That’s right, WE, as in you, me, and Americans as a whole. There is just too much stuff. Now I am sure you hear it all the time, a sort of bleak judgment of us as a country. We are wasteful, lazy, consumer driven, we seek convenience, but at what price. Frankly, I am sick of it!

Everything we hear today is about the economy, or how we cant buy things we really need anymore (like a Snuggie, if only I had 19.95 plus S&H, curse this economy!), and blah blah blah. Let face it, we have all got a lot of stuff, let’s forget about buying more and really focus on what is right at our fingertips.

The most important thing about home harmony is organization. Most peoples definition of organized is that something fits into a particular place.

“All of my clothes are in my closet.”

“My tools are in the garage.”

“My paperclips are in my desk drawer.”

But it’s the sub-categories, and division of space that is really going to take organization to the next level.

First, pick a space: Don’t try and do the whole bedroom all at once, start with the closet, then move to the dresser, etc. If you start in one space you are less likely to be overwhelmed by the whole room.

Now in sorting this particular space it is important to ask yourself questions:

1) Do I use it and at what rate?

2) Will I ever use it again?

3) Could someone else benefit from this item?

If you answered yes to 1, decide how often it is used. Place it accordingly in the place (snow boots in the back corner, that favorite pair of sandals right up front). Also, decide if it even needs to be in the space. Seasonal items, or things only needed on occasion could go in the linen closet or garage.

If you answered yes to 2, deal with it as you would with 1. If you answered no, you have to decide right away are you going to GIVE or TOSS, make these piles and stick to them.

If you have to convince yourself to keep something (I should keep these nunchucks, just in case ninjas attack)then the item will never be used and you should get rid of it. If you are having problems throwing something away, put it in a prominent place and see how you utilize it, if you don’t use it in a month, get rid of it.

A note on memories: its hard to get rid of certain things because of nostalgia, and things like pictures and yearbooks can be important to save, but it you are keeping the Kleenex that David Cassidy sneezed into, it might be time to let go, and make new memories.

If you answered yes to 3, immediately take all discarded items to the Goodwill or Salvation Army. I can guarantee that 12 hours later, you will not even remember what you got rid of!

If you start small and work one space at a time, a big mess can turn into an organized home. Good Luck!

Having guest stop by, don’t feel rushed or obligated to do a deep cleaning on your home.

You can clean your home in about 20 minutes and have it looking great.

Start off with all the tools ready to go. You can carry everything room to room. You will need,a laundry basket, broom, dustpan or vacuum and a feather duster.

Begin with the first room, place all of the objects that don’t belong in that room into the laundry basket.

Using the duster, dust down all surfaces, lightly go over statues, you don’t have to move them, guests don’t look that close.

Make sure magazines, movies, etc. are put away. Clean up the floor, all you need is to either sweep it or vacuum it. This will take only a manner of a few minutes.

Move on to the next room doing the same steps. If you have items in your basket that belong in a certain room, drop them off as you go.

If you feel that a room needs a little extra attention, after you have done the main pick up through each room, then go back and spend the remaining few minutes doing the additional touch ups.

I must admit, I love the summer time! The outdoors, the fresh air, the trees everything!

Everything, except come time to put our garden and summer things away for winter. Well this year we did something different.

We created a Christmas scene using our gardening/summer things, saving us a bunch of storage space.

I used an Iron Plant shelf for Santa’s sleigh. I wrapped lights around our tomato cages which looked like Igloo’s.

And I used our older grill as a reindeer!

Next time you start storing stuff, pull it out- It just might save you from going to the store and purchasing Santa’s sleigh and Reindeer!

The biggest problems were the books and the Mega Block sets that we were given. My husband had also gotten the kids a set of soft balls like you see in play areas at fast food chains. My five year old was pretty good at separating the toys into different containers, but the three year old liked to dump them over again, and to use the books as shoes…

When I went to Pier One, I saw the tall Bookseller Bookcase, and bought two. They look great right next to each other- like something you would see in a magazine- and even better, they held all of the books, and the dvds! The slanted shelves are great for kids, as it is so easy for them to slide the books in, and they can move them around without the entire set moving or falling. The large, flat shelves fit some huge, coffee table style books on dinosaurs and animals very nicely.

With the books out of the way, I stacked all of the Mega Blocks into a nice tower, which is on top of the fireplace in the corner, and put the balls in a large japanese fish bowl style pot I had gotten at Sam’s Club.

Then I searched online for a toy bin that would have compartments, but not close up like a toy chest. Again, I wanted something that had a slanted front, but could also be used as a window seat. This was rather difficult. After much time spent on Google’s image search, I found the Land of Nod site.

