Choose Organize and Maintain® to assist you in organizing your home, office, small business and/or life in Central New Jersey and Bucks County, PA. Whether you want to organize a move, need to reclaim space in your existing home, or need assistance with issues specific to the seniors and older adults, you can count on us to provide solutions to relieve you of feeling overwhelmed.
I recently contributed a tip to a Home Organization blog post by Redfin.
Review your wardrobe twice a year: “Only keep clothing that fits well, looks good on you, and you like wearing. Toss or rehome anything that doesn’t fit, is torn or stained, or you just don’t like. The goal should be that everything in your closet is something you want to wear, which makes getting dressed in the morning much easier.”
You can find the full article here. https://www.redfin.com/blog/home-organization-tips/
We’ve had a pretty mild winter here in the Northeast so far, but I’m sure we will get a few big snow storms before the winter is out. Next storm, use being home bound to your advantage and spend an hour or two decluttering your home. Tackle that closet or room that you have been meaning to get to. Or take a serious look at your wardrobe. What can you donate? Here are some other ideas:
There are so many areas of the home, just pick one and dive in. Then you won’t feel guilty when you spend the rest of the day watching TV.
Spring is finally here. Do you look forward to annual spring cleaning, or dread it? Or just skip it all together? Don’t feel overwhelmed. No one says you have to spring clean your entire home in one day or weekend. Take it in small manageable chunks.
Spring cleaning is a great time to clear out the clutter in your home. Here are five easy places to start:
Bonus Tip: Clutter isn’t limited to physical stuff. Anything that doesn’t belong can be considered clutter. Think about your email inbox. Do you get lots of newsletters, advertisements, coupons, etc? Take a few minutes and unsubscribe from any that are on longer relevant to your life. Stop them from coming in. For those already in your inbox, for any that are time sensitive, like retail or restaurant emails, delete all but the most recent one or two. Most email programs have a search feature that will allow you to filter by sender or subject line and then delete on mass.
Christmas is over, New Years has come and gone, and it will soon be time to take down the tree, the lights and all the decorations. Before you pack everything away until next year, spend a few minutes and review what you have. Did you buy new decorations this year? Have you not used certain ones in a few years? Is something out of style? Worn or broken? The end of the season is the best time to purge unused items and downsize your inventory to what you actually use, instead of packing everything way with the intent to deal with it next year. By doing so now, you will gain some storage space and make decorating next year much easier since you won’t have to sort through unused items to find what you really need. And if you need to replace anything, you can plan accordingly, whether you take advantage of an after season clearance sale or shop off season, instead of waiting until next year when everything will be full price.
For the last few months, I’ve been on a mission to downsize and purge from my house things I do not need. My latest project has been my CD collection which is huge. From a collection of many hundreds, I selected about 80 CDs that I haven’t listened to in years and probably will never listen to again. I brought them to the local used record store that buys used LPs, CDs and DVDs. I was hoping to get about $1 per disc. But as I browsed the store while the clerk reviewed my collection, I realized I wouldn’t be getting that much. Most older, common CDs were selling for $1.99.
They wouldn’t be able to pay me $1 and sell for $1.99 and make enough of profit. Sure enough, the clerk called me over and said my total was $34.00. I was slightly disappointed, but only for a bit. Making money wasn’t the point of this exercise. My goal was to declutter my house and create space, which I did. If I wanted to get more money for my CDs, I could have tried selling them on my own on eBay or Half.com. But that would take months if not years to sell them all, plus the added effort of packaging and shipping out each sale. Tossing them in the trash was never an option, as they still have value. Selling them in bulk was the best option.
The point of this story is that the value of our stuff can be determined in many ways. It’s a matter of how you look at your stuff. I saw my CDs as something I once enjoyed and got use of, but are now just taking up space. I also saw the value of the space I’d gain by purging. Others may see the original purchase price of $12 or $15 each, which would make purging much more difficult. When I work with clients, I coach them on how to look at their possessions. Think about what value the item currently brings you instead of the original cost. Or how much value have you gotten from the item over the years compared to how much you paid for it. You will start to see things differently.
For the last few months, I’ve been on a mission to downsize and purge from my house things I do not need. My latest project has been my CD collection which is huge. From a collection of many hundreds, I selected about 80 CDs that I haven’t listened to in years and probably will never listen to again. I brought them to the local used record store that buys used LPs, CDs and DVDs. I was hoping to get about $1 per disc. But as I browsed the store while the clerk reviewed my collection, I realized I wouldn’t be getting that much. Most older, common CDs were selling for $1.99.
They wouldn’t be able to pay me $1 and sell for $1.99 and make enough of profit. Sure enough, the clerk called me over and said my total was $34.00. I was slightly disappointed, but only for a bit. Making money wasn’t the point of this exercise. My goal was to declutter my house and create space, which I did. If I wanted to get more money for my CDs, I could have tried selling them on my own on eBay or Half.com. But that would take months if not years to sell them all, plus the added effort of packaging and shipping out each sale. Tossing them in the trash was never an option, as they still have value. Selling them in bulk was the best option.
The point of this story is that the value of our stuff can be determined in many ways. It’s a matter of how you look at your stuff. I saw my CDs as something I once enjoyed and got use of, but are now just taking up space. I also saw the value of the space I’d gain by purging. Others may see the original purchase price of $12 or $15 each, which would make purging much more difficult. When I work with clients, I coach them on how to look at their possessions. Think about what value the item currently brings you instead of the original cost. Or how much value have you gotten from the item over the years compared to how much you paid for it. You will start to see things differently.
I recently had to treat myself as a client to deal with a situation in my kitchen. You see, I bought a new microwave. I’ve wanted one for a few years now. My old one still works, but it was small and not that powerful. After saving up some gift cards and doing research, I finally decided it was time. I love the new microwave, but it is bigger than the old one. My microwave lives inside a large cabinet next to the stove. I love being able to shut the door and hide the microwave. And the cabinet is large enough to provide some extra storage. I used to store cutting boards and sheet pans in the cabinet next to my old microwave, but now there is no room for that. So I was forced to make some changes.
When it comes to kitchen tools and gadgets, I have a hard time purging. But I know it must be done from time to time. In this case, I could have shoved the excess in another cabinet and just lived with it. But I knew I’d get frustrated by the overflow very soon. I also could have moved some things around and stored some items in the oven, like many people do. Again, not for me.
What did I do? I took all the baking equipment out from one smaller cabinet and the storage drawer under the oven. Seeing everything together, I decided what I really needed and used versus what I could do without. And then I packed up what was unneeded and put it in my car with the old microwave to donate to charity. I didn’t allow myself to really ponder each item. I went with the facts of how often or when I last used each item. And I trusted my gut.
The process only took about a half an hour. And it was well worth it.
Welcome to my first blog post for Organize and Maintain. I hope you find it inspiring, informative and entertaining. I’ll be sharing tips on how to get organized and stay organized, links to useful resources, and some relevant stories from my life.