Clutterbug - Real-Life Hacks and Tips to Declutter, Organize and Clean your Home Fast - The Anti Marie Kondo Method | Clutterbug Podcast # 15

Episode Date: June 30, 2016

I'm a ClutterBug! I am living proof that you can still have a lot of "stuff" and have a clean, organized and clutter-free home! Here are my top tips to getting organized and staying that way, without having to become a minimalist! Stop the clutter dance and get organized for good!  What's your organizing style? Find out what ClutterBug you are at: http://clutterbug.me/what-clutterbug-are-you Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey guys, welcome back to the Clutterbug Organizing Podcast. Today I wanted to talk about the fact that I am like the anti-Marie Kondo and how I really practice organization in a completely different way. I did read the life-changing magic of tidying up. Everyone was reading it and I was so excited to read this book. But I have to say that I found it really unrealistic. and perhaps I'm a little biased because I am a clutterbug. I do have a lot of things and I tend to like having a lot of things. I also have three kids who have things as well and I really didn't find

the idea of pulling everything out and putting it in a giant pile in my living room and then going through it and seeing what sparks joy as realistic in my really busy schedule. The other thing is There's a lot of things that, especially when it comes to kids' belongings, that I don't find joy in, but kids find joy in literally everything. I mean, kids want to keep gum wrappers. So when you have three little kids, this method, I mean, I don't know. I just feel like it's really great to be a minimalist. I wish I could be a minimalist, but the Marie Kondo method is really to become a minimalist. So if that is your dream, if that's something you're, you know, aspiring to be, then that book

will absolutely definitely work for you. When I look at magazines and see perfectly white, spotless, empty spaces, that isn't really what I'm, I feel, you know, my home, I want my home to be like. So my organizing style is most definitely like anti-condo. It's just, it is not like that. I'm a clutter bug, and that's the truth. I like having a lot of different cameras. We collect different cameras.

I like having lots of different lenses. And I suppose you could say that those things bring me joy, but then there's other things I have like a can opener, which does not bring me joy, or things like extra labels, craft supplies, things that sometimes just really come in handy. You don't want to get rid of them. I am all for purging and all for living with less.

but that being said there are people out there like me that want to be able to have an organized home that's beautiful and functional but that also you know can be maintained long term even if you tend to buy things from you know now and then and that's the other problem i had with the book the life-changing magic of tidying up it's sort of a quick fix and i say that because you're getting rid of everything's you're you're really pairing down of course it's easy to stay organized when you don't really have a lot of things. But it wasn't really teaching people how to stay organized. So as you buy things and things are given to you and how as you accumulate new things,

you're just going to be back where you started again. And I don't, for me, it isn't realistic to live in a really sparse environment. So instead, I have a few tips and tricks that you can stay organized without having to take absolutely everything out of all your closet and drawers and cupboards. and had piled on to the middle of the floor and do a huge purge. Purging is definitely part of the, you know, sort of program I follow to go from clutter to clean, but it's not the only part. There's other things that I feel are just as important, if not more important, to staying organized for good.

So some of the things I wanted to talk about really quickly are the valuable real estate in your home. I know I've talked about this before, but just in case you didn't know what it was, was I wanted to talk again about the valuable real estate and how important it is to utilize this to stay organized for good. So basically what this means is, the spot where you use the thing, whatever it is, should be the spot where it is housed, and the things that you use the most often

should be in the easiest to access places in that space. So what I mean by this, obviously we all do this in the kitchen. The glasses are usually beside the sink. or close to the dishwasher and the plates and the forks and the utensils are close to the dishwasher, but also in a space that's close to bring to the table. The things that aren't used as often, perhaps mixing bowls, things like that, are in a spot that's really hard to get to you, either up high or even in another room. And that goes for things like roasting pans that are just used a few times a year,

those things that you really do want to keep because you don't use them all the time. but shouldn't be taking up space in your kitchen or invaluable space in your kitchen because you're not using that often. And I really use this example a lot in my bathroom because I have a lot of perfumes and I have things, you know, smelly lotions and things that I purchase that I'm not using all the time, but they are nice to have when I'm going out and I want them. I'm not going to get rid of them because I actually enjoy them, but it's not something I use on a day-to-day basis. So those things are not kept in my bathroom. I keep them in the hall closet in a bin where I keep all my extra products, is what I call it. And that way, the things that are in my bathroom are literally just the things I use every single day.

