We each have eight pairs, nine pairs, and I think there's a crack in our minimalism here. So you guys have 18 pairs of shoes in the Earth Street? So the question is, do you use them all? I want to say yes. But in reality, the answer is probably no. Okay, so we're going to play a game. I'm going to ask you questions. How you use them? Okay. Answer is no. Put it on the floor. Okay. Do you love them? Yes. The answer is no. Yes, love them all. What? I know you love them all. No, that's not true. I could probably give up a pair. Okay, so you ready? Yeah. All right, let's start. This one. Trail shoes that are not super rugged. Do you use them? Yes. When was the last time you used them? Two days ago. Okay, so they stay on the table. Okay. This one. My only pair of dress shoes. That's fine. You only have one. That's right. So let's keep them in the Earth Street. Yeah. This one. My babies. I bought my babies in Austin. My precious. I've always wanted a pair of boots. It's my very first pair. Ostrich. Do you use them? Yes, all the time. Every day. Every day. Okay, so I want to see pictures every day. I'm sure there's some footage. We have a YouTube channel, so I'm sure there's some footage somewhere if you're wearing those. All right. What about this one? I don't wear them. Okay, so those can go to the floor. So look, you did good. Yeah. From nine to seven. Yeah. All right, your turn, Lauren. Yeah, that's when it gets real. For some reason, it's way easier to know which stay and what should go when you're watching your significant other do it. If you love them, keep them, but try to make an effort to wear them. Okay, fair enough. And those? I think that's one of those things that I want to keep, but like put it on my calendar if I haven't used it in three months. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah, so like this was the first round around. Yeah. Next time you guys do it, if you haven't used them, then at that point. Then it's time to let them go. Yeah. And same with my case. That's just true. Okay. With Xiomara's help, we narrowed our shoe collection down from 18 to 15. Maybe not our best work, but organizing isn't about perfection. It's about function. And since we have the space, we decided to give ourselves a little grace in the shoe arena. Excuse me. I have a question for the owners of this Airstream. How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? A lot. A lot of wood. A woodchuck would chuck a lot of wood. So chucking wood is a lot of wood. A woodchuck could be chucking wood. While it may seem like Frank is goofing off, he's really working on a super exciting project for our closet, but more on that in a few. For now, it's time for Xiomara to teach us the golden rule of organizing. Never pile, always file. You never want to roll your socks because when you roll your socks, with time, this will stretch out, right? So you want to always get the socks in full, like this. And then go ahead and put them like that in there. I put the white ones first. Okay. No, see? So now you want to put them this way. Oh, okay. And like that, and put them in there. Okay. And they should be nice and tight all the way. Push them back. This is a much better way to organize socks. File folding pants is pretty similar to socks. You always want to remember to hand iron them like this. That way they're less wrinkled when you wear them. But there are tons of videos on YouTube that'll teach you how to file fold. So we'll skip the details here. But if I can learn to do it, you can learn to do it. If you want to, of course. It's been a game changer for us. While Ciamara and I file folded all of our clothes, including those previously stored in the back of the truck, the guys worked on a really important project. You see, one of our biggest goals with organizing the Airstream was to create the space needed to completely empty out the cab of the truck. Because as you may have noticed in another video or two, it had gotten completely out of hand. And what exactly is this important project these two goofballs are tackling? They're building custom shelves for our closet. Frank is even taking the curve of the Airstream into consideration. Our plan is to keep the right half of the closet for hanging clothes and the left will be shelving for the folded stuff. With the closet in progress, it was time to tackle the bathroom. And boy, it needed some serious work. Oh, that is just ridiculous. So there, I think, let's try this one. Put it like this. Okay. Yeah. That one. Oh, there you go. Oh my God. That's amazing. And we'll be using the ones that you already have. And you're not wasting your space. It's literally perfect. Yes. With the bathroom coming along nicely and Frank making great progress in the closet, it was time for Daniel to tackle that nasty pile of cords. So the reality is we have an entire Airstream filled with tech and each one of those technology pieces come with its own cord. Therefore, we have a million cords. Ew. That's going to take a while. So CMR and I started creating labels for the bins we're going to use in the closet. Things are growing well, making some good progress on the cords. They all have a home. I just don't necessarily know where that home is. So you can consider some of these cables to be homeless. Just like us. Now we're going to label them. With the closet basically complete, it was time to call it a night. But before we said goodbye to Frank and CMR, they gave