The Storage Palooza storage bins are perfect! I did not think they would hold everything, but they do. I got one three bin unit and one two bin unit. The kids love them, and I finally have a normal, livable house! Even the one year old can’t do too much damage.

Keeping records is all well and good, but it can soon become a serious storage problem. Even if you have enough box files, filing cabinets and storage systems to keep all of this paper organised and neatly stored in one place (and I must admit that my own ’storage’ of all this paper was far less organised,) ultimately you can soon be overwhelmed by the sheer amount of space which a significant number of paper documents takes up.

In the end, my solution to the problem was to go digital - I purchased a Hewlett-Packard Scanjet 5590 scanner, with automatic doucment feeder, and spent a happy few months scanning any stray pieces of paper, phone bills, and the like, as I uncovered them during my rather wider trek though my somewhat disorderly house.

Armed with a digital PDF copy of my documents, I could easily shred and recycle the originals.

Nearly 25,000 pages later, not only did I save a huge amount of space, but now that all my paper is on my computer, it’s easy to find things. I can easily search for what I’m looking for, and find it in moments. And it’s easy to make a backup copy as well.

There’s nothing not to like about improving your filing system - and all the extra space I now have in my home is perhaps the greatest prize of all.

This is how go about it: Start with the Kitchen: I use Pril liquid soap to clean up the dishes. Even If they are washed, I clean them up again. At night, who know what creepy-crawlies visited the kitchen?

Next,I scrub the sink and the slab with Scotchbrite. I use a little Surf excel, diluted in water for this.

Then the floors are cleaned using Surfactant’s floor cleaning solution.

Now it is the Living Room’s Turn: Living room is generally clean. I use Amway’s cleaning solution for the glass cupboards. There is dust under the settee, so I have to vacuum with my Eurekafobe’s vacuum cleaner.

Finally I clean the bathroom: I use Harpick for the toilet and Dettol for the rest of the bathroom. I clean the wash basin with surf excel or Ariel.

Phew! After this I can finally relax!

Well, first find a place for everything. I cannot stress this enough. If items in your junk drawer have a home, you will always be able to find it.

To do this, I emptied the drawer and sepearated the contents.

I purchesed some bamboo drawer organizors from Walmart and put all the little odds and ends in there. Then, I put all the “lost” items away. These were things from loose change to socks!

After everything had a home, I was much more willing to take the time putting them away.

I would estimate the square footage of the closet at around 36 square feet or about 6 x 6 feet. Not a lot of room, but once I learned how to make the most of the space, I can fit a lot into it and it helps me declutter.

The first thing I realized with my walk-in closet is that there was a lot of wasted space. With clothing racks on 3 sides of the closet and shelf space above each rack, you would think I’d have all the storage space I needed. But I was actually wasting all kinds of space at floor level.

 I did make a trip to my favorite ‘big-box’ retailer and load up on Rubbermaid storage containers. They come in so many styles, you can always find one that suits your needs. I like the Rubbermaid storage containers that are made of clear plastic so you can see the contents. I also like the Rubbermaid containers that have built-in drawers for smaller items or even to store papers.

I even bought one Rubbermaid product that is made for hanging file folders so I can store all my warranties, tax documents and other important papers.

Of course I bought a shoe organizer too that utilizes some of the floor space in my closet.

Now I can actually walk into my walk-in closet without tripping over junk!

A few weeks ago I took one look at the mess that passed for my home office and decided I just had to bite the bullet and get things organized. It felt like a monumental task. But I had a spare half-day, thanks to the severe weather outside and a cancelled gym class and I just got to it.

First off all, I got a couple of plastic garbage bags for the ‘I really do not need this any more, it’s definitely

(a) past its sell-by date in terms of usefulness or

(b) information which, if I ever need it, I can look up online in five seconds. I pulled everything off every surface and onto the floor.

And began working through the piles.

I managed to throw a good deal away using the (a) and (b) principles I’d planned to work to. That left bills I needed to keep, school records the kids would want to see one day, correspondence with the IRS, you know the kind of thing. The question was, how to organise all that.

Easy-stack, versatile but low-priced storage boxes seemed a good way forward. But as the weather was bad I couldn’t pop down to the mall and buy boxes. I ordered online and went for the ‘Get Organised’ range. My job was practically done, as I knew I wouldn’t get them delivered for a couple of days.

In the meantime, I sorted everything into piles and wrote out temporary labels which I put on top of the piles, ready for when the boxes arrived.

Less than half a day’s energy and my life felt more ordered already. Now on to the garage to see what was lurking there…