It’s hard to find the energy/time/interest to organize. So when that inspiration to organize finally hits and you are able to clean out that black hole in your home, you probably feel ecstatic! Yay! Time to post a brag picture to Pinterest!

But how often have you kicked clutter to the curb only to find out that it has moved back in and invited several of its buddies with him a year later? So frustrating!

So what’s the answer to removing your Unwanted Clutter Guest?

1. Put everything in its place at least once a week. You can do a big tidy-up on Saturday or tidy up a little bit every night, but the goal is to make sure that every object has a home and that every object returns to its home regularly. Consistency is the key here.

2. Your best bet is to keep clutter from accumulating in the first place. That’s why I say be very careful about using shopping as a form of recreation. Be very wary of sales, freebies, two-for-one deals, etc. Remember, only YOU have control of what comes into your house. If it doesn’t get into your house, it won’t become clutter.

3. When people ask you want for your birthday/Christmas/etc., tell them tickets to events or a gift certificate to a spa or a restaurant. Have the grandparents buy the kids memberships to the zoo or museum or Itunes gift cards. Anything that’s not an object.

4. Don’t use the mall or that cute shopping street full of boutiques as a hangout, escape, playdate or walking venue. It’s more than likely that you will stop to look in a few stores, and once that happens, you KNOW you will buy something you don’t need!

5. Make sure everyone in your house knows to put things back where they found them. To do this, they will have to be aware of where things go. This is where labels come in. Read more about using labels in your house here. Convince skeptical family members that if labels work for the Berenstain Bears, they will work for them too.

Every house winds up with some clutter in it sooner or later (even the homes of professional organizers!) The trick is to understand how it ended up in your house, so you can get it out as soon as possible and prevent it from accumulating again.

In the last few weeks, I came to a momentous decision: I decided to allow my 7-year-old son to keep his Legos in our living room.

Those of you who have heard me speak about organizing toys probably know how much I hate Legos (thousands of ugly, tiny pieces of plastic, each of which go to a different Lego set, thus requiring them to be organized minutely AND kept organized by children who couldn’t care less about organizing). I always advise parents to keep toys — including Legos — in the playroom or kids’ bedroom, because it is easier to keep the house feeling orderly and more manageable when toys are limited to certain spaces.

This decision to store the Legos in the living room didn’t come lightly. For the past 3 years, we have stored the Legos in the playroom in the basement. There, Nathan had plenty of room to spread out and build to his heart’s content. And if the Legos didn’t get picked up and put away quite every night, well, that was ok because the playroom was in an out-of-the-way corner of the house.

But I noticed Nathan played less and less with his Legos. Turned out he didn’t like to play down in the playroom, because it usually meant being by himself. I noticed he played with the Legos more when he was in the living room, because that’s where I tended to be more often. This was problematic because I wanted him to play with his Legos more. I think Legos teach kids so much in the way of math, physics, design and more.

So — deep breath — I decided to let him store his Legos upstairs in the living room. Currently, they all reside in a red bin tucked between the couch and the end table. Because of the way the couch is positioned, they are not immediately visible when you walk into the living room. (Completed Lego sets are on display in Nathan’s room.) And Nathan knows that if he wants me to continue to allow the Legos to live upstairs, he has to be diligent about putting them away everyday.

So far, so good. I haven’t stepped on a Lego piece yet since they have come to live upstairs, nor have I had to gaze too long at their garish, plastic ugliness. Nathan has been pretty good about putting them away when he is done with them. It turned out it was a good rule to break.

Which leads me to this question for you all: Do you have any “rules” in your house that you decided to bend? Why did you make that decision? Share in the comments below!

