Organizing Home Tips

It depends on how many closets you have the in the house. This is a full day’s work for 6 hours. Closets for the kids, husband, and yourself, linen closets. If you’re like many of us, you probably are going to find many things that don’t belong to the closets. You will not try to organize yet. Just take things out and decide what you’ll do with them.

Start with your own closet and work to your husband’s if he has a separate one and the kids’. Keep in mind, anything you haven’t worn in 2 years need to be donated or tossed out if they’re not in good condition. Many people say donate cloths that you haven’t worn in 1 year. But I think it’s a little harder to toss out the pretty dress that you bought and never worn once. So try the 2 year rule. Put donations in one large garbage bag and thrown out ones in another. Throw out dry cleaner hangers and old plastic hangers. If you haven’t done so, buy some nice wooden or plastic hangers.

Remember, it’s a lot easier to declutter the closet on your own. If you show the clothes to your husband and ask for his opinion. Most likely he’ll like all of them and you end up keeping them all. It’s hard to donate the dress you worn on the first date with your husband. But if you didn’t wear for 15 years and it no longer fits, let it go. Someone can enjoy them as well as you did. The hardest part is to donate the nice piece that you bought on sale and never wore once because it probably isn’t your size. You can always try to sell it on ebay or consignment store. Just put such items in a separate bag.

This is the hard working day. Make sure no kids are around. Try to save 5-6 hours uninterrupted. Start with anything that’s on the floors, tables, and counters. Pick them up room by room. Toss out unwanted items and put them in the garbage bag. Save the ones that you need in the plastic bins. This will take you 2 hours depending on how messy your house is.

Next step, go though your drawers in the kitchen, home office, and bedrooms. Toss out and keep. This will take you the rest of the day. Organize items by bins and mark them using the marker.

The most important part of the day is to clean and declutter. Remember the main reason the house is messy is because you saved too much stuff. So please don’t feel obligated to save. Don’t touch the paperwork such as bank statements, bills yet, just put them in a large plastic bin. You will sort them out later on.

How many of us feel the same way? Our coffee tables are full of books, magazines, paper cups, and everything else. There are socks underneath the beds and we don’t even dare to open the closet doors. If you have been fed up by the mess in your house. It’s time to take action!

Sometimes it’s harder to get started when there seems to be so much stuff to do. But you can do it! You don’t need to hire a professional organizer. That’s true, you can do it all yourself. Just make sure the children are not around and husband is at work. Give yourself 5 uninterrupted hours to clean, sort, dump, and organize. Then do the same the next day, and the next day…

Day one: this is not your cleaning day, but a day of preparation.

• Get yourself half dozen contractor sized garbage bags
• Markers
• 4-6 Plastic bins (large)
• Cleaning supplies
• Shoe organizers if you don’t already have them (plastic or metal)
• Nice hangers
• Storage bags

1. Are you left handed? Organise your closet left to right so you can always see what you are taking out. Keeps your closet organised.

2. Put an empty coloured hanger in to separate different kinds of clothes.

3. For left handers – put the shoes you use the most at the left hand end.

4. Never overfill the closet. Store things in colour coded bags. Code by season.

5. For closets with lamps – put a daylight bulb in.

6. Clean it regularly. Taking the clothes out lets you review what you do and do not want in there.

How many times have you said to yourself I wish I could stay organized? I am a professional organizer and I tell the women I work with it is possible to keep organized but I don’t think it is possible to stay organized. The word stay gives the impression that once a task is done it is done for good. But if you have a life, live with someone, have children or have a home no matter how organized things are they just get undone. Here are six tips to help you keep organized by clearing clutter and getting a grip on clutter control on a consistent basis.

1. Put things back after using them AKA: get rid of the evidence. This is an easy habit to get into and it will make a big difference in clutter control. Teach your family to put things back after using them. If you make a sandwich put everything away that you took out to make the sandwich before you sit down to eat it. Put the bread back, replace the perishables in the fridge, and put the utensils you used in the dishwasher and wipe off the counter. No evidence remains that you fixed a sandwich. This will help eliminate clutter around the home when you get in the habit of doing this in every room.

2. Don’t set something down to deal with later. Later usually means clutter is starting to creep and piles are being made. When you have something in your hands, go ahead and deal with it then and there. Put it where it belongs. You may think it is simpler at the moment to set something down and deal with it later, but it just creates more work later. Get in the habit now of putting it away the second you’re done with it. Teach your family members to do the same.

3. Every night plan on a nightly pick up that will take no more than 10 to 15 minutes. Things do get undone and left out and papers and magazines dropped where they were read and maybe the laundry is folded and sitting on the couch—you get the idea. Have family members help pick up before going to bed because then you won’t have a mess staring you in the face the next morning. This is doing clutter control a little at a time which makes the task easy.

4. Involve the family in learning to keep organized. The reality is that every member of the family plays an important role in maintaining an organized home. Hold a family meeting to decide as a family which responsibilities will be done by each family member.

5. When you are living with the things you love and use and that light you up keep it that way by making sure that everything you bring into your home has a purpose and that you need it or just can’t live without it. Clutter control can be possible if you can adopt the attitude of one in and one out. When you buy something, let something else go. This isn’t always possible to do if you are buying things you need and use but it is something to consider.

6. Keep a toolbox in a place where everyone knows not only where to go to get a tool, but where to go to put it back when they are finished with it. By keeping a toolbox handy, you’ll have the correct tool for the job. It is much easier to pound a nail with a hammer than a shoe, or screw in a screw with a screwdriver rather than a butter knife (which scratches and bends your good knife). Get into the habit of putting the tools back in the tool box as soon as you finish with them.

Clutter Control will be effortless when you use these timely organizing tips and you will be able to Keep organized.

About The Author

Marilyn is a professional organizer who works with women and seniors in clearing clutter and providing organizing tips. Clearing clutter helps those she works with to have less stress in their lives and feel more joy in living.

Marilyn invites you to visit her website http://www.marilynbohn.com where you can find organizing solutions. You will find fun stories and free organizing tips in her blogs, articles and videos.