Tag: organise

Reset for Autumn

As the seasons change your priorities change, so your home should too! Now that the holiday season is over, it’s time to reset for Autumn!

One minute you are digging out your summer wardrobe, having picnics in the park and looking forward to getting away from it all, the next thing, the children are back at school, everyone is back to work so days are full-on, mornings are pressured and you spend more time indoors trying to juggle everything (including hungry children, mounds of laundry and keeping up with tidying and cleaning!).

Before it all becomes too overwhelming, now is a great time to reset your home; to declutter the summer paraphernalia and organise key areas of your home so that daily life flows more easily.

In September, I shared tips with Sarah Julian at BBC Radio Nottingham and Kelly Hinch at BBC Radio Leicester. Read my reset tips below and grab my quick Checklist to reset for Autumn!

My Autumn Reset Tips

It’s time to get practical! Your home needs to work for you. Now is the time to remove the excess from your functional spaces and organise them so you can access what you need and keep things tidy with ease.

Go for impact!

Focus on the area(s) that will make a big difference to your day. You use these areas daily, your day will run smoothly if you can access everything you need easily, the state of this space can have a really positive impact on how your mood.

Complete one area before you move to another. It’s difficult to complete an area if you try to multitask (which isn’t a thing by the way – the brain can’t multitask, it just swaps between tasks which it’s not very good at doing). Work on one area, if you find things that need to live elsewhere put them to one side (or in a box) to take to other rooms once you’ve finished.

Reset your Hallway

The hallway is your launchpad. It’s the last place you spend time before you leave your home and the first space you see when you come home. When you create a welcoming and functional space that supports you it will have a big impact on the start and end of your day.

Ensure you have homes for the shoes, coats, bags, and items that you need daily. Hang as much as you can, allocate space for each item and use containers for small items such as keys, tissues, wallets, gloves, glasses etc.

Occasional wear, summer coats, and shoes you only wear every now and again should be packed away or live in wardrobes. This is not the place to leave things that aren’t helpful to your mission of leaving or entering the home smoothly each day.

Reset your Kitchen

The heart of the home, it’s also the place where paperwork, bits and bobs, toys, pet paraphernalia, bags, clothes and all manner of other clutter gravitates to.

You visit this room at least three times a day, and probably much more. You’ll likely want to prepare meals, make drinks, clean, do laundry and many other tasks as easily as possible. You spend a lot of time here. You may also eat family meals and spend time with guests, so you want it to feel inviting.

Your reset for this space will include returning items to their homes, recycling/shredding/filing paperwork, packing away picnic sets, decluttering things you no longer use,

Reset your Wardrobe

You wear clothes everyday. When you have a sea of clothes you no longer wear and seasonal items peppering your wardrobe it can make it so difficult to find what you need.

Imagine how much calmer your mornings would be if you could find what you need easily rather than having to spend time rummaging for items you know you have but can’t find.

Keep the floor-drobe at bay by making it super easy to put things away:

  • Pack up off-season clothes and remove anything no longer fits or doesn’t feel great.
  • Separate clothes into categories such as work, social and occasional items to make it easy to access those items you wear day to day.

Need help to work through your Autumn Reset?

Are you ready to do your Autumn Reset? Download my Quick Reset Checklist to tackle your kitchen, hallway or wardrobe today!

Download my Quick Reset Checklist here

Find out more about my Decluttering and Organising services 

Contact Laura to discuss your organising needs on +44 (0)7970 989955

How to organise paperwork

If you have yet to find the best way to manage your paperwork, I’m writing this just for you! Paperwork is a fact of life but it doesn’t have to be the cause of so much clutter! The good news is, it is possible to keep it all under control if you dedicate a little time to setting yourself up with a simple system so that you tackle it as it comes into your home.

If you have yet to find the best way to manage your paperwork, I’m writing this just for you!

Paperwork is a fact of life but where does it come from and does it have to cause so much clutter?

Like death and taxes, you can’t get away from it! Anything from owning a gadget, to holding a bank account, store card or mobile phone, being employed, having a family, running a home or car, all generates paperwork! And that’s the important stuff! Then there is the paperwork that just arrives without cause or invitation; the leaflets, marketing materials, menus, catalogues and magazines that come through our doors all the time!

Do you also generate your own paper? I know I do; hand-written notes, printed documents, tickets, itineries to take to events, because you may need them, or simply because you prefer to read a real document sometimes.

In a bid to hold on to paperwork that may be useful, you stash it in a drawer or file it in away but it soon mounts up.

According to US National Association of Professional Organisers:

we don't look back at 80% of the paperwork that comes into our homes

Searching through mountains of paperwork to find that one important document you need is so frustrating!! At best it can cost you time searching, at worst it can cost you the price of a holiday when you can't find your passport!

The good news is, it is possible to keep it all under control!

And it's not that hard to manage if you dedicate a little time to setting yourself up with a simple system so that you tackle it as it comes into your home. Make sure you take 10 mins every day to do the following (don't just stack it up to deal with 'later'!)