On Friday, I listed the 5 easiest places to organize in your home. That list is designed to help people ease into organizing if organization doesn’t come naturally to them. Today’s list tackles the 5 hardest-to-organize places in your home. The point of this list is to steer you away from starting with these difficult spots, because working in these areas without some smaller organizing successes under your belt may trip you up, leading to burn-out and abandonment of all future organizing projects. And I don’t want to see you give up on your dream of living a more organized life! So here is a list of where NOT to start organizing in your home:

5 hardest-to-organize spots in your home (#1 is the hardest):

5. Toys Toys are actually not too difficult to organize when you are by yourself. It’s when you are trying to help your children sort through them that you may run into problems. Any organizing project that involves asking your munchkins to make some decisions about THEIR things is going to take longer and be more fraught with conflict between you and them. Sure, you could organize their toys without their presence, and certainly if you have kids 4 years old or younger, I think that’s perfectly fine. But once your kids are a little older, you should get their input first so you don’t inadvertently toss their favorite toy. Here’s an older blog post I wrote about organizing kids’ spaces that will help you avoid stepping on major landmines once you work up to tackling this spot.

4. Clothes Clothes get put in the “hard” category because we tend to have a difficult time deciding what to discard when we know we paid a lot for an item, when we think we may fit into a particular garment again “someday” and just by the sheer volume of clothes many of us have in our closet (and in drawers, bins, in the basement, etc.) For this organizing project, you definitely need reinforcements in the form of a good friend who can be honest with you about what looks good on you and what you should definitely toss. And if she comes bearing a bottle of wine, all the better to make this challenging organizing task a tinge bit easier.

3. Sentimental Here, I’m talking about things such as old love letters, yearbooks, photos, your grown child’s baby clothes and schoolwork, tickets from old concerts, and other memorabilia that tends to make us feel something in our heart and stomach when we think about getting rid of any of it. Anytime we are sorting things with a lot of memories attached to them, we run the risk of getting distracted as we walk down memory lane (thus making the project take for-ever!) Sentimental items also tend to defy categorization, because they can be just about anything, making it difficult to follow the organizing principle of grouping like items together. You might want to consider calling in a professional organizer or at the very least, your most organized friend to help you at this point.

2. Craft supplies Wow. This is where it gets really hard. I have never worked with a crafter who owned only one type of craft supplies. Most crafters engage in a wide variety of crafts, meaning they have a wide variety of craft supplies in every conceivable size, shape and color. Lots of little items to sort means lots (and I mean lots) of little decisions to make. You will undoubtedly need to purchase some organizing supplies to store these items, and that means even more decisions to make. Plus the large volume of items to sort means this organizing project is going to take more than a few hours to complete. Professional organizer needed here if you are inexperienced or easily overwhelmed by the decluttering process.

1. Paper Without a doubt the hardest thing to organize in your home, because each piece of paper tends to be different from the next, making categorization formidable. We often stumble trying to figure out which papers we have to keep for tax or other reasons, and we tend to find ourselves bored out of our minds by the monotony of the task, which makes abandoning the project halfway very tempting (and very common). It’s difficult to know the best way to handle the different types of paper that come into our house and the best way to set up a filing system. Definitely get some help here so you can get it done right the first time.

So there you have it: where not to start your organizing project if you know that your organizing skills are not strong. I want to see you be successful in your organizing endeavors so you can achieve the house of your dreams. We have to walk before we can run. Start out by taking baby steps towards organizing and save these hard-to-organize spaces for a time when you can get someone to help you with them or after you feel like you have earned your black belt in organizing.

In the comments below, let me know if you agree that these are the most difficult-to-organize spots in your home. Do you have a different opinion regarding challenging spaces? Let me know!

Image courtesy of Flickr.

If organizing doesn’t come naturally for you, then it’s best to ease into getting your home organized by starting with an easy area. Save the tough, complicated spots until after you have successfully organized some of the simpler spots in your home. But where are these simpler spots? Here are the top 5 easiest-to-organize spots in your home. Check back Monday to read about the top 5 hardest-to-organize spots:

Top 5 Easiest-to-Organize Spots (#1 is easiest):

5. Pantry Fairly easy because we are not dealing with items that hold a lot of memories or were very expensive. If you have ever been inside a grocery store, then you can organize your pantry. Start by tossing all of the expired, moldy, buggy or unlabeled, don’t-know-what-it-is food. Donate food that is still good but your family will never eat to your local food pantry. Then organize your pantry the way a grocery store is organized by designating a section for each type of food (eg. all the pasta and rice on the top shelf, all of the canned vegetables on the middle shelf, etc.) Label those shelves so someone in your family besides you can actually put things away. You might need a few products such as risers and pull-out drawers to maximize space, but consider that a really valid excuse to spend an hour collecting ideas from Pinterest.

