Dear Readers,
I hope your week is starting out well!
In today's newsletter, we are continuing the organizing topic from two weeks ago. In that newsletter, Jill explored some of the ways being organized can make your life better. In today's newsletter, we share some specific tips to make your cleaning and organizing efficient and painless!
Have a wonderful week!
-Tawra
www.LivingOnADime.com
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Get Organized! Part 2 - Tips For Getting Organized
by Jill Cooper
If you missed part 1 of "Get Organized!" you can find it here.
One of the main excuses we use to avoid getting organized is that we don't know where to start. We can become so overwhelmed that it can actually paralyze us mentally so that we can't figure out what to do. I was at that point myself the day after Christmas this year. Boy did I have a mess, plus my CFS was really bad. I was caught in a vicious cycle. I was too sick to clean, but sitting in a mess was making me worse.
Finally, I decided I needed to practice what I preached and, using sheer grit, I made up my mind to clean off just my fireplace mantle. While I was doing that, I noticed some other things in other areas that I didn't want to forget to box up, so I started gathering those things together. Then I figured I might as well bring in the boxes for the things I had just gathered. One thing led to another and before I knew it I had cleared most of my living room.
Just find one small area and start working on it. You usually feel so good just getting that one area done that you become motivated to do a little more and then a little more. It doesn't matter what area it is in life. Whether it is dealing with debt, losing weight, getting organized or something else, stop looking at the whole picture. I'm not saying that you should live in denial, but when it's time to get the job done, you'll just get overwhelmed if you keep looking at the whole picture. Pick one small area and work on it. Once you have mastered it, then you can move on to the next one.
Instead of saying I'm going to clean all the closets in the house, just decide to clean one closet or if it is really bad, decide to do just one shelf in that closet. The same goes for the kitchen or any room. Start with one shelf at a time.
It would be impossible to cover everything about how to get organized in just one article, but here are some tips to help you get started. These ideas aren't in any particular order and some are short tips and others are longer. I hope they help you.
General Points:
- If you are sick or are having trouble getting motivated try my 5 minute trick. I make myself get up and clean during the 5 minute commercial on TV. For example, I try to bring in the laundry off of the line, wash my dishes or pick up a room. That way, when I'm not feeling good I don't overdo it but, at the same time, I feel like I am accomplishing something.
- Start with the easiest area to clean or the area that is bugging you the most.
- Work quickly. Don't pick up that cute snowman your child drew and ooh and ahh over it for 10 minutes trying to decide what to do with it. Either toss it or put it in the "memories" box.
- Have boxes and trash bags ready to use. I designate boxes for "items to give away", "things to pack", "things that go in another room" and "trash". Once you have filled a box or trash bag, set it outside of the room. This makes it easier to see what still needs to be sorted, gives you more space in the room to work and gives you the feeling that your are getting somewhere.
- When you first start, do a fast once over in the room. Quickly go through and pick up all obvious trash and take out very large items that don't belong there.
Quick Ideas to give you a jump start:
- Make your bed. (2 minutes) Don't assume that this will take too long. Some people spend more time trying to decide what to eat at a restaurant than it takes to make a bed.
- Wash dishes and clean counters (depending on the level of the mess, 15 minutes to an hour).
- Designate a spot for keys, purse, backpacks, shoes and coats.
- Clear off the dining room table. If it is really bad, clear off the easy stuff and put the rest in a box to sort later while you're watching TV.
- Quickly go through house and pick up all items of clothing. Hang them up or put them in the hamper.
- With a trash bag, go through the house and pick up obvious trash.
You'll be surprised to see how much difference it makes just getting the trash and clothes picked up...
You should be able to do all the above things easily in a couple of hours on the first day. Then make sure you keep doing them each day. If you did a good job the first day, it should only take you about 15-20 minutes each day after that to keep it picked up.
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Deep Cleaning or Organizing
- Start with one shelf or closet at a time. Don't flit from one room or closet to the next.
- The main idea here is to purge! Get rid of it. Toss it out. Call it whatever you like. Just stop holding on to this stuff.
