Cleaning should NOT be put off until springtime! Organization is your friend, so give it some love!
Here are a few great tips to help you transform your house transformed from looking like the crazy kid down the hall’s college dorm, to the perfect haven of neat stacks, each lovingly attacked by the label maker.
Train your kids. Set up a system that they can use right when they enter the house. Hang hooks for their backpacks and jackets at their height. Teach them to empty their bags and tack notices to a corkboard for you to check.
Do the “trash bag tango”. Have the whole clan pitch in for ten minutes a day and fill one “toss” and one “donate” bag to clear the clutter.
Embrace the idea of working from home. Designate an area, like the kitchen table, where you can get work done without feeling cramped. It should be easy to set up and remove daily. You can even transform a closet into an office or purchase a simple desk to be your workspace.
Create zones in your home and workspace. Remeber to utilize vertical space (hang shelves, hooks, and boards) and set limits on how much paperwork can live in your surroundings.
Tackle your junk drawer. Place the rolling pizza slicer and anthing else you bought for less than $5.99 in a cardboard box. Every time you use one of these items, put it back in the drawer–it’s safe! At the end of a month, examine the things remaining in the box. Do you really use them? If so keep them, if not…you know the drill!
Control the clutter. Simple containers–like a basket that matches your home decor and holds all the remotes, or a nifty storage cabinet for the mountains of DVDs–help keep clutter under control. Limit your magazine collection to no more than two back issues. If you’re concerned about losing or missing out on the information, remember that there’s always the internet.
Sort the mail. And learn to discard the junk! After taking the mail out of the mailbox, quickly sort through and discard the junk mail before the whole pile takes over your kitchen table. Create temporary storage for your mail: use a 3- or 4-tier file tray or wire shelves and label each section with “to-do”, “when I have time”, and “file away”. Pour yourself a drink or sit down with a snack and find 10 minutes a week to go through your mail and clear out your trays.
