Clear counters, peace of mind, it's a miracle! I've worked hard to simplify my life and it's really paid off. I live and work in an apartment shared with my best friend and the steps below keep us both sane and happy. Here are the steps I took to make every day tasks less painful and keep my house clear even during the busy times.
1.) Purge Donate everything you don't use or can't sell. Do it in small batches, shelf-by-shelf, drawer-by-drawer so you're not overwhelmed.
2.) Stash Wash and put away dishes, art supplies, clothes, etc. as soon as you're finished.
3.) Banish Rent storage or ask friends/family if you can rent/use space at their houses for merchandise. I was so stressed before my BF generously offered his sunroom for storage.
4.) Schedule I schedule my blog posts, reselling tasks, housework, and now my food menu for 1-2 months ahead of time. I always know what to keep on hand for food/craft/work supplies. I can order in bulk and save. It just keeps life sane in general.
5.) Station I have a blending, tea brewing, product photography, crafting/art-making, and blogging/writing stations in my apartment. There's a home for everything and it speeds up production immensely. Have the items for your daily tasks accessible to speed up time.
Bonus, Back-Ups: Cooking ahead of time and freezing the meals, buying items in bulk when you find them for cheap or on sale, and other back-up maneuvers like making more product or components of your product when sales are slow for the busy times is a HUGE life simplifier.
What steps to do you take to simplify your life? I'd love more hints and tricks, this is always a process of trying new things to improve productivity and work/life balance. This convo was inspired by Thrift Shopper for Peace. I'll be chatting about it more soon.
Great tips! Unfortunately things like that can be hard to apply with a child in the house! I do keep up with the purging; at least try to. Can't relax in a cluttered space! Yours looks great!!
ReplyDeleteI have great empathy for parents. It's hard enough to do it all without kids.
DeleteDisagree. Teach the kids to clean up after themselves and make the cleaning part of the day. Teach the kids to purge (my mom had a massive yard sale every spring, and we ALWAYS cleaned out our own toys).
DeleteIt sounds AND looks like you've discovered a "sweet spot" for organizing your life and space in the "now". As things change, you'll be able to tweek your habits, adjusting them to fit new challenges! Congratulations. Doesn't it feel great?!?
ReplyDeleteYes! There were many frustrating months of bumping into boxes and feeling clutteted to lsnd here.
DeleteUr, cluttered and land. I hate typing on a phone.
DeleteIn my really small space, I have found these things to be true. Purge always. Clean immediately. Leave the blender out and plugged in. Sell smaller things. Hang lots of things on the wall (oops, I'm still working on this).
ReplyDeleteI'm in a wall hanging process, too. And that blender us always out and ready!
DeleteYour home looks so great! This is a weak spot of mine and it is basically overwhelming me. Purging is happening on a constant basis at this point and I am also trying to set up spaces that 'work' for me. My next project is putting two extra clothes racks on the ceiling of the office.
ReplyDeleteI'll get there one day. Trying to make it sooner than later!
Becky :)
I'm not fully "there"either. Always a work in progress. The clothing racks sounds like a good idea.
Deletegreat post. my goal this spring is to do a room by room purge and i've already told myself that if it becomes overwhelming, i can do one room a month. it'll take longer but at least i'll get rid of things. the hardest thing to part with will be books but i will take those to a used book place and at least get cash or credit for them. it's harder to do when you're not the only one - i live with two men (husband and son) who have STRONG sentimental attachments to things!
ReplyDeleteFantastic post and great advice. x
ReplyDeleteHope it helps you. Thanks Vix!
DeleteFirst off, I'm loving your new blog layout. Secondly, this is such a quick and easy-to-read post, but I know the tips you shared will really help me. I'm such a clutterbug and I keep EVERYTHING. I need to purge for sure. Also, I love scheduling and having a plan, but sticking with the schedule/plan is hard for me. I think I need more self-control!
ReplyDeleteI may have to do a follow-up with tips of staying focused/sticking to a schedule. I also have plans for "evolution of a blog post/setting a blogging schedule" post. I keep my blog editorial schedule flexible because I end up hating/trashing a lot of posts I wrote ahead of time. Counter productive, but I don't want to post something I'm iffy about.
DeleteOn keeping to a pre-determined schedule, setting a timer really helps you keep on task. It helps you realize just how fast an hour passes- and how much time we spend on distractions. It's easy to get sucked into the internet rabbit hole for hours. I use the one on my phone (great for on-the-go) and online-stopwatch.com.
Oh, and thanks for the kind words on the layout. :) Slowly trying to make it more editorial without losing personality.
DeleteFor scheduling, I suggest setting alarms. We have the technology to remind us to do what we want to do! Set an alarm for Saturday morning or evening or Wednesday night or whatever, and have it say : Do 10 minutes of scheduling or whatever. Alarms are so useful!!!
DeleteHell yes to alarms! I love them.
DeleteYup, a place for everything and everything in it's place saves an enormous amount of time and energy. I learned this the hard way and continue to struggle with it, but being organized soooooo makes a difference in life.
ReplyDeleteYes indeed! I'm going to have to make a trip to the craft store tomorrow morning and spend money I shouldn't have to since my previous disorganization helped me lose a couple of important supplies ;p Organization SAVES time and money.
DeleteThe purge part is so important!
ReplyDeleteRecognize your things are THINGS and not worthy of emotional attachments.
I'm getting better at that. That and getting rid of things I'll "use/read one day..." If you haven't touched it in years, you won't! out it goes...
