Take control! Organize your home with ease
Create order from chaos and eliminate stress-causing clutter
By Jennifer Foster
Ever pondered the connection between domestic chaos and finances? According to Oprah Winfrey’s favourite organizing and time-management expert, Julie Morgenstern, people spend up to 20 per cent of their annual budget on crisis purchases related to disorganization and clutter. It’s no surprise then that the author of Organizing from the Inside Out (Owl Books, 2004) believes an organized home can save time and money, and reduce stress.
So, if you’re planning to move, are expecting a baby or finally want to get your stuff in order, take your home computer to task and go to it. Getting organized and banishing clutter has never been easier.
Let the fun begin
For starters, give the task of organizing an element of fun. Tune in to your favourite online radio station or play a CD you like to “get your brain in gear,” suggests Donna Smallin, author of The One-Minute Organizer Plain and Simple (Storey Publishing, 2004).
Create expectations
Next, type up a short, realistic list of outcomes and post it where you can see it. Alex Fayle, president of Professional Organizers in Canada, calls this printout an “organizing audit” that will help keep you focused on your goals.
You can now schedule your organizing sessions with an organizing program, such as Outlook Calendar. Use a word-processing document in Excel or Word to compose a list of what’s important to you (call it a household inventory). Fayle says this master list keeps you from being “completely distracted by the momentary reappearance of things from your past that don’t have meaning.”
Make a plan
Morgenstern’s three basic steps to getting organized are analyze, strategize and attack. “Most people dive in without a plan and within a few hours the whole thing has been abandoned,” she says.
Do a room-by-room inventory: define the functions of each room, identify the objects needed for those activities, and evaluate the storage space. Morgenstern suggests starting with the room you use the most. You’ll get satisfaction from seeing that room take shape. In turn, you’ll be motivated to do more.
Once in “attack” mode, remember Morgenstern’s SPACE acronym:
- Sort
- Purge
- Assign (a home)
- Containerize (store for easy retrieval)
- Equalize (maintain and re-evaluate system)
Create a sorting process
Sorting is all about streamlining. Think about the function of each room and banish objects that don’t fit the function.
Refer to your household inventory list if you get stuck and keep this mantra in mind: “If I have not used this item in a year or more, I’m going to donate it.” Take Smallin’s quiz if you need more help determining where a particular item should go.
Computer software can be helpful for both moving and general organizing. Interior designer Christine Kaartinen, a Toronto mother of two, used high-level AutoCAD floor-planning software when her family moved into a bigger home. But you can use standard computer programs to get the job done, too. Torontonian Adrienne Teron, mother of two boys, uses a standard Word template to print 4”x 6” cards with recipes on them, which she then stores in photo albums.
Get ready to purge
Now that you know what’s going where, you’ll need to find homes for your unwanted possessions. Check out this story for suggestions on what to do with your old goods:
Find a home for each object
Assigning is all about finding a place for an object. Morgenstern stresses that each room should only retain objects used for activities within that room.
Jane Veldhoven, a professional organizer in Halifax, N.S., finds Excel helpful for the assigning process, especially for anyone about to move. “By creating a spreadsheet for each room, listing everything to be moved and [knowing] where it will fit in that space often makes you realize some things will have to go.”
Colour-coded labels, which can easily be created in your word-processing program, are useful whether you’re moving, reorganizing items to a different room or putting objects into storage. Kaartinen used them for her big move. “It was easier to know where the boxes needed to go — was it something to be unpacked right away or something to be put into the basement,” she says.
Containerize
While labels help you find what you need, containers simplify storage item retrieval. Kaartinen used clear plastic bins for things that were going into basement storage, and then used an address label template to create labels to attach to the front of each bin. “Not only do I have a label reference, but I get visual details of what’s inside,” she says.
For the playroom, Kaartinen used low-height shelving and plastic baskets. A colourful tag attached to each basket depicts, with words and pictures, what’s inside. “The kids could read along and learn how and where to put things away on their own,” she says.
Teron uses templates to create labels for just about everything — her return address, file folders, storage bins, kitchen canisters, addresses and spice jars. “I like things neat and consistent, so I needed a system that let me do that easily.”
Your home computer can help you store all your household information. Veldhoven suggests creating a master list in Excel of what is stored where. List each file’s title and then its contents and location. You can even colour-code the spreadsheet to match the colour of the labels. Burn it to CD and store it in a safe place.
Stay balanced
Now that you’ve reached your goal, what’s the secret to staying organized? Both Fayle and Smallin say committing just five minutes a day is all it takes. “Organizing is freedom. When you’re organized, you feel ready for anything,” says Morgenstern.
