Get Organized This Year with Six Simple Steps

Cut down on clutter-Spend 10 minutes a day going through each of the rooms of your home. Find a tote, bucket or box that you can use. Browse the room, looking in any cupboards, shelves or other nooks and crannies and analyze the usefulness of the items you find. Are there items you haven’t used in years? Books you have never read? Stuff you are saving, “just in case”? These are all things you can eliminate and will probably not even notice they are gone–except for having a little more room. Donate your unused items to a charity, such as ARC, the Salvation Army or Goodwill. Make a quick list of what you have donated and their value and you can add these items to your charitable donations at tax time. Consolidate messes-Sometimes it’s not possible to clean up and put everything where it goes in the time you have. When you are in a hurry but want to spruce up, put all your messes in one spot. Try putting a laundry basket in the kid’s closet or the hall so that you can put the toys and other paraphernalia in there for them to put away later. Have a nice basket or container of your choice on your counter to put those items that just don’t seem to have a home in rather than leaving them out to clutter up a counter. Clear the table putting the dishes in the sink, even if you don’t have time to wash them. One pile of “junk” on the floor looks a lot better than pieces of it scattered all over a room. Put things away when you are done using them-This is something those of us with kids would love for them to do, yet we don’t always do it ourselves. However, putting items away as you use them eliminates a buildup that can lead to an intimidating mess. For example, put items away as you bake to keep your kitchen tidy while you cook, making shorter work of clean up later. Instead of leaving your shoes in the entryway make a quick run to your bedroom to put them away and prevent a pileup. Each item you put away as you go is something you won’t have to do later. Make sure everything has a home-If items have no where to go, they will never be cleaned up. Go through your rooms and find a place for those things that are constantly hanging around. If you need to rearrange to make room, do it. If you don’t have room, get rid of what you don’t really need. There are so many great organizational totes and buckets–use them, but do so wisely and with a plan. Before you go out to spend a bunch of time and money on organizational tools, make sure you have a plan for where each item will fit when you are done. If you can’t find a place for that new bucket then you aren’t yet ahead of the game. Create a budget-This doesn’t need to be fancy or intricate and in-depth. Simply calculate your expected income and your expected expenditures for the year by month. Use categories to visualize where your money will or can go. Make sure your income is greater then your spending. Then, stick to your plan with a method that works for you. Are you able to use a credit card and limit the amount you spend to what you have calculated? Maybe your best option is to only use cash for purchases; when the cash is gone, so is your spending. Find what works for you and stick with it. Don’t be afraid to appropriately adjust your budget as needed, but make wise decisions and cut out your spending on items you don’t really need or want in order to pay for the more important things or put your extra money in places where it will benefit you in the future. By creating personal awareness of your financial situation you can make wiser decisions in your spending. Don’t buy it-So often we get it in our heads that we need something, just to forget about it in a few days or weeks and later cart it off to a charity. Objectively analyze if you really want to spend money on the current item on your mind. Do you already have something that would work just as well? Is that new gadget something you are really going to use, or something that just looks neat in the ad? Not only will you eliminate the clutter in your home, you will save some money along the way, by only buying those things that will truly add value to your life.

In just a few minutes of organization a day and with a little discipline you can accomplish a lot, creating more space, financial security and piece of mind.


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