Know Yourself; Stick to your Routines
It is so easy to fall into the trap of doing what others think we should be doing — from the kind of bins we use to organize to how we manage our days. The truth is there is a pattern for you that works for you. And when you find that pattern it is much easier to manage your home. This is how I flow from roller coaster to sloth and still manage to keep a home that is relatively orderly.
Functional & Esthetic Organizing
There are two part of organizing - functional organizing and esthetic organizing. It might seem like a small distinction, but I’ve found making this distinction allows clients to make clear decisions about their space. Instagram and Pinterest are filled with images of beautifully decanted pantries and rainbow fridges. This is esthetic organizing. (What instagram doesn’t show is the hours of work and calculation it takes to maintain those pantries and fridges.) I love doing the work of decanting. I organize closets because of the feeling I get when the work is done. The more Pinterest Pretty the result, the more satisfying the work is for me. But that doesn’t always mean the closet or pantry is actually functional on a daily basis. That is where functional organizing comes into play. When I am organizing for function, I consider things like accessibility and upkeep.
Overwhelmed with mess? Read this.
Sometimes we get so stuck trying to be Pinterest Perfect, we forget we are better than perfect with are real.
Real is dynamic and creative. That is my fancy way of saying life is messy and this shows up in our homes.
Even the media proclaimed queen of tidy, Marie Kondo, got real recently and admitted that having kids forced her to live in an untidy state.
By implementing systems, we can keep ourselves out of the storm of chaos. We can fall back on our habits and our natural tendencies while we work our way back to that rainbow.
Managing Holiday Decor
I suggest you focus on curating your holiday decor rather than just collecting items. Curation is about spending time reflecting on who we are, and how what we own portrays who we are.
The Holidays can suck.
Boundaries around my time and my space have saved my mental health, and I want you to know you are not alone if you feel the need to put up some boundaries this holiday season.
2022 Fall Challenge
Join me in documenting and honoring our own path so that we can manage our home in a way that matches our path and honors our needs.
From October 30th to November 11th, I will send you prompts that will get you thinking about your path. We’ll take a look at different parts of your house. We’ll self examine everything from your mud room to your laundry room/pattern.
Home Management during Life Transitions
A dear friend of mine hired me to come organize her closets. She had a new job, a new baby, and a new apartment in the last 19 months. (Plus…2020!). Additionally she indicated they planned to move again in the next two years. What she needed most from me was not closet organizing. What she needed was a real truth - she is in massive transition, and organizing her home might not be the solution now. I know. I know. Stay with me.
How to Organize Transitional or High Traffic Spaces
Transitions, or times of change and/or movement, can make it incredibly difficult to keep your home organized. These transitions, changes, and movements in your home can be both physical and in your life circumstances.
In this post we will look at how physical transitions in a space impact home organization. In the follow up post I will write about how life transitions, such as births, deaths, divorces, etc. impact home organization.
How To Distance Yourself from Sentimental Items
When my son was born, I realized I needed to make space for him and his stuff. Unfortunately, the most logical items to give away were my beloved books. This was incredibly hard for me, but I did it slowly. When I use these distancing techniques to talk to myself about this process, I can see the logic much clearer, and so I share this tool with you today with the hopes of giving you some clarity about and distance from those sentimental items.
Creating Paperwork Habits
In my experience, paper management doesn’t have to be a daily habit, a weekly habit, or even a monthly habit. Rather, managing it must be nearly an automatic behavior that happens enough to keep your papers in order.
For me, when I wake up, I make coffee. Waking up is a natural trigger for me to make coffee.
When it comes to paper, I have a few natural triggers that help keep my papers in order.
Sentimental Paperwork
Last week, I went through my papers. For the most part, the minimalist in me won. I got rid of a lot of papers. But then I ran into the cremation bill for my dog Egypt who passed in 2021.
Organizing and Minimizing with Your Elderly Parents
Death, and the lead up to death, is hard. It can be complicated by a home full of memories. It gets even more complicated when those memories are not yours. It is a very common scenario — elderly parents want to leave these memories to their adult children, but the child is not interested in those items — or at least not in the volume the elderly parent is interested in leaving. This can cause conflict and stress in the relationship. The process I am going to lay out is designed to help the child in this situation take care of themselves first and then go on to assist their parent.
Home Management & Conflict
Conflict is inevitable. Your preparation and response to it can make all the difference in the world. When it comes to home management, I focus on changing spaces rather than changing the people around me. For me, the goal behind having a well managed home is for me to be able to enjoy the people around me. It frees my time up for those relationships. These tips are really about helping you focus on and maintain relationships.
Spring Cleaning with A Spiritual Twist
This Spring, in addition to the usual reset, it is marked by a historic convergence — Easter, Passover, and Ramadan all fell in the same time this Spring. This only happens every thirty years or so.
While those of us in the organizing world mark Spring in a very practical sense, this year, with three of the world’s major religions celebrating at once, I want to honor it from a spiritual perspective as well.
Action Planning for Recurring Tasks
Re-occurring tasks need a plan, but don’t require all of the steps written out like a formal action plan for, say, reorganizing a garage or arranging for a big move. If we plan for re-occurring tasks in a strategic way, then we never have to plan for them again. They become automatic and easier and easier every time we do them. This frees us up for the magical, not planned, lovely moments of our lives.
Vision - Decluttering Sentimental Items
My goal is to give you two concrete tools to craft a vision that can guide you in minimizing your home. First, those of us with too many sentimental items are often multidimensional idea people that don’t always have room in our homes and our calendars for all of those ideas. By recognizing that, we can release some of the items, but actively keep the ideas. Second, sometimes our visions compete, and when they do we can often find solutions that can allow us to maintain those visions.
Folding is Optional
Think of folding like a hammer, sometimes it is the tool you need for your home improvement project, and sometimes it is not. Just be thoughtful and intentional about where and when you use what tool.
Fall Challenge Reflection
One big trigger for me is the changing of the leaves. When I see the leaves start to transition, I know it is time for me to transition my home as well. I start monitoring the weather, and slowly switch out my summer and winter clothes.
2021 Fall Organizing Challenge
M.O.M. recognizes that we are all in different spaces in our lives. Sometimes we are in the space to minimize and sometimes we are in the space to organize. The main focus should be on our needs, and not on the strategy of the season.
Transitions
Rather than beating ourselves up about the mess life transition brings, let’s recognize the transition and learn from it. We can use that information to create new routines and modify our visions. This will get us a lot further than shame ever will.