DeleteExcept for number 3, I do the same thing as you. I also like to multi-task. For example, I like to work on my eBay listings while watching TV. Or, while I'm waiting for something to download or upload, I will sneak a peak at my favorite blogs, like Thrift Core :0)
ReplyDeleteI love multi-tasking, too. Even while lounging with friends watching stuff I'm usually writing/making price tags or something else work related. :)
DeleteSometimes it really helps to block all distractions and get focused and down to business, too. I do a mix.
DeleteI applaud your organising skills! I *used* to be able to do that when we lived in an apartment. Smaller the space, easier to keep organised. Remarkably, although the flat was built in the 20s, we had massive closets, and huge rooms so it was easy to keep things out of the way. Then we moved to a big old 1930s house (actually it was the same kind of house I had dreamed of when I was a child!) with an infant. I was also a brick and mortar shop owner with only occasional help. That aside, old houses often have very little storage space as people owned less. It took me a year to get everything out of boxes because of my daughter being small and me afraid she'd get into something. Our worst enemy was not getting proper storage from the beginning, but that was due to my stubbornness as I wanted pieces that were authentic and went with what we had and loved. Its never going to be like when we lived in a smaller space -- I actually love my clutter and thrive in chaos (I'm a child of Eris, goddess of chaos!) and people love my house as there is always something interesting for their eye to rest on. We've made huge changes and its much better since I've found proper storage (books are our nemesis as we all love and collect them) like the massive MCM room divider that holds SO many books, my vinyl, CD collection, even a liquor cabinet, and makes a divider for the LR (I hated that you just walked right into the LR when you walked in the house). My house is always clean, just messy, but I like it. Everyone who visits feels comfortable (except for my OCD future SIL, who doesn't even have a painting on a wall!) Its a house that reflects us, our lives, and is lived in and utilised well. One thing we *must* do is the kitchen, I have exactly 2 ft wide, 1 ft deep of counter space! And the cabinets are terrible quality vintage that don't even fit a dinner dish in them (thank heavens we have a great dining room with an amazing MCM set that gets a lot of stuff out of the way!) I did get an amazing deal on a set of original 1930s metal cabinets from a kitchen set up *exactly* like ours, so soon as we can afford contractors, that will be a great help as really that's the room that gets messiest due to those blasted cabinets (or lack thereof, due to three doorways!) I do have a schedule for chores, which I've fallen back on due to an eye injury, but it will be back to normal soon (thank heavens I have a husband not afraid to clean! He's been such a blessing during this ordeal.) Its funny, lately I've been talking about selling the house and moving back to the city to apartment life... I think its more that I miss being in the thick of things, but I also like living in smaller spaces that are easier to keep clean! XXX PS my daughter was taught to clean and tidy up from a toddler and always loved to help, and now as a teen she's a slob! I just shut the door, too tired of getting in a huff over it! She'll change again I'm sure! (She better!)
ReplyDeleteShe'll change, I was a teen with a room tha'd go from pristine to disastrous like a cycle of chaos. Likely because just like now, I was always working on something and tearing up the place in the process. :) It drove my mom crazy.
DeleteI bet your home is fun, I loooove a cozy space filled with "organized clutter" and still feel like this here apartment reflects that in a more streamlined way these days. Tons to look at it, newcomers wonder about in awe like it's a wunderkammer of thrifted artness. I've noticed the same thing, the less space you have, the less you want to own and the more creative you have to be with storage, which leads to better organization. Funny enough, moving to this MUCH larger apartment has inspired me to purge like crazy and be organized because it's very finished, sleek, and modern and looks better with less.
Good luck keeping it all together!
I have such an emotional attachment to pretty much EVERYTHING I own that to purge something would give me great displeasure. First off, I have a shopping addiction. I watched an addiction show about a guy who had a shopping addiction a few weeks ago & we shared so many characteristics it was uncanny, except our root is probably not the same. & I feel like one of them hoarders on TV who, if someone went through their stuff when they weren't home & threw it out would either go into a deep depression or commit suicide (not being dramatic here). There was one woman on Hoarders who had a rat pissed on, shit on doily that was like rolled in a corner & she was crying throwing it in the truck saying it was like throwing a friend away... totally me.
ReplyDeleteLove the Spring Blossom Green, BTW. One of my fav patterns. Another, BTW.. how comfortable is your couch?
Anyways, small steps for us in their household. I'm in the process of getting my BF to put his laundry in the hamper & change the toilet paper roll when it finishes. I have started doing the dishes more often, especially after my BF & I had the same thought within the week - if people from the other building look into our kitchen & are as disgusted by the mess as we are by some of the other apartments in the other building.
The couch is crazy comfortable, friends have slept over and I've passed out on it many times before, too. Perhaps not as comfortable as a super plush modern couch but it would surprise you! I'm nowhere near Hoarders bad but I do have some childhood VHS tapes I'm about to hoard in the closet until I can get them unto DVD (I don't have a VHS player so yeh...hoarder move.) And a stack of magazines I'm trying to force myself to get rid of. I want to write a follow-up post with tips for purging and the psychology of attachments to objects, which many of us thrifters have to deal with in spades.
DeleteI'm constantly clearing my thrift finds from my dining room table. Even when I'm not buying I'm bringing older items back from my booth. I need a whole room of shelving for inventory. I have items scattered in 5 rooms. I can't believe my husband puts up with me.
ReplyDeleteThings are always coming in-and-out of my pad too so that it's rarely COMPLETELY clear, but it's so much better than it used to be now that I use the steps in this post. My roomie is my long-time best friend and very understanding of the occasional disarray. Best roomie ever.
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