Thrifty Gifty #14—Jewelry Organizer

Here’s another one that has been around the internet in various forms. I’ve been meaning to make one for some time. I already had some thrift store frames in my stash; yesterday I went to Home Depot to find some kind of wire mesh.

Understand, I'm trying to do this for as little money as possible, a) because I’m cheap thrifty, and b) because my goal is to show you gifts that you can make for a pittance.

Therefore, I did not want to spend $7 or more for a big roll of chicken wire or wire mesh. I didn’t need that much, and I didn’t want to spend that much. After a couple trips around the store, I ended up with a gutter cover. It was about 10” wide and 3 ft long; it was also curved, so I had to flatten it out. It was just under $2.

I originally was intending to use a bigger frame and just make this work, by overlapping two strips of the mesh, but as it turned out I had a narrow frame that worked very well. I had paid 50 cents for the frame months ago.

The metal had to be trimmed some, then I tacked it across the opening of the frame with carpet tacks, because I couldn’t find the staple gun. I think this falls into the “fast, cheap, good” theory. Actually, most things do. You can’t have all three at the same time. If it’s cheap and good, it’s not fast. If it’s fast and good, it’s not cheap. And, as in this case, if it’s fast and cheap, it’s not good/done well .

After giving it a coat of Heirloom White and hanging it on my wall, my jewelry went from this (yeah, I don’t dust)….

…to this. Aha, I forgot to mention one very important step: the row of cup hooks for hanging items. I might add one more on each side of the frame for bracelets. Yeah, I don’t have a lot of jewelry either (although this isn’t all of it).

(the paint job was also fast and cheap, but not good!)

Gutter cover, $2 (I could have made two this size with it), frame 50 cents, cup hooks, about $2 for 8. I had the paint.

If you or your recipient own(s) a lot of jewelry, you may want to use a bigger frame, which would require a roll of the wire grid available in the fencing area. It was about $7-$10 for a roll that would be enough to make quite a few of these. Or you could use lace, or just wires strung from side to side. I’m sure you could come up with other ideas.

I’ve been so busy coming up with and making thrifty gifts for my series that I’m no where near done Christmas shopping and all that! So, although I said the series would run through Christmas, I think I’ll end it with this Friday’s linky party. Now I just need to come up with something good for tomorrow’s final Thrifty Gifty idea!