4. Gift wrap Your gift wrap is pretty easy to organize because you simply toss the ugly, wrinkled, torn or never-used items (I’m talking about you, 50th anniversary-themed gift wrap!) Then you group like items together. For this type of project, you might want to purchase a gift wrap organizing device. Here’s an old blog post of mine with some ideas.

3. Bathroom Don’t let the size of the space intimidate you. It is in the easy category because we are not usually dealing with sentimental objects in the bathroom or lots of little items that defy categorization. Work one shelf or drawer at a time. Toss expired cosmetics and medicines. Toss products you never liked or will never use. As a general rule of thumb, if it’s covered with dust or grime, toss it (the dust and grime indicates that you are probably not using it). Then designate each drawer or shelf with a category (eg. cosmetics, hair products, shaving items) and put items away.

2. Linen Closet Not too many decisions to make here, just grouping like with like (the more decisions you have to make, the harder the project is). Pull everything out on to the floor. Toss all of your threadbare, ripped or stained towels (or donate them to your local vet’s office or humane society). If you don’t like mismatched sheet sets, discard any sheets that are not part of a full set. Then fold everything back up. Group your towels on the shelves by bathroom. Group your linens together by bedroom. Toiletries or cleaning products get grouped together into little baskets. Label the baskets. That’s it.

1. Tupperware/Gladware This is the easiest spot in the house to organize because it requires very little decision-making, very few steps, hardly any time and no purchases. Simply pull all of your Tupperware out of the cupboards. Match up lids with containers. Containers without lids and lids without containers get chucked. Do not save more than 15 containers. Nest all of your square-shaped containers together, your rectangular shaped ones together and your circular ones together Place lids on their sides, grouped together by shape in an empty container. When it comes to organizing, it doesn’t get much easier than that.

You will notice that the easy spots all involve minimal decision-making, relatively small spaces and few to no new purchases (purchases can be tough because they require more decision-making). So if you are new to organizing and feeling a little overwhelmed, make it easy by starting small. And if even the small spots intimidate you, you might want to consider calling a professional organizer (like me!) to come and help you.

Check back on Monday to read about the 5 hardest spots to organize. And in the comments below, let me know if you agree that the 5 spaces I listed today are easy to organize. If they are not, what makes them hard for you? What are easier-to-organize spots in your opinion?

April is a good month to take stock of your children’s closet and figure out which items they have outgrown, which items can go into storage for next winter, which items can be handed down to a younger child and which items they are lacking for summer. But, boy, that can be a big job! Here are some ways to break that big project down into smaller chunks:

1. Know what clothing size your child currently is, so you will automatically know which size clothes to remove from her closet.

2. Set aside a few hours and send your munchkin to a sitter. Clear off his bed so you have a place to sort or consider bringing a folding table into his room. You will need space to make many piles of clothing.

3. One at a time, pull a garment from the closet and ask yourself, “Does this still fit my child” and “will my child still wear this item?” If the answer to both questions is yes, put the item on the bed and start making piles of clothing by type. This will make it easier to put everything back in the closet when you have all of the blouses grouped together, the dresses grouped together, etc.

4. If the answer to your two questions is no, either put the item in a box for donation or in a bin of clothes to be handed down to your next youngest child. If you are making a bin of hand-me-downs, make sure you allocate one bin per size of clothing.

5. Charities don’t want clothing with ripped-up knees, broken zippers, stains or frayed edges, so be sure to throw that kind of stuff away.