So I do have like a big fat curling iron. I have like a little skinny curling iron. I have things like that that I don't use all the time that I just don't store in my bathroom. And that way the things I do use all the time are really easy to actually. and they're not getting jumbled up, but if some, for some reason, I needed those other things, I still have them stored in another location where I know where it is and I can get to it pretty easily. So that's what I'm talking about when it comes to valuable real estate. And this is one of the major reasons why people's space gets out of control. First of all, they don't have a

home for something at all. But most of the time, people do have a home for something, but it's not easy to put back. So instead of putting it away, they leave it, you know, on the kitchen counter. Or a really good example is, you know, we used to have my children's laundry basket in their closet in the bottom of their closet. And instead they would just throw the clothes on the floor in front of the closet. That little extra step of opening the closet and putting their clothes in, they weren't doing it because it wasn't as easy as it was just throwing it on the floor. A simple solution is just literally to move the laundry basket out front of the closet where they're throw the clothes and voila problem solved. So it's not a perfect fix, but it is a fix. And once the kids

got in the habit of throwing them in the actual laundry basket, then I was able to open the closet, set it in the closet, they got used to doing that, and then I could shut the doors and they were used to. Sort of like training a puppy. You train your family, but you also train yourself to get really organized. And using valuable real estate is exactly how you do it. So if you were the type of person, you know, maybe you even have a home office, but you tend to come home and pile all of your mail on your kitchen counter for bills to be paid, all of that stuff all over the kitchen counter. That is exactly where you should put your mail sorting system. And you should just get a basket or a file folder or something and have it right there.

So you can literally drop the mail into the places where it goes, but at least it's organized. So finding the valuable real estate in your home is absolutely key to getting a organized and staying organized for good. And it's everything. Take a look at your home and see what's laying around. Nine times out of ten, that stuff that's laying around is stuff that doesn't have a home that's really easy to get to you. It's not easy to put away. Or the spot that is easy for it to get put away is taken up with stuff that you're not using all the time and then therefore the stuff you do use all the time doesn't have an easy spot to go. Hopefully that makes sense. It's definitely I'm probably making it sound more complicated than it actually is.

But one of the first things I would do is really take a look at each and every one of your spaces in your home. See where you're having a clutter issue and see if just rearranging things, moving things around and making things easier for you to get to it and put it away can help get rid of that clutter problem. This helps with children. It helps with husbands. It even helps with yourself if you're having a particular problem. You know, if your husband comes home every day and he doesn't put his shoes in the closet, he puts them, you know, just leaves them in the hallway, put a basket right where he normally puts them and he'll put his shoes in there instead. You definitely have to be flexible and we have to find, you know, the valuable real estate in our home. A secret number two to really staying organized and getting organized is to use containers.

And I mean use containers in excess. Here's why you can store so much more in a container than you can just putting something on a shelf. So if you're finding your closets are bursting, your bookshelves are bursting, your drawers, everything like that is just overflowing, having sorted containers inside those spaces where the things that you're putting in there can have its home can really make sure that you're staying organized and able to even store so much more than not having a container. I especially love using bookshelves with big deep containers that you can fill up with children's toys. You can put books, you can put clothing in there, all craft supplies, all those things that otherwise, you know,

take up a lot of space on the shelf. You can really stack them and take up so much, stack so much more inside a container. Having labeled containers also means that you can literally toss things in. You can open up a drawer, you can toss things away, but you're tossing it into the appropriate home so things don't get all jumbled up. I love drawer organizers. And this is a container inside a drawer that keeps things really sorted and clean. And you can even go further and label all those things. And what that is going to do is help you remember which all of those containers are for and also help your family know. So it's easier for them to put things away when they're done using them. I swear to you that labeling is magic. If you kids never put the scissors

back in the right spot when they're done cutting, you know, something that they need opened, just put a little bin inside the drawer, label it scissors, and you'll just wait, just see the magic that will happen when people start putting things back in their proper home. So containers are absolutely the secret to staying organized. The other thing I like to say, unlike The Marie Condo method, I really don't think that taking, you know, absolutely every article of clothing out of your bedroom and piling it in the living room is a realistic approach to organizing your bedroom. First of all, that's very, very time-consuming. And I have three little kids and they're involved in activities and we're busy with things. Taking the time to do that is overwhelming. But I don't think it has to be. The way I got organized and the way a lot of of my clients have gotten organized is literally one drawer at a time. Five to 15 minutes tops every day.

