Organize Me Posted by Unknown | Tuesday, January 31

Something about a clean organized space makes me very happy, and peaceful.  Life gets so busy and we have hundreds of things to accomplish in a day, and cleaning usually falls to the bottom of the list.  I have come to realize for me that when I am feeling out of control and disorganized, my house is usually looking the same.  For some reason, when I look around and see toys and clutter and dirty dishes and food crumbs on the floor and clothes everywhere, I start feeling claustrophobic and overwhelmed.  Anyone else?  

Now don't panic, I'm not saying your house has to be immaculate all the time, everyone certainly has their own threshold of tolerance based on your personality, but what I am saying is if you can create some helpful systems it will be easier to keep things in their home and help teach your children to do the same. 

My lovely friend Robin is the queen of organizing.  I mean it is a gift!  She naturally thinks to label and categorize her stuff in ways I would never.  But in her house, when her kids need a bandaid, she knows exactly where to find them! Or when her husband asks for the tylenol, he won't even need to ask, because it has a home that anyone can find.  Here are a few pictures of her genius.

Pantry

Medicine Cabinet

Crafts 

Amazing right?  The benefit to creating an easy and might I add very decor savvy system will minimize the hundreds of questions we are asked per day and reduce the amount of headaches caused by searching around your house for things like your car keys!  

If you notice, the top picture is of Robin's pantry, yes even her food is organized into categories... but I have to say, when any of her 4 children ask her for a snack, they have a "snack basket", with healthy snacks.  Ok, so for me, who makes snacks all day, this would be amazing! At least 2 of the snacks can be raisins or peanut butter crackers, vs me being asked 10 times and then finally getting out the cheese and crackers, right?  This system can work for anything and everything in your home.  But to take baby steps, we could start with the important things like, personal and financial papers, your keys, a place for your kids homework, a change collector, and the list goes on.  

I dream of a huge mud room some day and with 5 kids I am going to need it!  But for now, I have created a  "make shift" mud room  with 2 rows of hooks to hold the kids back packs and coats and boots etc. I have 2 baskets, one for hats and one for gloves.  And of course a calendar and cork board to remind me of things! 

Check out this simple DIY project from Real Simple

Let's Get Organized!