6. As you are removing clothing that is outgrown, make a list of items that will need to be replaced as well as clothing that your child will need for summer.

7. It might take a few hours, but eventually you will be done sorting through everything. Be sure to get rid of the discard box before your child has a chance to come home and start pulling items back out of it! Label the hand-me-down box and put it into storage. You should be left with several piles of clothing on the bed that are all the right size, the right season, in good shape and appealing to your child.

8. Before you put everything you are keeping back in the closet, do a little closet analysis. Girls’ closets tend to contain more things that need to be hung than boys’ closets (think of all the dresses, skirts and blouses they wear). Perhaps you need to add a closet rod or lower an existing one so your daughter can hang up her own items. Your boys’ closet might need more low shelves or drawers to accommodate folded items.

9. Try to leave at least 15 percent of the closet empty to facilitate easy retrieval of clothing as well as to allow for growth. Closets where everything fits with barely an inch to spare will quickly become disorderly again.

10. Group like items together on the rods and shelves and then LABEL those spots so your munchkins know exactly where everything goes. Kids naturally like order and are more likely to maintain that order if they don’t have to work hard to remember how you set everything up initially.

11.  Leave a donation bin in the closet’s corner so your kids have a place to toss clothes they have outgrown. This will make future closet clean-outs much easier.

12. Maintenance is key once you have finished organizing your kids’ closet! Teach them how to fold clothes and how to hang clothes on hangers. Do periodic closet checks so you can nip the closet messiness in the bud before a small clean-up job becomes a two-day reorganization project.

And there you have it! Your kids’ closet is ready for warmer weather, you and your children know exactly where to find everything, and the whole system is much more manageable. Time to snap a photo and post to Pinterest so everyone can see how awesome you are!

Image courtesy of The Container Store.

Many people have asked me what my organizing process is, and I realized that unless you have had me come to your home for an assessment, you probably don’t know how this whole organizing thing works. So let me break it down for you:

1. Before we start any actual organizing, we schedule an organizing assessment. This is where I come to your house for an hour to get a first-hand look at what your project entails. I ask you lots of questions about how you use your space and what you hope to achieve. You show me your space, and I take lots of notes and photos.

2. Next, I go home and type up my findings in a proposal for you. I outline what I can do for you, how long I think it will take and how much I think it will cost. If you like the proposal, we move to step 3.

3. Now is when we schedule some organizing sessions. We will work in 2 to 4 hour-long blocks of time. We will clarify what your goals are and then dig in to the actual sorting of everything in your space. Here, I act as project manager and coach, teaching you the best way to sort through your things and helping you make decisions if you get stuck.

4. After we have sorted through all of your belongings and figured out what stays and what goes, we install systems. This means I draw on my experience and creativity to figure out the best way to maximize your space while keeping new purchases to a minimum. I will devise custom solutions for you that work with your habits and goals.

5. After we implement all those storage and system solutions, we talk about maintenance. I will provide strategies tailored to you for maintaining your newly organized space, keeping in mind your strengths and weaknesses, preferences and habits.

6. At the end of each session, I take all your castoffs to Goodwill or other charities. We talk about whether you can do some sorting homework on your own. I provide text, email and/or phone support to you in between sessions.

7. It might take a few sessions, but eventually we are finished! Your space now looks and feels amazing! I will check in with you in a few weeks to make sure that you are able to maintain the systems in your space. Meanwhile, you get to revel in a home that finally feels like the welcoming, comfortable refuge you deserve.

If you would like more information about how my organizing process works, please feel free to email me at info@respacedpdx.com.

Image courtesy of Perfecto Insecto at Flickr.

Does your house feel out of control? Are you sick of the clutter, the piles of papers, and the tornado of toys and art supplies on the floor? The trick to keeping your house clutter-free is to get rid of the stuff you are not using. The less stuff you have in your house, the less you have to put back and clean around.

