What helped me to clear the clutter in our home was to reduce the amount of stuff we had. Then when cleaning each room could be quickly restored to order within minutes. Especially kids’ stuff like toys, papers, clothes (kids’ clothing breeds in the night, I swear).

toys: yah they will cry if you do it in front of them, so weed through them when they are asleep or gone from the house. Keep all the stuff they love and actually play with. They won’t even miss the bags of stuff you give away.

clothes: Less than 7-10 of any item at any given time i.e 7-10 undies, 7-10 pants, 7-10 shirts, 7-10 sweaters, 7-10 pairs of socks, etc. This is still a lot of clothes and provides a great deal of variety. They won’t even miss the clothes you take out and this will greatly reduce your laundry/piles of clothes laying about. May pose a problem if/when you have a teenager or fashionista middle-schooler (cross that bridge when you come to it) but little kids under 10 or so usually don’t mind this.

papers: on the daily, when they bring it from school file and/or dump that day or place in a pile and go through once a week. Papers they are proud of go on the fridge for that week or so and/or papers you want to keep go in the keep box/drawer. When they are not looking toss the rest with the newspaper/paper recyclables.

furniture: if it’s not functional, get rid of it. Like a coffee table, for example, to me it’s just a clutter spot and something else for my kids to run into. Got rid of it years ago and don’t miss it. If I have company we drink coffee/tea in the garden or at the dining room table if cold outside.

husband: tell him to keep his stuff out the way/pick up his things or they will get the same treatment as the kids stuff!! I do most of the housework but my husband does not like the 7-10 only rule for clothes, so he takes care of his own clothing and stuff.

This blog entry written by Trula. Thanks for visiting Family Earthprint!

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.