us homework. So a few hundred miles and a couple days later, it was time to test out our newly acquired organizational skills. I'm getting ready to go get the truck washed now that I've cleared out everything. And this was part of CC's homework to go through the truck and reorganize it. There's way more in the truck than expected. I could make up an excuse and say that we travel a lot and don't really ever have time to sort through everything. But the reality is there's just a lot of crap in the truck. You don't necessarily realize it until you pull it all out. And boy oh boy, did we need this. Desperately. It's been basically since we bought this truck nine months ago or so, since there's been nothing yet. So pretty excited to see it clean. Good news, I found a local shop that'll hand wash the truck. And honestly, I just don't think driving it through a drive-thru car wash is going to get the job done. It's going to require a little extra love. Have fun. Your destination is on the left. Now that is a pretty truck. Well, minus that little dent we haven't gotten fixed. All right, so the plan, at least the initial plan, is to start organizing things by category. So for instance, all of the generator supplies, all of our travel supplies we use when we have to get up and hop on a plane, and then all the tools. And just start from there. After hours of working on the truck, it was time to make a donation run. With the purge complete, we were pretty proud of our Pinterest-worthy tiny home. But the true test of how well a home is organized isn't how pretty it is, it's how well it works for you. It has been a little over a month since Cece and Frank came to help us completely gut and reorganize the Airstream. And while the entire process was transformational in so many ways, what it really taught us was a new way of life and a new way of thinking about how to organize our own space. We're so excited to show it with you now. But start with the truck. Y'all are gonna be impressed. Now I'm really excited to show you the cabin of the truck because even though I thought it was super organized, this is kind of like my catch-all space junk. And there was so much of it in here. Now I introduce to you my back seat. Notice something? Like all the space back here? Honestly, it's been a game changer. Now if we have friends who want to take somewhere, they can actually ride in the back seat as opposed to taking a different car, which has never been the case before. Everything is so much more organized. And if you're interested to see what we travel with in the truck, we have a video coming out soon so be sure to subscribe. Let's check out the Airstream. The first thing you'll notice in the Airstream is that it is so clean in here. We used to spend hours of time every single week picking up random stuff because in a tiny space it gets messy fast. Now that everything has a home, we've pretty much eliminated that. We have not had a single stupid conversation about cords in the past month, so this may be one of my number one favorite additions from Cece. Creating dedicated office space has also been a huge deal for us because as you notice, our table's empty. And this is pretty normal unless I'm uploading videos. We love these containers. They're so convenient. Every morning when I go do my workout outside, I just literally grab my workout bin, take it outside with me, use everything I need, put it back up, and voila! Perfectly right back in its box. These cool little bins come in and out and it's so convenient for storing smaller things. I'll let Daniel tell you about his office space. One of the things that I've absolutely loved is that Laura and I have our own dedicated space. And because I'm a little OCD, that helps my mental health a lot. Now I've got all my paperwork organized with color folders and they're of course categorized. And since I'm the one that uses the printer most often, I've got the printer up here, I've got our laptops and tech up here as well. Now that I've got everything organized, one of the biggest things I've noticed is that when we're moving from campground to campground, things stay put. They don't jostle around during the ride. So when you open a cabinet, there's no more surprises. Something I've been carrying with me for a little while, the world's hottest potato chip. It's called the One Chip Challenge and I've been challenging Lauren for months. So if you think she should take the One Chip Challenge with me, please drop a comment below and encourage her because as of today, she's not interested. If you comment below, I will know who you are. When Cece told me that we were going to be able to consolidate my pantry just to this side of the Airstream, I honestly thought she was nuts. But sure enough, it's worked like a charm. So this is an example of where those original containers that we had from Amazon work perfectly. But what's so amazing about this setup is because I only have two of these for food up here, I only use two. Therefore, I've been saving a lot of money on groceries since we did this. Our daily kitchen items cabinet has also been awesome. This little bin has been amazing. It's our daily stuff. So it has vitamins, stuff I use for smoothies, literally drop it off, get my morning things done and put it right back. Daniel has a dedicated spot for all of his coffee gadgets, which means these actually get put away in the morning. And then also we love this little