Hi y'all.
It's Gary again from
Can I just tell you how much I HATE my system for construction paper storage? I'm talking about the big stuff. That 12x18 monster that doesn't fit anywhere. For the smaller sheets, I use my filing cabinet and hanging folders. That is awesome. But for the big stuff I laid all of my sheets inside my cabinet on top of each other. So if I needed a certain color in the middle of the pack, I had to use my poor overtaxed arm muscles to lift up the rest of the papers and pull what I needed out. All the while I'm praying that it doesn't rip or crinkle and make some kid cry.
It's time I came up with a PLAN! I recently saw a Pinterest post about creating student mailboxes out of those FREE Priority Mail boxes at the post office. I immediately ran over and picked up 30 of them. No one batted an eyelash. Looking at them I thought it would be a lot of work to put something like this together. So I let them rattle around in my trunk for a while.
Then it hit me. Why not use them to hold construction paper? Oh yeah, each color could have their own slot and I could put them up against a wall in my teeny weeny classroom. Perfect. Making 12 boxes seemed easier than making 30. So I set to work.
The boxes measure 12 inches lengthwise and 17 inches widthwise. I want some of the paper to hang out, so I cut the tabs off the open end after sealing up the bottom of the boxes. This made the box now 14 inches long instead of 17.
I found some duct tape in our new school color (they had the lime green as well, but that's not my favorite). I placed three strips along six of the boxes across the bottoms to hold them in place. Then I wrapped the entire perimeter with tape on the bottom and top. Voila!
They don't fit perfectly inside because the box is 12 inches and the paper is 12 inches, so they bend a little. But I figure that's better than what I was doing, right?
Cost? All about $1.00 worth of materials. Time? About 30 minutes to attach six boxes together. It helps to watch your favorite trending Net Flix show season. For me it was OITNB.
Let me know if you make one as well. I'd love to see it!
