Repurposed Topiary Form

I love it when utility, organization and creativity combine to solve a problem in my life!

That’s what happened today when I put together this little reminder tree for our family.


I’ve been hunting for ways to control the paper clutter that enters my house with my children each day.  I have a file system that I use for the big papers, which works fine if I just deal with the stack consistently.  The little papers are another story.

Most of them come in the form of reminders.  Reminders for Scouts, food assignments, equipment lists for campouts, Activity days reminders, gymnastics info.  Many of the important little details that I MUST see in order for things to run smoothly around here come into my home on 1/4 sheet of paper.

Those papers get lost in the big ones.   I hate it when I find a reminder, too late.  So I’ve been looking for ways to keep track of the little papers.  The fridge is out because too many people like to take the magnets to do whatever with, or rearrange things for fun, and so forth.  My kitchen is very open and all the wall space consists of windows and cabinets (sigh…no awesome chalkboard or bulletin board in my kitchen’s future).   I wanted it in the kitchen, however, because it is the hub of our family activity.

In my basement today my eyes settled on an old topiary form and a light bulb turned on.  I’m going vertical with the reminders!  I gave myself 7 minutes to complete this project (including pictures) from start to finish because I had to pick children up from school.

I took the form and set it in an IKEA pot that was in my pantry.  I weighted it with a bag of dry beans and then filled in the top with some fabric scraps.


The ball on top seemed a bit bare, so I added a couple of birds for fun.


I cut a length of several bright and cheery ribbons (it’s raining today and I need some color to lift my spirits) and tied them in a simple knot at the base of the ball.  It’s ready to go.


A quick collection run around the house turned up some clothespins and we’re in business!  I now have a place to clip those little pieces of paper that are important for about 24 hours at a time before they’re replaced by another.


Amazingly, I didn’t have a single reminder paper for my children that’s current.  Last week was spring break and I guess nobody wanted to bother reminding us about things until after it ended so currently it only holds a couple of coupons I don’t want to forget.


I have high hopes that this little tree will help all of us keep track of those frustrating but essential little papers.  The children were really excited about it when they came home from school.  I’m hoping that they’ll think it’s fun to clip their papers on, and it will be easy to see at a glance which papers are no longer needed.  When a clothespin is not in use it can be clipped wherever, on the ball, the trunk, or even around the edge of the pot.

So there you have it.  Seven minutes to a solution.    It now sits on my kitchen counter, cheerfully awaiting my first reminder of the week (please don’t let us forget the Pinewood Derby later this month).   I was thinking that this could be used for displaying other things, like photos, postcards or greeting cards.  Do you have any other ideas?  What do you think?  What would you use it for?



Note:  to see how I took the clothespins from regular to adorable, check out this post Thanks for stopping by.  Have a great day.
Hopeful Homemaker linked to DIY Day and Remodelaholic