trick for our coffee mugs. Of course, we don't travel with them like that. When we travel, we just simply put them down here. It's awesome for quick access, considering we use these a couple times a day. And even our junk drawer has stayed organized. Siamara told me that I was going to love these little organizers and she was right. Right now, I just use them for overflow, but I know exactly where my overflow is and they're so easy to grab and put back. And you're probably as surprised as I am. My fridge is really easy to maintain. Everything is organized and even the interior too. How amazing is this? Remember what my freezer looked like before? Not anymore. Now, this particular part of the Airstream is probably the part I'm most proud of because I helped maybe like 2%. In reality, Frank could have done the whole thing by himself, but he was so nice to let me partake in the build process. Because of the way it comes from the factory, there's so much wasted space in this closet. All you have is really the pole to hang stuff on. So by creating custom shelving, we created so much more space here. Because Cece taught us how to file fold, I can get so much in these tiny bins. On top of that, with each shelf, I've got two of these exact bins so you can fit so much more stuff in your closet. This right here, this is Lauren's favorite bin. When I'm looking for my keys or my hat or my wallet, Lauren has put it in this box called the Drop Zone. And because we have a 50-50 split with shelving and hanging clothes, we use this section for the stuff that we want to just quickly pull out. For instance, a rain jacket. And down below, our laundry basket. The organization of the bathroom has also really improved our efficiency. We had already added this little hook here for somewhere to hang a towel when you're getting out of the shower, which is great. But Cece showed us some new tricks. We hadn't had a bath mat because I had no idea where to dry it. But Ciamara is a genius. She told us to put our clothesline out that was built in here originally. And after we're done with the shower, simply hang up the shower mat here. She also introduced us to the Simple Human. And this is now how we store all of our shampoos, conditioners, and soaps. Yes, we have a lot of them, but it means we don't have to move them when we travel and it's so convenient. I will say I really love these little small containers. You probably noticed them in our junk drawer in the kitchen, but from a standpoint of keeping small things put together nicely and keeping them organized, which is difficult, works great. Ciamara had us dedicate specific space to the daily use items, which is at eye level and works great. Remember that ridiculous junk drawer? It's now been turned into the paper goods holder. Now that I've got them all in one place, I easily know when I need to buy more and when I don't. Last but certainly not least is our bedroom. We use the storage under the bed for things we don't use on a regular basis. I know you're shocked. Daniel's babies under the bed. But he actually did wear these the other day. If you remember earlier in the video, I had stuff literally just falling out like a waterfall from up here. But now, super organized, pure bliss. I've got all my tops similar to how I have them organized in the closet. But one of my favorite little things Cece did for us is she added these little delightful, I don't even know what you call these, I would call it essence of awesomeness. And it makes our bedroom smell so good. The next has been super helpful as well. It's how I organize my sock and underwear drawer. Now, while most of us don't really think about those things, once you have it organized, there's no going back. You know, the best part is I've actually kept it organized. It's so tempting to just throw your socks in the drawer. Same goes for underwear, but it's all file folded and it's easy access at all times. One of the really cool things that Cece reminded me of is it's always good to keep a notepad next to your bed. Because if you're like me, the wheels are spinning all night and sometimes it's best to just jot it down on a pad. My side of the bedroom looks a lot like Daniel's. Got my tops and my bottoms. I'm officially obsessed with how awesome file folding is. And honestly, now that I've got the hang of it, this doesn't take me any extra time for what it used to. What's that thing in the middle? This is an alpaca. And he's literally there just to make me smile when I open it. I don't keep a whole lot of stuff by the bed, so I have extra space to grow. I love this container for underneath the storage of the nightstand. I use it to throw my PJs in here and other random things I use regularly. How impressive is this transformation? The fact that it looks Pinterest worthy like it did a month ago today really speaks to how incredible Samara is at what she does. I think one of my biggest takeaways is that yes, you could very easily go to Container Store and buy some of the items that you've seen in the video. But the difference is that CC customized them to how we use the space every day. And that has made a huge difference. If you want to learn more about Samara and Lily's organizing, we'll leave a link in the description below. But if you enjoyed this video, give it a thumbs up, have questions, leave a comment, and we look forward to seeing you next week. But don't forget to wander local. It's good for the soul.