I admit it. Keeping things tidy has never been easy for me. My mother tried to get me to make my bed every morning when I was growing up, and to this day, I probably only make it a handful of days out of the year. I mean, I'm just going to mess it up again every night, so what's the point of making it look nice it it's doomed to get ruined?
But since moving out on my own and getting my own house, I have begun to see the wisdom in organization. No, I will probably never make my bed every day, but I feel much better about the state of my house when everything has a place. Or at least has the appearance of neatness. Organized chaos, I suppose. This week, I have noticed a few areas that really needed help. First, the laundry closet was full of random objects that have just been thrown in there because we need to keep them handy, but they don't have a specific spot. The bathroom counter is always in disarray, because I never put away the things I use every day. So I went hunting today in search of good bins, baskets, and organizational containers - preferably for cheap, since I can always upgrade later when I really have a system down.
Organizing the kitchen wasn't really on my to-do list, but I came across these adorable containers for 70% off at Michaels and I couldn't pass them up. I had storage containers for my flour and sugar, but they weren't fancy - just Oxo pop containers that didn't have any flair or character. So I was excited to find these perfect glass containers with the ideal amount of vintage detailing that is more reflective of my style and personality. They had a bunch of different kinds of jars that coordinated, so I got several of each kind to display. Recently I've been toying with the idea of taking the doors off two of the kitchen cabinets, and today, I decided to go ahead and try it out. I love it! It adds visual variety to the space and it's practical. It eliminates the hazard of the open door above the dishwasher that's always there to bash your head on when you're loading or unloading dishes. (Poor Jamey has fallen prey to it several times already.) It's also one less door to deal with in the awkward lefthand corner, when you're flipping them back and forth to get to different dishes. Plus it's easy access to dishes that we use often, and I finally get to display them!
Righthand cabinet.
Lefthand cabinet. Now I just need to figure out what to put in all my pretty jars.
Swapped out my flour and sugar containers for these. The detail on these jars hearkens back to the linear style of the 1930s and 40s.
Next: The laundry closet. I was excited about this closet when we moved in because it has a ton more shelving than our rental house did. And I can actually reach it! Well, most of it. We use this space to store laundry necessities as well as some tools, hardware, spare lightbulbs, and other miscellaneous supplies that we like to keep handy. I should have taken a "before" picture so you can see the drastic difference, but I'm sure you can imagine the chaos of having everything shoved in there with no rhyme or reason. It makes finding things very difficult. So I bought a bunch of these plastic containers at the dollar store and sorted the items for easy retrieval should we need them. It's a thousand times better.
I also got these white baskets to store the hand towels and wash rags in, since they always tend to
get pushed to the back or fall through the cracks.
Lastly, the bathroom counter. This space has always been a hazard zone for me. Just ask my parents. Hardly a day went by when they wouldn't complain about hair ties, bobby pins, earrings, and makeup strewn all over the sink. I'm guilty as charged. And some things never change. I hate the mess as much as anyone, but again it goes back to practicality. Why put things away when I need to use them every day? I thought about getting a shelf or a cabinet to put them in, but I really wanted to keep them handy. So I found this decorative bucket to put the bigger items in - contact solution, hairspray, deodorant, etc. and then I got smaller plastic containers for the little stuff. One for me, and one for Jamey to put his allergy medicine in. If it's not out in plain sight, he will forget to take it, so it's nice to have it handy as well.
So neat and tidy!
I'm beginning to think there's a unique strategy for keeping a clean house. Cleaning schedules and checklists never work for us, no matter how much I've tried to keep to them. I'll do okay for a few days and then before I know it, everything is a mess again. Must be that Second Law of Thermodynamics. I'm think the easiest way to keep things clean is to set myself up for success by keeping things handy for when I need them, but sorted enough so I can find them. The more complicated the system, the harder it will be to follow. The last few weeks, I have finally found the perfect cleaning strategy - I call it the "10 Minute Pick-up." At the end of the day, Jamey and I will take around 10 minutes to straighten up the house - put the dishes in the dishwasher, wash the pots and pans (no more stinky dishes in the sink!!), sort the mail, put away shoes and personal belongings that were used that day, vacuum the rug, pick up the dog toys, etc. And it's been awesome! I no longer feel like it's my sole responsibility to keep the house tidy, since having someone to help makes things go faster. And it doesn't take hours to catch up and clean the mess that has accumulated over many busy weeks. And now that things are more organized, picking up will be easier, so it's a win-win situation.
On to the next project!
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