Hasta La Ideas

Holiday decorations, tools, and forgotten objects reside in our basements alongside spiders, mildew, and dryer lint. Basements are fantastic places to hide when tornado sirens blare, but are also places where stored objects are easily ruined.

If you use your basement for storing things other than root vegetables, let me introduce you to my Three Laws of Basement Storage. These Laws should be followed if you want to protect the things you have chosen to have in your basement. (”Things you have chosen” is my way of implying “stuff that is not clutter.”)

1. Thy stuff, it shalt not be on the floor. There are two types of basements: those that have flooded and those that have yet to flood. Everything should be stored on shelving at least a foot off the floor.
2. Thy stuff, it should be stored in air-tight, hard plastic containers. Sure, rodents will eat through plastic, but other pests (silverfish, crickets, flies, termites, etc.) tend to stay away from it. Do not store things in cardboard, paper, wood, or flimsy plastic bags if you care at all about what is inside the container. A few desiccant packets in your containers are also a good idea.
3. Thou shalt own and run a dehumidifier/humidifier when necessary. Climate control is your friend.

What rules do you have for basement storage?