5 Steps and 5 Minutes to an Organized House
Getting (and keeping!) an organized house can be an overwhelming task. But if you make organizing a daily commitment, it’s one that can absolutely be accomplished. If clutter rules your life and you want to climb out from under it, commit to these simple challenges, many of which take only five minutes, to get you there in no time.
5 Minutes to an Organized House
Front Door Declutter
The front door area of any busy family’s home is often a cluttered jumble of bags, hats, shoes, and mail. To keep this high traffic area nice and tidy, commit to storing only two pairs of shoes per family member. If more shoes migrate in, commit to putting them in another area of the house at the end of each day.
To keep paper clutter from piling up, store a binder and a three-hole punch at the front of the house and insert divider tabs for bills, school events, permission forms, etc. Every time a piece of paper comes in the door commit to recycling it, or hole punching it and placing it in the appropriate spot in the binder. In this binder, I also add a plastic envelope with a velcro closure to store loose items like coupons, invitations, and other paper items that I need to keep handy. The closer the recycling bin is to where you store this binder the easier it will be to streamline the amount of paper entering your home.
Manage Laundry Piles
Place a hamper in a central location like at the top of the stairs and commit to gathering stray socks and dirty dishtowels immediately. In the laundry room, designate a drawer or bulletin board with pins to hold socks or gloves that come out without their mate. In my busy family, I try as much as possible to purchase socks in the same colour in bulk to further alleviate the search for the missing pair. Don’t let stray socks trip you up in your quest for an organized house.
Daily Drawer Declutter
Take 5 minutes daily while on the phone, or in-between steps of meal prep to dispose of junk from drawers. To keep drawers organized, utilize acrylic drawer dividers. The asset with acrylic is that the dividers are slim and see-through, which I find more pleasing to the eye and more efficient on space. Take the organization to the next level and label each compartment to keep things in their assigned spots.
Closet Control
Once a week take a few minutes to go through clothing closets and sort things that can be donated, repaired, dry cleaned, or disposed of. Designate one bag that acts as a catch-all for items that need to be taken to the dry cleaner and hang this bag in a central location—bonus if the bag matches your décor! To keep items in your closets easy to find, be ruthless. If you don’t wear the item regularly, don’t let it take up real estate in your space. Let the items in your closets, and the items in your home in general, bring you joy rather than cause chaos.
Set a Timer
If you’re still stuck, remember that the path to an organized house doesn’t have to be a marathon. It can be a series of short spurts. So use this analogy and set a timer – even add it as an appointment in your calendar! Cleaning and decluttering for just 5 minutes every day will make a ton of progress in pursuit of an organized space.
