Saturday Giveaway: Clutter Rehab
I have TWO copies of today’s book to give away! The book is called Clutter Rehab: 101 Tips and Tricks to Become an Organization Junkie and Love It!
This book came at a fun time for me. I’ve already been working on the 40 Bag Challenge (I’m up to 8 10 bags!) and this slim easy-to-read book is just the thing to keep that momentum going. Broken into short chapters, it covers topics such as toy storage, keepsake storage, and (near and dear to my heart!) budget organizing solutions.
Would you like a copy of this book? In comments below, describe one small area of your home that you’ve organized in a way that works well for you. Maybe we can all get some ideas for making our homes more functional. I’ll be announcing the winners of these books sometime on Monday!
Thanks for the giveaway! I organized my spice cupboard after your post inspired me:
http://beanland.wordpress.com/2011/01/27/order-with-spices/
I like our laundry set-up. The three biggest kids have a small tub on a shelt where I put folded clothes and they put them away. Right next to the washer, it’s convenient for me and motivates me to fold right away and get it ready for the kids.
I’m a basket girl. We have a row of deep drawers in our master bathroom so each as 1-2 baskets with it’s own “category” of stuff, toothpaste, floss, extra (new) toothbrushes / hair stuff / otc medicine / etc. Works for us!
Jan
Not much of our apartment is organized, but our bookshelf is well organized (shows you where my priorities are!). The fiction books are alphabetized by author’s last name. Text books are organized by subject… there are separate places for my craft books, cook books, hubby’s books, devotionals, kids books, etc. I love it.
I am on the 40 bag challenge too. We added onto our small house last year and the new family room has lots of closets. I bought some cubed organizers for the new closets and reorganized my school closet in there…and finally took all of my school stuff out of the linen closet (the linen closet has been my school closet for almost 9 years) and now I have a linen closet. Got rid of a whole bag of linens ( to be used as plant covers when we have freezes here in Florida during the winter). I am really loving my house even more…streamlining stuff…I am on six bags already!
I am proud to keep my tupperware cabinet pretty organized. All the round ones together and the square ones stacked by size and all the lids neatly stashed. I have to redo it from time to time, as other members of the house aren’t as diligent as me, but I love being able to reach in and get exactly the right size container and s lid to match!
Hmmm, I’d say my schoolroom is pretty organized–lots of bookshelves etc. AND, my kids and I have been organizing their toys a bit. I finally made a rule that generally speaking, we will not be storing any toys in bedrooms. Because their rooms were getting SO cluttered, stuff was getting shoved under beds etc. and I was going crazy.
We have a bunch of things bagged up to donate to the thrift store–SUCH a great feeling!!!
A small area…hmmm…that’s probably the only size of an organized area in my house! I love my bedroom and that’s because it isn’t cluttered! We have absolutely bare minimum furnishings and such and that makes it much easier to keep everything out…I’m hoping for clutter rehab because the rest of my house (and, yes, even sometimes the master bedroom) need it!
I’d like to say that I have all of these ingenious ideas for organizing, but I don’t. I just completed my first week of Project: Simplify and I love how organized my closet is now. I bought a couple of storage drawers to sit on the floor of my closet to hold some things that I had hanging around my room…like my many bras and hats! I saw this book a few weeks ago online and wanted to pick it up at the books store, but when we went they didn’t have it! I’d love to own Clutter Rehab!!
We have lots of little ones in our house, and in my kitchen I have two baskets that are at an accessible shelf under the counter – one has bibs and one has washcloths. I like the system because it is easy to use and easy for the kids to use too.
I too am working on the 40 bag challenge. I worked with a friend and we did a full week of organizing. I learned to put like things together, not spread all over the house. All office supplies stored together, all craft stuff together, all …it seems to help. Also, I use see through plastic boxes to group things together.
Our school shelve. I put a cubbie for each childs books and clip board ect. to fit their stuff. It makes it much easier to find things.
I like the way I did the little kids closet. I keep 4 kids clothes in there as well as alot of toys and it is organized. I have a dresser along the back wall which has sheets and blankets in it, the older boys shirts and pants are hanging on the top rack and the 2 younger kids clothes are on the bottom rack. There are plasic storage containers on the shelves above of Lincoln Logs, Legos, Little People, Dinosaur/farm animals, action figures, and they are even labeled. On the floor is the big box of Duplo blocks and a big box of Hot Wheels. I can find everything and it looks good,I will have to use some of all these great tips for the rest of the house!
I have all of my baking supplies and equipment with in arms reach of the kitchen counter. This has really helped me to whip up some food quickly. The rest of the house could stand some help.
