Last week I read a post from a fellow mom of many, who has caught the organization bug... This is her post.
First of all, let me set the record straight. I am a pack rat by nature, and contained chaos and DISORGANIZATION is more my style. Having 8 kids (7 under 7 when our last set of twins were born) has FORCED me, along with the conviction of God, to change my ways. Here?s how I did it, step by step.
?1. Pray. I can not do anything without God?s help, I am completely dependant on Him. I prayed HARD that God would give me the motivation, desire, ability and time to de-clutter my house. I asked for a flat out miracle, and I got it.
?2. Set rules for what stays and what goes. Here are mine:
?*Item must be used often, ?or will be used often in next 6 months ?
(ie off season clothing and Christmas decorations)?
Anything not used often, or used seasonally must go.?
*Anything that does not have a PROPER place-get rid of Toys?
*Keep ONLY toys that are favorites that are played with daily?
*Only ?keep a few of the favorites (ie we had more dolls than you can imagine with 7 girls, we kept 3 dollies to ?share and the girls that had REALLY special dolls (American Girl etc) got to keep their special dolly on their bed or on a shelf)
?*The entire room must be able to be cleaned and swept/vacuumed within 10 minutes even if everything is out of place. If we could not clean the room entirely in 10 minutes, there was still too much stuff in the room. (As we went forward, we continued weeding toys out if we had too much to stay within the 10 min limit) *keep only toys that you have a PROPER place for Clothes
?*keep minimal number of pj?s,shirts, shorts, dresses, pants, and sweaters (about 5-7 per kid)
?*kids ages 6 and up are responsible for putting away clothes in dresser in their room. Kids age 4 and under, I take care of their stuff, no dresser in their room.
?*one pair dress shoes (for church) one pair gym shoes, 1 pair of flip flops or crocs, one pair of winter dress shoes, one pair of winter boots per child. (off season shoes are stored in a plastic tub.)
*ALL other shoes we sold at a yard sale or gave to the local free store.?
Kitchen?*get rid of ANYTHING that is not used often. Don?t keep extra pots pans etc.?
*Keep everything in a PROPER place, if it does not have a place, get rid of it. (I hung all my pots, pans, skillets on a wall in my kitchen. I have a small kitchen. Anything that could not be hung (with the exception of cookie sheets and such) I gave away. Books/School supplies/craft supplies
?*anything that is not used OFTEN, get rid of. Keep only the stuff you really need and use. My temptation with craft stuff was that we might use it someday. If I had not used it within the past 6 months, I got rid of it. *Everything must have a PROPER place to stay. If there is no proper place to keep it, get rid of it. How to de-clutter.
?*Warning- Work on 1 room at a time*?
? ? Take EVERYTHING out of the room that is being de-cluttered. Take everything out of closets, drawers etc. This creates a really big mess, but everything is out and you can go through it easier. Only put the things you REALLY need back. Everything else, bag or box and take outside. If you don?t, the kids and your husband will drag everything they ?can?t live without? back out. The other advantage to doing it this way is you will get tired and just want to get it done. When that happens you get rid of a lot more stuff because you are tired of dealing with it. :) When you are full of energy you will find a place for things, when you get tired, everything goes. Lol? ? ? Re-arrange furniture etc and get rid of clutter catchers. We had armoires in the family room that we just stuffed things we didn?t know what to do with into. We never used that stuff, it just sat in the armoire and the armoire took up space in the room. I got rid of the armoire and most of the stuff in it (after all I no longer remembered it existed). Now I don?t have a hiding place for junk and only keep what I really need.
? ? ? Hang shelves and buy small bins etc to get things out of corners and off the floor etc. We buy cheap brackets and a 2 x 12 piece of wood and made our own shelves to organize clothes, craft supplies and towels and undies and socks. These are proper places for things. Lol
? ? ? Get the stuff that you are getting rid off out of your house and off your property AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. Otherwise the temptation to go back through and get things out is too great. I would load the back on my van and take a load to the free store everything I left the house.
SOME ORGANIZING TIPS
Shoes We have 2 sets of plastic drawers (on wheels) that serve as the shoe closet. There is a drawer for each type of shoe. All gym shoes go in one drawer, church shoes in another, etc. We keep a milk crate by the door for the shoes that are worn daily. Shoes go into the box when they walk into the door. Other shoes (like church shoes) are kept in the respective drawer.
Clothes All kids age 6 and up have a shared dresser in their room. Everyday clothes and jammies go in the dresser. They are responsible for putting their laundry away We have 1 room that is a pantry/clothes room for all the rest. (Only canned goods are kept in that room since there are clothes in it) We put shelves on the wall and all dress clothes, and all clothes belonging to kids under age 6 go on the shelves. We have a wooden bar attached to the underside of the bottom shelf where all dresses are kept. In the winter/fall coats and jackets are at to be kept on a hook in the family room. Off season clothes were boxed and sent to my MIL?s shed. We keep a few off season clothes here for weather changes.
?School/craft supplies We are blessed to have a room designated as our school room. We have 2 large book cases for text books/school supplies. Each child has their own shelf and all of their workbooks etc are kept on their shelf. We have plastic drawers on top of the bookshelves. There are 3 drawers in each unit and the drawers are big enough to keep crayons, pencils, pens, scissors, and compasses in. Rulers are kept in a small basket on top of the shelves. Each child has their own little utensil drawer with their name on it. We have 2 smaller book shelves that contain reading books. We only keep books that will be read by all or are favorites. All others we gave away. All craft supplies are kept in marked boxes on shelves built for that purpose in the laundry. After it?s done :)
Once the house was de-cluttered it is now manageable for the kids and myself to KEEP clean. We do jurisdictions. EVERYONE (age 3 and up) has a jurisdiction. They are as follows: Kitchen Dining Room School Room Family Room Laundry/bathroom Cooking Laundry (cooking and laundry is only assigned to children ages 6 and up and is supervised) Jurisdictions rotate on a weekly basis. The person assigned to the jurisdiction is responsible for the following:
*Jurisdiction must be cleaned before dinner time or before we leave the house
?*If a mess is made in their jurisdiction, they are responsible for it. If someone else makes a mess in their jurisdiction, that child has the authority to go to the one who made the mess and tell them NICELY that it needs to be cleaned up. If they don?t clean up the mess, then I am to be told. If the child assigned to the jurisdiction does not handle it properly (ie yell, be hateful, argue etc) then their punishment is to clean up the mess themselves.
?*Jurisdictions must be swept/mopped/vacuumed at least once a week or as needed.
?*Roommates are jointly responsible for their own bedrooms. Bedrooms must be cleaned up BEFORE bed time, vacuumed once a week, and beds must be made every day. We are working on a reward system for keeping jurisdictions, good behavior, scripture memorization and Bible study. Right now each child has a star chart. Every day they can earn a star in the following areas: Jurisdiction kept clean Jurisdiction kept clean without being told or reminded Good behavior Reading their Bible or a book for 20 minutes Taking part in family Bible study and working on weekly memory verse. Hope this helps someone else.
Blog post written by Lisa Kim Peters Young
Source: http://blessedlittlehomestead.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-joy-of-de-cluttering-guest-post.html
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