Makeup Organization from HEAVEN.


 I am 28 weeks and nesting terribly. I keep taking on random projects and trying to get everything more organized before the baby gets here. I need to be more organized anyways, baby or not, but I'm happy to utilize the nesting instinct to keep me going and inspired.
My most recent project was organizing my makeup. I usually keep all of my makeup in a medium train case. It only has one compartment, and the zipper is halfway broken. I know, it's in sad shape.

The toothbrush is to show you how big this case isn't.


I literally just throw everything in there, and I can't see what all I have, and then I don't use as much of it. Plus my brushes get all kinds of stuff in them that they shouldn't.

I saw a picture on Pinterest or somewhere showing a really cool makeup organizer using a picture frame and magnets and stuff. It looked pretty cool and "organizey".


http://laurathoughts81.blogspot.com/2011/03/make-up-magnet-board.html


 I went to the blog post and was both shocked and appalled. What looks like a ten minute project was actually a lot more work than that. She started with a frame (which I don't have) and painted it (why does everyone paint everything? I don't have time for that crap) and even took it to a hardware store where they fitted it for a freshly cut metal sheet to make it ready for magnets. That is just the beginning of the work put into this particular organizer which I am ashamedly too short on time and too lazy to accomplish.
Overall, I try to avoid any projects that involve having things cut for my specific project. It sounds expensive.

 So like any sanguine would do, I sought ways to minimize the work and tweak this project to something a little more realistic for me. I figured I could make my own hanging organizer with some magnets and pockets out of junk I have lying around. Then all you would *really* need is the magnets so I went to Ace and picked up some magnetty things.

It has three languages. It MUST be a good product.
I think this was like, $1.19? I also got a roll of the same basic thing but you can cut smaller lengths. I didn't know which I would end up using for sure. The total was less than $4.

Once I got it home I realized I had no clue really what to do, so I threw it in a drawer to brainstorm. And by brainstorm I mean to say that I ate dinner and went to bed.
But as SOON as I woke up I was all jazzed about the project again and was like "Heck yes, I'm gonna find something to complete this project!"

It only took about ten minutes for me to start getting flustered, knowing that I have magnets but literally nothing else. Finally I looked in my mirror-cabinet and decided that I hated everything in there and simultaneously realized it was all metal inside.

I literally use NOTHING in this cabinet. Why does this stuff exist???
This seemed superior to the hanging frame, because I could suddenly just imagine my kids going in the bathroom and playing with my makeup, emptying it in the sink, or at the very least, just accidentally knocking it off the wall. But they don't ever open the bathroom cabinet.

I started the project off with pulling everything out and tossing it {neatly} into a box from the closet that contains all our extra tubes of toothpaste and bars of soap and whatnot. In hindsight, I should have wiped it down at this point, since the shelves were removed (all but one) and all that. But then again, makeup has a magical way of getting everything covered in that grimy makeup dust so I wonder if it would have mattered.
Anyways... moving on....
I sorted through all my makeup and had to throw away fifty things that had been sitting in that stupid case even though they were empty/dried up/sticky etc. Apparently I *never* throw anything away, even if it's a retractable eyeliner pencil with no eyeliner in it.
Next I separated it out into palettes which I knew were each going to get there own little square magnet and tubey things and brushes. I had several leftover things that were obscure and seemingly without purpose so I set them aside until further notice.

On the frame tutorial, the woman painted medicine bottles black to hold her brushes. I had no desire to do that. I thought about finding a container to just sit inside on the lowest shelf, but I really couldn't find what I wanted. It would have to be heavy enough that it wouldn't just fall over, and light enough that it wouldn't break if it fell in the sink. I didn't really know what I could use so I once again started running around the house looking for stuff. I finally settled on the idea of PVC as little pouches for brushes and tubeys, and anything else that needed to go somewhere. I need to be able to see what I have, so the PVC was a pretty good choice.
You may be asking "Oh my gosh, where can I get thin, clear PVC?"

I'm really cheap and I reuse EVERYTHING.
 Look familiar? It's those little plastic bags that halloween costumes come in. I always have a few somewhere, never throwing them away, thinking, "some day, I'm totally going to need this stupid bag with a hook and a buttoned flap." Well, today was that day. I cut off the bottom 2 inches or so, and I glued the "pouch" inside my cabinet. It was a little loose to hold up my brushes, so I added a dot of glue in a couple places to make divided sections. I use a glue gun for all my gluing needs, because that is literally all I have.

See? PVC glue-gunned to the back of the cabinet, and divided with glue-spots into sections. I am the cheapest person ALIVE.


Then I proceeded to stick magnetic squares to the bottom of each of my pots and palettes and stick them inside the door. In the tutorial for the frame organizer, I guess she got dollar tree magnets and glue-gunned one to each thing. My magnetic squares were super cheap and already had the sticky on the back, so I don't feel bad about having to throw them away when the makeup is gone or buy more when I get more makeup.
OMG I just remembered I have an NYX smoky eyes palette coming... I need to go check the mail.....

*Elapsed time, 15 minutes*

It's not here yet.
Okay anyways, you should wash your hands before trying to use the magnetic squares. I pulled the first one out and it would not stick at all, and then I realized that I had a layer of makeup gunk on my hands from handling all this makeup that had been thrown in a train case for six months, so I ruined the sticky. No problem, I just had to glue-gun that one, but seriously - just wash your hands first.

Then there was that one random tubey... technically it's an eyeshadow, so I cut a strip and stuck it up there too.

I made a second PVC pouch above the first one and finished up throwing my odds and ends in there. The last step was taking a 4-5 inch strip of magnet and putting it near the top to hold all my pesky bobby pins. Right now I can only find like twenty of them but as I find them, I now have somewhere to stick them. There are stores of bobby pins all over my house so it will be like a scavenger hunt.

Bobby pins.
The finished cabinet looks like this:

PVC adds to the affect of your makeup magically floating.

Floating makeup everywhere!!

I'm really excited to be able to see everything I have all at once, and obviously, there is plenty of room to add more stuff as I need to. I'm sure there are LOADS of people who are more practical and don't want to devote their entire makeup cabinet to their makeup stash, but I am not one of those people. As far as I am concerned, this cabinet was useless before. I don't even really remember ever opening it. Although I have opened it about fifty times today, just to admire all of it. :)
So there you have it. Here is how you ruin a perfectly good, crafty tutorial and make it super cheap and easy, but not pretty enough to put on Pinterest.

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