My pantry is pretty organized. Pasta, rice, beans on one shelf. Canned tomatoes on another. Jarred sauces and random cans on another and a everything else on another.
I wish I could say I have a long list of well organized areas to choose from, but I am currently much more in the hopelessly disorganized drowning in clutter category. I have managed to organize my kids art supplies fairly well in one cardboard box with a lid (the kind reams of paper come in). Markers in one cup, colored pencils in another, crayons in a huge bucket–where do they get all those crayons–paper standing up against one side. It has worked fairly well, as long as my toddler doesn’t get into the box and throw all my carefully sorted items onto the floor. And it makes it much easier for me to turn them loose for some art time since they know where everything is and can get at it all easily.
I’m not sure that I like how anything in my home is organized, other than my silverware drawer at the moment! Seriously, I guess I did recently move the changing table into my daughter’s closet and all her little dresses hang over top of it, but the two bottom shelves are great toy storage. I had all our school stuff organized at the beginning of the year, but ah, not well enough to make it through to the end apparently!
My family room is the most organized spot. My husband built a Pottery Barn-like white shelf system. We put baskets on the shelves and use them to organize our toys. On the opposite side of the room we keep diapers and wipes under an end table; then in front of the table is a basket with all of our Wii games and controllers. It works well to disguise the diaper and wipes. Everything has a place in this room- the rest of the house could use some help.
My homeschooling books are the most organized part of our home. We spent a long weekend adding built in bookshelves and so now I have a separate shelf of each grade level’s book and supplies. This one thing alone saves me untold hours each year packing things away, sorting them and pulling them back out.
I’m constantly battling the “make time to declutter.” But, I know I got somewhere when my son (on his own initiative) organized his Legos by shape in my old craft drawers — that I had just decluttered (aka purged and reorganized) and no longer needed!
Small home, 3 adults, 2 teens all trying to merge two households into one. To make things worse there is haording to add to the frenzy.
I’d love to read this book but I am in Australia.
I struggled to think of an area in my house that is truly organized, so bad is our house.
But, we recently set our boys up with a set of “offices” in our basement family room – three desks attached to each other, to keep their school books and supplies. I feel like schooltime is much more in control now that we’re not spreading out all over the dining table upstairs.
Pictures. When I add a new one to the pile, I put it on top of the previous ones. Then at least they will be in order when I find the right album!
My pantry. My kitchen is the place I feel the most productive so keeping the pantry in order helps things to run smoothly!
I never feel any part of my home is as organized as I’d like, but I guess our school area is the most organized. We spent a long weekend reorganizing it a few weeks ago. We added shelves for our books and tubs for each of the kids’ things. It’s made our days go much more smoothly. Now if we could only tackle the rest of the house!
My medicine cabinet is organized. When I get a little crazy from the chaos that is my life, I peek in there. It’s a beautiful thing.
Hhmmmm… My youngest daughter’s toys are stored in cabinets in out family room. I have kept them very organized of late. My other kids’ toys are in the basement and are an absolute disaster!
Btw, I made your orange chicken last night at my husband’s request. So good!
I think my kitchen drawers. They hold what they’re supposed to and not much else. In the drawer with measuring spoons, etc., I have some shallow boxes to help organize things and I find that it makes a huge difference.
The “homework station.” I have a small rubbermaid container where I keep all the necessary homework supplies next to a designated area for my Kindergartners papers. I like not having to hunt down supplies to get his work done faster. And I always know where his library book is!
I like my laundry/master bath. Right now, it’s overrun w/laundry, but there is a realatively good system in place.
I am not the best organiser, which is why I need the book! But today I just bought a small whiteboard for messages to hang in the kitchen. This should eliminate all the little notes and messages to each other that lie around the kitchen table on scraps of paper and always get lost!
We just got done redoing our laundry room and now it functions pretty well for us. I have wall cabinets up with a hanging rod and shelf between them for clothes waiting to be ironed. On the other side I have a 4 bin laundry sorter and on one end wall I have a thing on the wall to put my iron in and hang the ironing board from.
My kid’s school paperwork!
I have a small file system that has a pocket labeled: “To Do” Everything that needs to be filled out/returned/dealt with goes in there. I go through that folder 3x each week.
The rest of the ‘stuff’ that comes home (completed worksheets, pictures, etc.) goes into a magazine file labeled with the school year and the child’s name until I get to that part of their scrapbook. I pull out the stuff for the scrapbook and then have the child pick out 3 things to keep that go in the keepsake box. The rest goes in recycling or trash. Homework that needs to be done goes in a special box in labeled folders for the kids to work on. Sounds complicated, but it really isn’t! And it works well for us.
