Monday Made It!! Teacher Toolbox

If you are a teacher, and you're on Pinterest, chances are you have seen "The Teacher's Toolbox". I have had this on my "To Do" list since last May! However, since I teach in Virginia, May is the "Land of Standardized Testing" -- so no toolbox was made! It has been on my summer list for several weeks now, but my summer work at the Technology Office has consumed all of my time. As you can imagine, I was SO excited to have an excuse to go to Lowe's this week to pick up the box for this! I wasn't sure if I wanted a tall toolbox, or a wide toolbox, and spent the better part of 15 minutes in the aisle trying to decide! My friend Valerie over at http://asking4seconds.blogspot.com made a really cute red one that was tall. I am jealous of all of her drawers, but I really liked the look of the shorter version. The dark blue also went well with my decor- but I may spray paint it black later. I picked this up at Lowe's for about $16. 

Here's a close up of the label - you can even order them on Amazon: 

So, I was left with 8 large drawers and 14 small drawers to decide what to name. While I poured over Pinerest post of others trying to decide what drawers I needed, I started cutting scrap book paper to cover the drawers. I made a template for both the small and large drawer front, and then chose 3 different prints from my scrapbook paper pack that I purchased from the local Wal-Mart for $5. (This pack has 50 pages of paper - at 10 cents a page, that will last a while! It only took about three half sheets. I could have probably just used one, but who wants every drawer to look the same?!) 

I used double sided tape on the inside of the front of each drawer, then just pressed the cut paper down. It stays flush, and I know that I don't have to worry about tape coming off the corners! I could have printed off labels to tape in - but I thought I may want to change some of the drawers once I start filling them up! I wrote on the outside of each plastic drawer with a black Sharpie. A neat trick you may not know about, is that a little rubbing alcohol takes permanent marker right off plastic! I even changed one or two as I was working. You can see one of my first drawers here: 

I did have some assistance with the project -- Angel watched over my every move, smelling every scrap of paper along the way! 

To keep some kind of pattern, I tried to do 3 large drawers, and 4 small drawers in the same paper. I did this for my first and second paper patterns. For the third, I only did 2 big drawers, but 6 small drawers. 

This didn't take much time at all - I actually worked on this while watching a movie, and things always take extra time with my special helpers! As you can see - they were a big help! 

 Here's the final finished project! I decided my labels would be:

 Big Drawers: pencils, index cards, pens, sharpies, tape, Post-It's, markers, highlighters 

Little Drawers: pins, flash drives, binder clips, Lottos (a reward system our school uses), small Post Its, staples, glue, rubber bands, brads, white out, rings, Band-Aids, paper clips (s), and paper clips (L)

Some other great ideas for drawers were erasers, hair ties, sanitizer, ribbon, magnets....the list goes on and on! Like I said, I can always take a little rubbing alcohol, wipe off an old label and add a new! 

Thanks for taking time to read my blog!