One way to make decluttering easier is to designate a donation corner in your house. Place one or two big boxes there. (Don’t use plastic tubs unless you want to donate the tubs too.) A good location for the corner is in or near your laundry room. That way, as you come across unwanted clothes while doing the laundry, you can just toss them into the box in the donation corner.

Get in the habit of putting outgrown toys, unused baby gear, lousy books and too-small clothes in the donation box instead of back on the shelf. Then when the boxes are full, simply drop them off at your nearest charity. Or use the tubs as the basis for your next garage sale and turn your castoffs into cash! You’ll feel better about yourself and your house after you get rid of the unused, unloved stuff that is weighing you down.

Never before in human history have people owned as much stuff, let alone had access to as much stuff as they do now. It’s hard enough for a healthy person to deal with, but if you are struggling with clinical depression, the daily work of “stuff management” can become absolutely overwhelming.

How clutter contributes to depression

Shame cycle: Organizing is not just a physical task, but a cognitive and emotional task as well. It takes a lot of energy, which you do not have when you are depressed. Consequently, you might avoid sorting through your things, which allows the clutter to build. You then might beat yourself up for not being able to do “such a simple task”, which worsens your self-esteem and increases your depression. The more depressed you are, the less likely you will be able to muster the energy to deal with all of your stuff.

Self-Isolate: To make matters worse, when the clutter build-up gets bad enough, you might feel so ashamed of yourself and your space that you do not allow anybody to come over. This is self-isolation, which can make you feel even more depressed. Depressed people spend more time indoors, which means more time staring at their clutter while that negative feedback loop plays in their heads.

Self-Medicate with Shopping: If you are depressed, you might even try to self-medicate your depression by buying yourself something new to cheer yourself up. And that might work in the short term, but soon enough you may realize that all of that shopping is just making the clutter problem worse. It just feeds the shame cycle.

What professional organizers do to help depressed people

Get support: The first thing I encourage a depressed person to do is to get support. Hire a professional organizer, who will figure out the fastest, most efficient way to clear your space while working within your limitations and your needs. Get an organized and COMPASSIONATE friend or family member to sit in on the organizing sessions with you and the PO so he or she can learn how to be a support to you in between organizing sessions. You need a cheerleader.

Clear large amounts of space to boost morale: The first thing a professional organizer is going to do is to start building up your morale, so you can start believing that you can do this work. Your PO will help you believe that you can have control over your living space. So what I do is ask myself, “what is the biggest impact we can make while doing the least amount of work possible? How can we clear a significant amount of space with little effort?” Usually that means clearing really large things out of the way first – furniture, exercise equipment, stuffed animals. Seeing clear space start to appear right away has the effect of energizing clients. And when I can energize my depressed clients, we can build momentum, which is what we need to continue with the rest of the project.

Set realistic goals for project completion and maintenance: If you are depressed, any organizing system I put into place for you needs to be as simple as possible to minimize your energy output. For example, it’s probably not realistic to put a shoe rack by the door and expect you to line up your shoes on it each day. But it’s no effort at all if we put a basket beside the front door so you can simply throw your shoes in. It might be difficult to fold your clothes and stack them on shelves. So instead, I might encourage you to set up a basket for each type of clothing and tell you to toss each piece of clothing in, unfolded, by type.

Do a little bit each day: Doing something will make you feel better than doing nothing. Set a timer for 10 minutes, grab two boxes – one for donations and the other for trash — and start clearing your space. If you do even that much each day, it will make a tangible difference. Depressed people tend to engage in all-or-nothing thinking, meaning they think they have failed if they haven’t completely decluttered their space. Instead of aiming for perfection, aim for progress. Heck, that’s a good mindset for us all to adopt, whether we are depressed or not.

Work during peak energy times:  If you know that you feel your worst during the evening, don’t attempt to start your organizing project then. Figure out when you feel your best, and schedule a short organizing session then.

Depression can be a devastating illness that effects how well you are able to maintain your living space. You don’t have to try to figure out a solution to this on your own. A professional organizer can coach you through this difficult time, allowing you to live in a space that will help improve your mood, not worsen it. If you live in the Portland-Metro area, you can email me at info@respacedpdx.com for help. You deserve to live in a space that heals, and I can help you get there.