- If it is not adding to or making your life easier, get rid of it.
- If it is ugly and doesn't work, toss it. (No I'm not talking about your husbands... now ladies we must be good ;-).
- If you don't use it or if it was the wrong thing or color, throw it out, sell it or give it away. I don't care how much you originally paid for it. Why are you keeping it -- to punish yourself for making a mistake?
- Don't use the excuse that "It will take too long to do now, so I will do it later." I was waiting for something to cook on the stove the other day and, once again, noticed that my spice shelf was a mess. I thought, "I really need to clean that," but my very next thought was "No, it will take too long." Then this little voice said, "You know, you can have it done before your sauce is finished cooking." Don't you just hate it when you hear those voices like that?! Sure enough, it only took me about 3 minutes to do it.
Find out where your "mess spots" are, think about why they are that way and find ways to change them. (I know with some of you, your whole house may be the trouble spot! :-)
Here are some examples of how to do this:
- I kept piling Kleenex, small bits of paper and other trash on the corner of my dresser. It drove me crazy. Why did I keep doing that? Because that was where I stood to empty out my pants pockets before I tossed them into the clothes hamper.
The solution: I put a small trash can on the floor by that spot so I could easily drop everything into the trash can instead of the dresser.
- Do you always have trash overflowing around the kitchen trash can? Start emptying it twice a day instead of once a day or buy a larger can.
- Are you forever frustrated stepping over mounds of clothes each time you walk into the bathroom? Make it a rule that no one can get dressed or undressed in the bathroom. Buy everyone robes. Get undressed in the bedroom, put on your robe, walk to the bathroom, shower, put on robe and go back to the bedroom to get dressed. This is also a great way to free up bathroom time in the morning if everyone has to share a bathroom.
- Do you have a cabinet in your kitchen that starts an avalanche every time you open the door? Ask yourself these questions: Do I really need everything that is in this cabinet? Could I get by with 15 plastic cups instead of 35. Could part or all of what is in this cabinet be put someplace else?
I keep all of my mugs on one shelf. In some homes, I haven't had room to do that, so I would keep 8 mugs that I used virtually every day on that shelf and then put the extra mugs in a less accessible place. Then I didn't have to fight 15 mugs falling all over each time I opened the cabinet.
- Do this with any cabinet. If your canned goods keep falling all over, try storing only 4 cans on the one shelf and putting the rest in another place, like a higher cabinet, another room or the garage.
- This applies to other rooms besides the kitchen. My bathroom doesn't have much storage space, so I keep all my extra toiletries for the bathroom in a basket in my bedroom closet and keep only the item I am using now on my bathroom shelf.
- Use the same method for linens and clothes. If you don't have a linen closet, store extra linens or guest linens in a guest room or spare bedroom. Also, store the sheets in the bedroom where they will be used.
Clothes and Laundry
Get rid of some clothes. We waste so much time and energy dealing with our clothes -- trying to make room to store them, shifting piles of them from one place to another, searching for them, shopping for them, cleaning them, or paying for their dry cleaning. Take the time to count just how many tops you have in your closet and drawers. Once again, I think you will be shocked. Even those of you who think you don't have that many need to count them because I think you will be surprised.
Now that you see you have way too many clothes, start getting rid of things. Toss the too big clothes, the too small clothes, the ugly clothes, the "what in the world was I thinking when I bought it" clothes. I don't keep clothes that are too big for me because, as soon as my clothes start getting too tight, I make myself lose the weight. I can't afford to buy more.
Why keep clothes that are too small for you? If you ever actually fit into them again, they will be so outdated you will need to get new ones anyway.
As far as the "ugly" and "what was I thinking?" clothes go, do you know that most women only wear about 10-20% of the clothes in their closets? Why? Because they feel ugly in the other 80%. You have probably seen those shows where, if you spend so much money and buy specialty hangars or closet organizers, you will have 50% more room in your closet. Well, if you use my method and get rid of the 80% of the clothes in your closet that you don't wear or need, it won't cost you a penny and you will have 80% more room.
