Managing School Paperwork
Functional paperwork requires your immediate attention and is giving you important information. Where as the sentimental paperwork pulls at your heart strings and tell you something very special about your child.
Creating a Capsule Wardrobe
I’m down to just under 100 items of clothing for all seasons. I have about 30 items that are just for warm weather, about 30 items for cold weathers, and then I have about 30 items that are cross over items – meaning they can be worn for both cold and hot. Here is how I, a self proclaimed sentimental lover of stuff that I keep and organize, did it…
The Relationship between Organizing, Minimizing, & You
I see the points these minimalists make, but they miss an important nuance — the relationship between minimizing and organizing.
First, the more you minimize, the less you have to organize.
Second, the more you organize and design systems for what you do have, the less you need to minimize.
Basically, there are times you need more in your life and, thus, you must rely on organizing rather than minimizing. And that is okay.
How to Manage Paperwork
Here is how I keep my paperwork in check, so I can spend that much more time with Boss Baby. This system is flexible and can be done on your time.
Manage Laundry & Increase Family Time
Let’s be honest…most of us have a “laundry chair” or side table where the laundry that has overwhelmed us lives. And we don’t let it live there because we are lazy. We let it live their awhile, so that we can use our time doing things we love a lot more than laundry. However, with a little intention, laundry can become less overwhelming.
Spring Cleaning
For me, spring cleaning means coming out of a winter hibernation of sorts and a GIANT welcome to spring. It is time to put away the comfort items from winter and get ready for the adventures of summer and spring. There are a few areas where I see the change as being vital to really be ready for this transition.
The M.O.M. Story: Laundry is leadership.
Home management — whether your style is to minimize, organize, or somewhere in between — is leadership. Today, more often than not, this work is still done by women, and if it isn’t done by women, it is still considered women’s work.
So, today, on the third day of Women’s History Month, I offer the idea that the problem isn’t that women don’t lead. Rather, the problem is that the definition, and our recognition of what it means to lead needs to be changed and expanded to include the “mundane” task of home management.
Closets: Managing & Creating Storage
Closets are really part of a larger storage strategy, and while this post is about closets, it is also about that larger strategy for managing and creating a total storage solution.
Designing Systems & Creating New Habits
…don’t try to force yourself or your family into a new system. ….learn more about yourself and the people around you, then use that to manipulate the space to ensure that the space works for the people.
How to Action Plan
An action plan powers your dreams. It combines your to do list with a timeline and a goal. You are now taking action with a purpose and in a timely fashion. And I love them. So. Much. .
Minimizing Sentimental Items
Here is where the problem came in — everything made me feel a deep joy — but some of my treasured mementos had to go.
Joy, for me, is in so many items I own. But the joy that I really need is the joy that will move my vision ahead.
Minimizing & Organizing During the Holidays
The holidays are full of stuff — oddly shaped stuff. This can cause an organizing and minimizing nightmare. There are all these little glass balls, and strings of various things — lights, garlands, beads, ice cycles, etc. If you are like me, you probably have a few other odds and ends that just don’t fit in a standard box.
Grandma’s Sweater
This means Grandma’s Sweater made it through 10 years of intentional decluttering. For 10 years Grandma’s Sweater lived in a closet with its tags still in tact while all sorts of items around it were re-homed.
How to Get Started Organizing & Minimizing
Organizing and minimizing is never done because true organizing and true minimizing is about how you think and how to respond, not about the items you own. The more of the physical labor you do, then more your mindset will change, and it will be easier and easier to manage your space with intentionality.
Trinkets & Chachkies
If you come to my house and leave “garbage” it might end up displayed on my bookcase…like the pistachio my best friend left in the medicine cabinet.
Fall Organizing Challenge
Seasons change and so do our patterns. As we move from the summer and settle squarely into the fall, it is a perfect time to spend a few minutes a day getting settled into the new rhythms of the new season. To honor these changes, M.O.M. will be hosting a Fall Organizing Challenge.
Baby Steps
In this phase of my life, my home is not the organized, minimized shrine it once was, but I am working through this phase to build new systems for this phase of my life.
I call this phase baby steps.
Closet Organizing Tips
I’m going through a big closet overhaul in my home right now. I live in a relatively small Manhattan apartment with decent closet storage — for Manhattan. But by most American home standards, my closets are very, very small.
Here are some tips that have helped me keep my closet in check!
Designing Systems
Organizing isn’t about forcing people into doing unnatural, unsustainable, or even new patterns. True organizing is about finding your already existing patterns and using them to make your life function for you.
A Minimalist & An Organizer Take on a Toddler’s Drawer
But this isn’t really about folding clothes. This is really about maximizing our time with our families and friends.