  • Open envelopes and sort out the useless paperwork
  • Recycle envelopes, leaflets, menus, instruction manuals (unless you intend to sell items in future) and anything else you can find online
  • Take action:
    • add any key dates and appointments to your diary
    • schedule payments, make phone calls, book appointments
    • login to your online banking and other accounts and indicate that you’d rather receive online bank statements
  • Once actioned, recycle or shred the document (unless you need to take the letter along to the appointment, e.g. hospital appointments)
  • If you don't have time or can't take action straight away - assign one shelf, basket or noticeboard for the paperwork that is Waiting to be Actioned

Then each week tackle your Waiting to be Actioned pile - ensure you go back to this location every week and take the actions needed (perhaps it's a Saturday breakfast-time job)! Once the task is complete, file, shred or recycle the document

Now you've got a system set up to take tackle your paper clutter each week, it's time to sort out your existing paperwork

  • Prepare - Choose a table or floor with space to spread out, grab a recycling bag, shredder and a folder with dividers
  • Gather all paperwork from around your home
  • Sort through it, shredding, recycling or filing
  • File the documents in sections in your folder

Don't forget to use a system that is as simple as possible but feels logical for you - afterall you need to use it!

If it's a huge task, do this for each room, then bring everything together in one and have another pass and it.

I've created an Important Paperwork Checklist that outlines sections and lists all the documents I'd want to keep safe to refer to in future. It offers a guide to how you could organise your filing and the types of documents you might file. I'm sure there will be other important documents that you'll need to refer to or keep as evidence for something and you need to decide whether to keep them. If in doubt, keep it and gain some advice!

What are you waiting for?

So get started and do let me know how you get on! I love to hear how you get on with my tips.

 

By the way, just so you know, I'm an Amazon Associate so I earn from qualifying purchases. 

 

About OrganisedWell

Would you like help getting organised?

Laura Williams, Founder and Professional OrganiserIf you need guidance, ideas and practical support to make more of your home, organise your possessions in a way that supports your best life or to get started with your decluttering project, then give me a call.

We provide tailored advice and practical support to clients looking to make changes, to create calm, ordered space and free up time and money to focus on the important things in life. We specialise in organising rooms, garages, wardrobes, paperwork and much more; see our services or get in touch.

Can decluttering be good for your mental health?

If you’ve ever found yourself getting frustrated at the possessions lying around your home, been unable to concentrate on a task when surrounded by stuff piled on surfaces, or if you’ve tried to read a book, mediate or have a quiet cup of tea but couldn’t relax until you’d zipped round and tidied up everything first, then you’ve been affected by clutter. I share why I believe that removing clutter from your home is good for your mental health.

I believe that removing clutter from your home is good for your mental health, even if you don’t have that much.

Google says clutter is ‘a collection of things lying about in an untidy state’. Interestingly we’ve used this term increasingly over the last fifty years.

If you’ve ever found yourself getting frustrated at the possessions lying around your home, been unable to concentrate on a task when surrounded by stuff piled on surfaces, or if you’ve tried to read a book, mediate or have a quiet cup of tea but couldn’t relax until you’d zipped round and tidied up everything first, then you’ve been affected by clutter.

Research published in 2011 in the Journal of Neuroscience found that clutter means we have too many stimuli in our environment, which can make it hard to focus.

Humans are innately organised but we all have different styles that determine how we feel about clutter. Clutter can cause stress and lower self-image. It can cause anxiety about how and when we will be able to regain control or how others will perceive us. It can also take us longer to finish simple tasks making us feel incompetent.

According to a Lovespace survey:

a whopping 80% of people in the UK admit their mood is influenced by the state of their house with a less cluttered living space making people much happier!

The good news is, we can maintain a less cluttered home by sorting our things regularly and being more conscious of what we bring into our home.

A good decluttering session can feel quite therapeutic because it:

  1. Creates a sense of confidence as we use our decision-making and problem-solving skills
  2. Creates order and control – we only keep the things we need and have the space to organise them
  3. Gives you feelings of gratitude and abundance – you might find lost things, forgotten treasures, things you can sell or give away. All of which makes you feel that you’ve gained or can benefit others
  4. It can lift the weight of guilt, the feeling that things are left incomplete, makes us feel lighter, freer, calmer and leaves us with a renewed sense of ‘home’

Here are five ideas for maintaining a less cluttered home:

  1. Keep a bag in the boot of your car for charity donations. As you come across something that is no longer needed, pop it in the bag. When it’s full, drop it off at your nearest charity shop
  2. Practice the 1 in 1 out rule – anything new coming into the home has to be exchanged from something that you no longer need or love
  3. Treat pending school holidays, birthdays and Christmas as good opportunities to sort out possessions that can be passed on for others to enjoy
  4. Engage the rest of the household in the benefits of decluttering their own things (they will know where to find what they want and they may even make some money selling old things)
  5. Focus on tackling one room and rotate rooms over the year

So what are waiting for… rally your household, pick a room, put some music on and go for it!

 

About OrganisedWell

Would you like help getting organised?

Laura Williams, Founder and Professional OrganiserIf you need guidance, ideas and practical support to make more of your home, organise your possessions in a way that supports your best life or to get started with your decluttering project, then give me a call.

I provide tailored advice and practical support to clients looking to make changes, to create calm, ordered space and free up time and money to focus on the important things in life. I specialise in organising rooms, garages, wardrobes, paperwork and much more; see my services or get in touch.

Call me on 07970 989955