Now purge those closets, taking everything out. I know you love that skirt that you have had for fifteen years and haven't worn for ten, but let it go. I loved my children for many years but, when they turned 18, I had to let them go and it wasn't so bad. As a matter of fact it was kind of nice because I was no longer responsible for caring for them. Besides, do you know how much fun it is to cook what you like for dinner for a change? As you can see, as much as I love my kids, I didn't suffer from empty nest syndrome.
Once you have finished your first purging, make a list of what you need for a wardrobe. For example: 2 black skirts, 1 brown skirt, 2 black pants, 1 brown pants, 4 church dresses, 4 everyday "grungy" outfits, 3 pairs of pajamas, etc. Now look at your list and place 2 black skirts in your closet, 1 brown skirt, and so on. The things that are left once you've gone through your list are things you probably don't really need and should get rid of. Of course the list I made above will not be the same as yours. Don't forget about purses, undies etc.
Do the same with your shoes. You really don't need 4 pairs of brown loafers.
Toys
Be still my beating heart! I watched yet another show last night where the family had floor to ceiling shelves in their living room full of toys. They had no furniture in the room because the floor was covered in more and bigger toys.
I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt thinking that maybe there were no toys in the bedroom, but I was wrong. The bedrooms were full of toys. Amazingly enough, this is not an uncommon thing. Toys and clothes seem to have taken over everyone's homes with papers coming in a strong third.
If this is you, why are you causing so much stress in your children's lives? As I mentioned before, too much stuff is very stressful to kids. I almost have a nervous breakdown every time I go to buy a new shampoo. Row after row of shampoos. Which one do I choose? Do you not think a small child has as much stress trying to decide when it comes to his toys?
Instead of sending counselors to the school to counsel the kids for every little thing that happens, we should be sending counselors home with them to help them deal with trying to decide which toys to play with today. What's interesting too is most kids only play with a handful of favorites, so why are we keeping the rest?
Proverbs 25:16 says, "If you find honey, eat just enough- too much of it, and you will vomit." In other words, too much of a good thing can make you sick. Are we making our kids emotionally sick by giving them too much of a good thing? That's just something to think about.
How to deal with toys:
Like their parents before them, most kids have a hard time giving up their things, so try these ideas to get them to release them. Tell them "You can sell them and keep the money" or "Let's give some of these to poor little boys and girls who don't have any." I usually try to get them to give them away first, but if that doesn't work then I go for the mercenary streak in them.
If you still can't get them to give up some of the toys, tell them you are going to pack the extras in a box and store them. If you do that, it's generally best to do it when they're not around or they will suddenly remember that each toy they haven't played with for ages is suddenly the favorite. After a while, they usually forget about them. If the child asks for something specific that has been packed away, you can give the child that toy, but don't give the child the whole box to look through. If the child doesn't miss anything after a while, make it quietly go away.
General Rules About Toys:
- If they are broken, toss them.
- If you have too many of one thing, toss the extras. No little boy needs 50 cars or 40 or even 25. Pick a certain size box and say "You can keep whatever will fit in here."
- One box of crayons is enough. Not 3 buckets full. And 3-4 coloring books is sufficient, too.
- Control the balls, dolls, stuffed animals and everything. Even though it may not seem like it at the time you are doing this for your child's well being.
- Get books under control. This rule is for both you and your children. For some reason, we have the idea that the more books we have the more intelligent we will be, but if they aren't being read and just sitting on a shelf or worse yet buried at the bottom of a toy box, what good are they? To me, keeping dust covered and smashed books isn't a sign of intelligence.
When all is said and done:
I couldn't cover everything in this article and haven't even mentioned things like tools, CDs or DVDs or even those piles of papers in your office, but use the same principles for all of them. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, you have to just do it. I don't mean to sound indelicate but I don't like to cut my toe nails or blow my nose but it just has to be done so I do it!!!
Now go get organized and liberate yourself from too much stuff!