Schedule it in. Don't have to spend an entire weekend going through your room, you know, piling everything on in the middle of the room. All you have to do is make it part of your daily routine. You know, you can when there's a commercial on, you can even take the entire drawer out of a bedroom drawer, you can sit there, and you can go through and you can purge things you don't want and organize and tidy it out. Then the next commercial, go get another drawer. It doesn't have to be overwhelming. It doesn't have to be this thing that, you know, you didn't get it done. You have to live like that the entire weekend. You can get your entire place organized in just 15 minutes a day. I promise you. Maybe it's just one shelf of your closet

or just, you know, short sleeve shirts of your closet one day. Take a lot of you. Take everything out does work for some people and it is a faster way of getting organized but sometimes I just feel like that isn't a really realistic approach for a busy family so the one drawer at a time approach means every day whatever time that you have you schedule just 15 minutes to organize some small area of your home and see what you can do that moves on to the next thing that I wanted to talk about when it comes to organizing is that everybody's different Not everybody wants to be a minimalist. And what I've really found is there is about four distinct organizing styles or organizing problems that people have.

One style I call the ladybug. And this is a hider. So you know you're a ladybug if you're the type of person that really likes your home to look very clean and organized, but you open up drawers and closets and everything's like a jumbled bursting mess inside. Ladybugs are hiders. They want their stuff not to be seen so everything's hidden away. So you have to really have good, you know, micro-organizing skills. And what that means is, you know, using a lot of sorted bins inside drawers, inside closets, inside everything. So you can really make sure that it's easy to still toss things away when you're done with them, but they're going into an organized system.

Then there's people who are butterflies. They are literally the exact opposite. A butterfly usually has empty dresser drawers, empty closets, and their stuff is piled like on top of their dresser or everywhere on the floor. You know, every surface of their house is pretty much covered with things, but the drawers and stuff like that is empty. So butterfly is a really visual person.

And unlike a ladybug who likes to hide things, butterfly hates hiding things. And they feel if it's out of sight, it's out of mind and they're going to forget about it and it's going to get lost or, you know, it's not going to be done or, yeah, it's just, it's almost like a fear for them. So organizing for a ladybug, it's not so much about making sure you have sorted bin systems and all of that. It's actually doing things like taking off the closet doors, installing a lot of hooks everywhere

so a ladybug can hang the things on the hook, using color-coated bins or clear bins on shelves. so the butterfly, I mean, can still see what they have while keeping it organized. So identifying what your organizing style is can be really essential of, you know, understanding why your home looks the way it does, how to get under control, and how to keep it under control for good. And you can take the free test. I'll put it in the link below. What's your organizing style?

And then it gives you a lot of, you know, tips and tricks for each of your individual organizing styles. So I think that's a really important part of getting, staying, you know, keeping organized. So I guess those are some of my quick tips. I don't want to make this podcast too long, but I really wanted to talk to you guys about the fact that I'm sort of like the anti-condo organizer. And while for things like clothing and, you know, stuff that we maybe have too much of, I think that book was amazing to get people really on board with purging and getting rid of things. But for the everyday busy family, I'm not sure how realistic it is. And the truth is, I'm not sure how that can really help you stay organized in the long term.

And maybe there's people out there like me who aren't thrilled with the fact that we have to be minimalist to be organized. I think you can be a clutterbug and still be really organized and still have a functional and beautiful home because I am. I'm a clutter bug. I have a lot of stuff. I keep a lot of stuff. I have memory bins. I have so much stuff. But I'm still really organized and I know where everything is and it's really easy to get to. So I don't want to discount purging. But a really easy way to get on top of getting rid of things that's simple and painless is also the 21 item toss. So this is something that I do once a week. No joke, you guys. Every single week I do a 21 item toss, and I make my kids do it too.

We just grab two bags, one for donate and one for garbage, and we find 21 things. You can put on some music, you can set a timer, you can see how fast you go. You'd be surprised how easy and quick it is, like under five minutes to find 21 things. It could be garbage. It could be scrap paper. It could be, you know, a shirt that has a stain on it or the button came off and you don't want it anymore. 21 things as fast as you can. It doesn't have to be all from the same drawer, the same closet, whatever.

It can be through your whole house. Run around and find 21 things each and every week. It really keeps your clutter under control, keeps your house manageable, and it's really fun and easy to do. So those are some of my most favorite organizing tips, even for us clutter bugs. Thanks so much for listening, and I'll put the link below again to the test so you can find out what's your organizing style and what clutter bug you are. Thanks so much for listening and I'll see you next time.