Image courtesy of smoMashup at Flickr.

Does the state of your teenager’s room drive you crazy? Do you find yourself in frequent fights with him or her in an attempt to get it cleaned up? It can be very maddening indeed, especially when the mess creates bigger problems for your teen such as lost items, late homework and chronic tardiness. If you are at your wit’s end about your child’s messy room, maybe these seven tips will give you some ideas for improving the situation:

1. With teenagers, it’s all about giving them as much control in the organizing process as possible. Commanding your teen to “go clean up your room” or telling him “you need to throw that away” is the surest way to start a fight. At the very least, it won’t help the room get organized.

2. Don’t judge the room by saying things like “this looks like a dump” and “why can’t you put your things away?” Teens will (rightly) interpret this as criticism and will respond by rejecting all of your suggestions. Instead, ask your teen questions such as, “Are you comfortable in your room? Can you find what you are looking for easily? Do you enjoy being spending time in here? Do you feel like you can concentrate in your room? Is there something missing that would make your room feel more relaxing?” The point of these questions is to get your teen to voice the need for change. If she admits that some changes are needed, she will be more likely to OWN those steps toward change. It’s all about getting THEM motivated because they CHOOSE to be, not because you are forcing them.

3. Promise your teen that you will not enter his room and throw anything away without his permission. You wouldn’t want him to do that in your room, so make sure you don’t do that in his room. Show him the same respect you would want him to show you.

4. Once they are able to admit that some changes are necessary, be ready with some suggestions but also be open to what they suggest. If they say they don’t enjoy being in their room, ask them what would need to change for them to feel comfortable. Do they need more space to store their belongings? More light to study by? A place to hang their sports equipment?

5. Let’s face it: Often teens will reject all the suggestions parents offer not because they are bad suggestions, but because they don’t want to accept any advice from their parents. If this is the situation, consider having a professional organizer come in to speak directly to your child and offer some suggestions. A neutral 3rd party may be just what you need to bridge that gap between frustrated parent and resentful teen.

6. For some teens, they may simply need inspiration and a chance to see the possibilities of what their room could be like. A trip to the Container Store, a home and remodel show or a Street of Dreams-type of event might get your teen excited about making positive changes in her space.

7. Finally, all teens need a place to study, a corner in which to relax, a workspace for hobbies and a place to store books, clothes and personal effects. Divide the room into zones and make sure each activity has its own zone, plus proper storage space to store all of that zone’s things.

Making sure your teen is involved every step of the way is the best way to make sure his room gets – and stays – organized. And remember to model good behavior. You can’t expect him to keep his room picked up if you don’t keep your own room picked up. Teens are very sensitive to double-standards so make sure you are modeling the behavior you want to see from them.

Image courtesy of PBTeen.

Dealing with Mt. Laundry is bad enough, but when your laundry room starts to feel more like a dungeon, it’s time to take action. Here are some ideas for spucing up this oft-neglected space:

1. Go through your detergents and cleaning supplies to pare down what you own. Toss duplicates, detergents that have clumped together and cleaning products that have dried up. Keep your laundry supplies to a minimum. For example, do you really need laundry softener AND dryer sheets? Do you really need three different stain removers or will one suffice?

2. Consider installing shelves along the side of the wall instead of over the washing machine and dryer. It can be really difficult to reach over the top of the machines, especially if you are short. And hefting big tubs of laundry detergent up high on a shelf is down-right dangerous.

3. A long countertop or table is indispensable for sorting laundry, treating stains, laying items flat to dry and folding laundry right out of the dryer to prevent wrinkles. Get one and see how much easier it makes doing your laundry!

4. If space is at a minimum, install fold-down ironing boards, fold-out drying racks and fold-down table tops. This allows you to get laundry done while conserving space.

How have you maximized space in your laundry room?

Image courtesy of Simplicity in the South.