Thanks for hosting this give-away. I won’t even tell you about the state of our home office and my craft ‘room’….
Lea
I bought the plastic drawer things that are Paper size, but deep. The kids papers from school go in there and then at the end of the year I can box them up and I have them in a handy place to put the papers and since I can’t part with the papers they bring home I have a place to semi-organize them.
We’re getting our house ready to sell, so staging is key! On the shelves in our bathroom closet, I bought 5 bright blue buckets (picnic section at the Dollar store) and store all my cleaning supplier, organized by type. Only cost $12 and looks much neater. Here’s the post with pictures:
http://uuhhwhat.blogspot.com/2011/03/home-bathroom-closet.html
I love my pantry and it is currently the most organized area of my house. Being a single mom of 6 (4 still home) I need more organized areas but my food is organized and I can esil find all the things I need to cook everynight.
This is a very small area, BUT, I installed sliding shelves in my pot cabinet that has really made my life much easier. No more digging at the back to find lids or shifting things around to get something from behind another item. The shelves slide out easy-peasy and I put a lid organizer in there to find the lids easier. Now I need to get sliding shelves for my baking cabinet and for my plastic/glass storage container cabinet and I will be one happy camper in my kitchen!
So far the only thing in my house organized is the kitchen! At least half of it. I try my best to keep the cupboards with all the dishes, pots, tupperware, cups, and silverware as neat as possible so it’s always easy to find what I need in a few seconds. Now to just get my pantry figured out! It’s deep and wide with only one shelf so it doesn’t work very well. I’m looking for something to add to it to help me out.
We pin our pairs of socks together with safety pins. We have small cups of pins in the master bathroom and the kids’ rooms. My husband and I are consistent and we’re working with the kids:) It is so great not to have to sort socks! I let the kids who choose not to pin sort their own socks.
I am up to 4 bags in the challenge! I would love the book!
Thanks!
The children’s dresser works for us — two kids, four drawers, surprisingly organized. We’re up to four bags in the challenge, but I know where other bags are lurking! Amazing what you can find when you think about it.
I have to honestly say there’s not really any area right now that I’m totally happy with
. I am being overrun with clutter!! I guess the closest YAY for us would be laundry. We do all of our laundry on one day. All of the children help sort, rotate laundry from washer to dryer, fold & then they put away their own laundry as well.
Can I be honest? I really struggle with throwing stuff out/donating it. At this point, I feel like my whole house is disorganized and clutter filled. Oh, where to even start???
Something I’ve organized well? Uh. Hmm. I guess my kitchen? I feel like I put stuff in the right places. Annnd, that’s only because my friend came over and helped me do it. An organizer I am not. Sigh.
You would think that with 3 grown children already out of the house and only 1 teenager left at home that I have this organization thing down by now and am a pro….that is so NOT the case!
The only thing that is organized is my business supplies and inventory. I don’t really know how this happens. Maybe because I am the only person that touches this or maybe because I fear loss of money if it were to become unorganized, most likely because it only consumes 3 rolling drawr things frm walmart.
As for the rest of the house? Well good luck finding something if you weren’t the last one to have it. Not to sound like I live in a sty or anything..it’s just not put together.
Yes I need help.
We are pleased with the organization of our son’s (3 years) toys, which we keep in the living room. We have a 3×3 set of cubes and fabric boxes that fit inside and I have labeled the boxes with masking tape for each toy category: puzzles, duplos, instruments, balls, blocks, and hammer toys, as well as a few cubes for books. We keep the remainder of his books in bookshelves in his room (we have a A LOT of books), and he stores his trains in a separate rubbermaid container. He is able to independently pick up his toys when asked, and he can find them again when he wants them.
Added bonus: having a small toy space forces us to regularly sort and purge, so even with generous grandparents and aunts/uncles, we are able to keep his toys to a not-overwhelming minimum. Now, if I could only do the same with my books…
Hope I’m not too late. I love my fabric area. It isn’t gorgeous like others I’ve seen, but I have my fabric stacked by type in a bunch of wire cube organizers that I got from yard sales- I can see everything and know where to look to see if I need something.
I made a rule that every dirty dish gets put directly into the dishwasher. So far so good.
My husband and I just recently got married and we live in a small apartment with not a lot of space. I have some decorations in the bathroom that are like small old style luggage boxes. They serve a dual purpose…. I not only have them on the counter for decoration but we also store things in these boxes. That was one of the best purchases I have made.
I have organized my pantry with plastic bins. A friend from church introduced me to this method. I LOVE it! My pantry hasn’t needed a full clean out since she helped me 2 years ago! Just a few minutes of straightening here and there!
About the only place organized in my house is the guest room!