I hope everyone had a happy holidays and new year. This is my first post of 2024 and I wanted to talk about a bit of a reset for the new year. Things tend to get a little chaotic over the holidays and guess what! It's the new year and a fantastic time embrace new changes and grow.
I know you are so busy and have so much to do. That's why I want to teach you 5 ways that will help you with that balancing act just a little bit more and teach you ways that you can get organized in 2024 that will work for your whole family!
Learn from Others
You took a great step in organizing from just reading this blog. It is going to walk you through the basics of what you can do on your own and give you some ideas and inspiration.
Even better would be to tune into the Organized Home Academy I am hosting launching Jan 8. This is free to attend. There will be other professional organizers speaking and teaching you about things like, organizing styles, decluttering decisions, organizing for busy parents, photo organizing, meal planning, and productivity. To register, click here.
Declutter
One of the biggest things that I can not talk about enough is the need to declutter. If you don't have enough space for your items, organizing isn't going to help. This doesn't have to take long. It can actually be fun.
Decluttering with the garbage bag therapy method can be one of the best ways to get started. Grab a garbage bag, set a timer, and run around and get anything that is obvious garbage. These can be things like wrappers and garbage, expired items like food makeup and medication, and stuff you know that is ruined and you won't be able to give away. You might be surprised how fast you can fill up a garbage bag and how easy it actually is. If you can, get the whole family on board to do this. If you are really busy, you can stop there as soon as your throw that garbage bag out and resume the rest another day.
The next step to decluttering is picking a small space. This might be something like just a small drawer, or a cupboard. If you can see every item, do a deeper scan to see what is in there. Your goal is to make sure everything in that space fits comfortably and can be easily found. If something doesn't belong there, move it to where it does belong right away so if something comes up and you have to stop, you aren't leaving piles anywhere in the house that can get ignored. If the space is too full and you have to take everything out, make a decision as soon as you pull it out whether it is keep, trash, or donate. Put everything back from the order of most important to undecided. If the items still don't fit, please consider getting rid of this item or finding a better home for it, if needed.
Sort Items
Once you have a space decluttered, you can fine tune and organize it. Here is how you do that:
Step 1: Make sure all the like items are together. This space should already be decluttered and this should have been done, but this is another chance to make sure that the stuff in this space will be it's final home.
Step 2: Sort. Now is your time to sort things within this space. Here is the time to think about things like, who is going to be using the stuff in this space, what are they going to be able to manage in terms of ease of finding or putting it away, and how refined do I want this space to be?
Keep in mind, the more you refine a space, the harder it will be to put things away. For instance, you can have a station for craft supplies. Within it you may have a clear bin labelled crayons, pencils, markers. If your 7 year old is going to be putting it away, can it be something they can take out themselves and mix them all together? Will my child take the time to sort between different bins within this bin to categorize these items separately. If so, can I actually expect them to sort them based on color?
This is where some acceptance comes in. If your goal for your child is to not leave the supplies lying around and to put things away, then perhaps you need to make it as easy as possible for them.
Containers and dividers
A container is simply a place to store items within a space in your home. Keeping in mind what I talked about in the sorting section, if you have too many containers, people might not bother to put things away, and if there isn't enough, there might not be an understanding where things go.
With the amount of categories in mind and space you have, it is time to shop for containers to separate the sorted items in this space.
Keep in mind for children, it is better to use clear containers and label them. If they are too young to read, picture labels are a good way to go. You can also get dividers for drawers and for cupboards to make things have more of a section. Make sure that these containers are not overfilled, that it is clear what goes where, and that the person in your household who will have the most difficult time putting it away, it will be set up with them in mind.
Create a Command Center
A command center is a life saving feature in a home that can manage so many things in the house.
Most people have this on the wall. It could be a board with some hooks and a place to hold mail. A place that you can write down your daily schedule. A command center is meant to be customized to meet the specific needs of a household. I believe every working mother should have a command center. Here are some suggestions you can add to your command center.
A landing zone. You can have a basket here to drop your wallet, keys, and change.
A mail section. If you checked the mail and you do not have time to deal with it immediately. Put a section here for you to drop it. Make sure you set a day every week to go through this to make sure everything gets done that needs to get done.
A schedule. You can get so many different kinds of wall schedules and planners. Find one that works for your family. It can be a dry erase board, paper, a chalk board. You can put appointments and events that need to be taken care of.
A school form section. You can have your children put their agenda and any school newsletters and permission slips in one spot so there is nothing late or missed. You can find a schedule every evening to go through it and make it part of your children's tasks to take it out of their bag and put it there.
A peg board. You can put a peg board in your command center to pin any papers that you need to have up and visual so you don't forget them.
Make sure you put your command center in a place that people are going to walk by when they come in and leave the house. This way they will have visual reminders to tend to it
I’m a disorganized adult that was highly neat & organized as a child and teen. I so look forward to the 8th!