Home Organization

So I've been wanting to clean and organize our house for a while. I'm the kind of person who feels happier and more comfortable in a clean and organized environment (I actually wish I weren't so sensitive to my environment!). Lots of other things keep getting in the way (like my three-month-old, a lack of motivation, other more urgent deadlines, etc.).

And then I got a request in the comments section of this post from WilderMiss to post a tour of my house. I've been wanting to do it for a while, so her request was a little kick in the pants.

And then I got an e-mail from reader Emily letting me know that she's moving to Houston and would be interested in looking at our house. I let her know that I would be posting pictures soon, but then she responded with the fact that she would be in Houston the following day to look at houses.

So I invited her to stop by our house, and that was a huge kick in the pants to get the place clean and organized. Thank you, Emily!

I feel so, so fortunate that the love of my life, Matt, also happens to be an equal partner. We worked together to get everything put away and cleaned. After we were done, I realized that we simply must, must, must commit to keeping our place picked up and organized as much as possible. I seriously feel so much better.

I've been pondering how to keep one's house picked-up and organized, and I think it comes down to these things:

1. Purge, purge, purge: Matt, Henry, and I have things that we no longer use. Our shelves are overflowing with books we never reference. Henry's closet is full of clothes he's already outgrown. I think the first step to maintaining an orderly environment is getting rid of stuff. It doesn't make any sense to clean and organize stuff you don't really need/want.
2. Make purging a habit: It seems to me that purging has to be an ongoing habit. I wonder what's the best way to make it a habit? Is it to keep a constant eye out for things that could be donated or tossed out? I once read about someone who had a specific box that she used to collect things for donation. When the box got full, she donated it. How could that work for us? I seriously don't know where we could store a box. I wonder if Matt would be willing to keep it in his trunk (since he's the one who always takes our donations to the store)? Also, my trunk is already full with Henry's stroller, since we try to reduce baby clutter in our house.
3. Be intentional about what comes into the house: If we are more intentional about what we buy and bring into the house, then we will be able to spend less time purging it.
   
4. Make a place for everything: If everything has a place, then everything can be put away. But making a place for everything is easier said than done! I find that it's particular hard to find a place for phones and computers while they are charging.
   
5. Reduce the number of dumping sites: We have three main areas that collect stuff in our house: our dining room table, the other table against the wall in our dining room, and the bench in our bedroom. We leave hats, mail, boxes, laundry--the list goes on and on. Three dumping sites leads to a lot of clutter!
6. Make it a habit to organize the dumping sites: If something takes three minutes or less to process (e.g., mail, trash pick-up, putting away a hat, etc.), then we should do it right away, no matter how busy we feel. If something will take longer than that, then we should give ourselves permission to organize it later.
7. Put stuff away at a specified time each day: For our family, it would work best if we would do a final walk through of our house before going to bed each night and pick-up whatever needs to be returned to its place. That way, we could wake up to a clean house.

Of course, changing one's habits is never easy. For me to turn something into a habit, I have to be very clear about what the action looks like, and then I have to have a regular schedule for implementing the action.

So in terms of my next steps, here's what I'm thinking:

1. Go through our book shelves and purge the books we don't really need.
2. Ask Matt if he would be willing to keep an ongoing box or bag in his car for donations.
3. Process Henry's clothes as soon as he outgrows them. I've decided that I'm going to make him a quilt for his first birthday out of my favorite outfits from his first year, so I have a bag in his closet where I can collect them. The other outfits should be put in the donation bag or box right away.
4. I need to clean out and improve upon our filing system.
   
5. I need to process all of our papers that need to be filed.
6. Do a walk through and pick-up every night. When would be the best time? Perhaps after dinner? Right before bed isn't good for me because Henry will have just gone to sleep, and I don't want to be banging around the house.
7. I already went through Henry's toys and organized them into two separate categories. There are a couple toys out on his shelf. There are other toys in a basket that I can pull out and rotate onto his shelf every once in a while. Then there are toys in a plastic container that he's not ready for yet. When he's ready for them, I can rotate them into the basket to then be rotated onto the shelf (in a Montessori environment, we limit the number of toys that children can choose from at a given time, in order to keep the level of stimulation just right). I need to be good about keeping this system up.
8. Lastly, I want to read really good books about home organization. I'm feeling totally inspired and passionate about this topic, especially since we plan to move to Austin in the coming months and we'll be setting up a new home. Do you have any recommendations?
   

Any experience with Martha Stewart's book?

I was able to order this book from the library.

One final thought: I really need to clean out my e-mail inbox. It currently has 1,344 messages. That will be a good project while breast feeding!

Share |