What's the best way to organize a junk drawer?

Pull everything out and dump it on a counter. You will find pens that don’t work, takeout menus from restaurants that closed three years ago, and at least four random screwdrivers. Sort into piles: keep, relocate, trash.

The keep pile should be genuinely useful items that live in a drawer because they don’t belong anywhere else — scissors, takeout menus from places you actually order from, a small screwdriver, rubber bands, a tape measure. The relocate pile is anything that has a real home elsewhere (stamps belong with your desk supplies, batteries go with the flashlight). The trash is dead pens, expired coupons, and mystery keys.

Once you know what’s staying, use adjustable drawer dividers or small containers (bamboo ones look good and fit most drawer widths). Group like items together: one section for writing tools, one for hardware, one for takeout menus and notepads. If you want a truly fast solution, a multi-compartment utensil tray from a dollar store works almost as well as custom dividers.

Don’t aim for magazine-photo perfection. A junk drawer that’s 80% organized and actually usable will stay organized longer than one that’s perfectly compartmentalized but annoying to maintain.