Archive for the ‘
Clothing ’ Category
Some of your children may have started school already. Some may still be anticipating the first day. Despite their start date, my guest blogger, Linda Samuels of Oh, So Organized! wants to make sure your child’s school year is a happy and organized one. Read on for her top tips for creating simple systems for getting and staying organized throughout the school year.
It’s that time of year. Leaves are turning, classes are starting, and new school supplies are flying off store shelves. The other day I came across an old pre-printed pad, “A Note to School from Linda Samuels,” which I no longer use since our daughters are in college and beyond. Seeing the notepad made me think about all the years of excited anticipation we had preparing for school to begin. Are you and your kids ready for the transition? Take a deep breath. Getting that organizing piece working for you can make a big difference in having your days run more smoothly. Here are my top tips for an organized, joyful school year.
Cycle – Giving closure to the previous school year helps us get ready for this year. Sort through last year’s school papers (preferably with your kids.) It’s a great opportunity to review what was accomplished and what they were most proud of. It gives you a chance to create a mini time capsule representing last year. Be ruthless when you sort. Save what’s important and recycle the rest. Store the “keepers” in a large envelope. Write your kid’s name, grade and year on the outside. Store the envelope in a larger container. Add a new envelope at the end of each school year.
Capture – Establish a place to put the current school papers as they enter your home. You can use bins, binders, boxes, or any container that’s easily accessible. As artwork, graded papers, or programs come in, put them in their designated spot. You might want a separate container for each kid. When the container gets full, you can do some editing. Then the “keepers” can be stored in their year-end envelope, as described above.
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| Classic Stockholm Magazine Files from the Container Store are helpful for organizing papers |
Land – Create a place for backpacks, coats and notes to reside. When kids come home, they will know where to put their belongings. Cubbies work well, as do hooks. Make them easily accessible both in terms of their physical placement in the home and the heights that you place things. The easier you make it, the better chance you have for creating the “place it here” habit. Consider adding a white board or other communication center in this area to leave notes, messages and important items for kids to remember. Before bed, have your kids make sure that all needed items for the next morning are reading in the “land” area.
Center – One of the essential ingredients for school success is establishing a place to do homework and have school supplies readily available. When it’s time to do that science project, it’s no fun to have to hunt for the markers. Review your current supplies to see if there are any items that need to be replaced. Create a zone for the supplies to reside. If your kids like to move around to various locations for doing their homework, then put together a portable tote or crate to hold the supplies. Whether they prefer working on a desk, their bed or the kitchen table, the supplies can “travel” with your kids.
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| Pottery Barn Schoolhouse Craft Desk |
Assess – Fall is a natural time to review clothing needs. Organize with each kid separately. Go through their closets and drawers. Remove any items that no longer fit, they won’t wear, or need repair or cleaning. With the “do not wants or fits,” donate or save for younger kids if appropriate. Make a shopping list of items that are needed. Remember that less is easier to maintain than too much. Factor in how often laundry is done. Especially if it’s done frequently, you many not need as many clothes. Getting dressed is so much easier and less stressful when everything fits, is clean, and organized.
Resources – This is the time of year when back to school tips and suggestions are abundant. Many of my organizing colleagues have great wisdom to share. Some of my favorite tips and posts are Lorie Marrero’s video about using a binder for organizing school papers and more, Leslie Josel’s Student Organizing Pinterest board, Clare Kumar’s 5 Tips for a Better Back to School, Helena Alkhas’ school paper organizing system, and Ellen Delap’s Back to School Tips to Organize Your Home.
Perspective – With transitions come new patterns, more to dos, and extra stress. Reminding our selves to enjoy the moments can be helpful. They go so fast. A few years ago I wrote a guest post for Working Mother, Moms’ ‘To Do’ Lists, about getting things done, parenting and appreciating the various stages of our children’s lives.
What are some of your favorite ways to stay organized for the school year? Come stop by to share your best tips and resources.
Linda Samuels, CPO-CD® is a compassionate, enthusiastic professional organizer and coach, founder of Oh, So Organized! (1993), author of The Other Side of Organized, and blogger on organizing and life balance. In July 2013, Linda joined the Institute for Challenging Disorganization (ICD) Board of Directors as President-Elect. She has been featured in The New York Times, Woman’s Day, Bottom Line Personal, Westchester Magazine, Everyday with Rachael Ray, and Enterpreneur.com. Connect with Linda on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, blog, or website. Sign up for a free monthly e-newsletter with bonus tips at ohsoorganized.com.
I’m always advising my clients to sort, purge and inventory their belongings before purchasing organizing supplies. My guest blogger, Moreen Torpy of De-Clutter Coach in Ontario, Canada thinks that sometimes organizing supplies that are supposed to help us are in fact cluttering our homes! Read on to see if you recognize some of the signs of this idea in your home…
Many times when I go into clients’ homes, I see they’ve purchased any number of organizing supplies and books. What they’ve actually bought is the dream of being organized, not the reality. This may seem a bit harsh, but stay with me for a bit.
Cubbies containing enough shoes to stock a shoe store isn’t organizing the shoes. It’s simply showcasing the quantity. Who really needs a hundred pair of shoes? My question is whether all this footwear is actually being worn, especially when there are large numbers of children’s shoes. Because kids grow so quickly, how do they even have time to wear all of them before they’re too small. In this case, the cubbies intended to organize are really contributing to the disorganization.
Empty bins stacked or not, intended to store off season clothes, are useless unless they contain something. Before buying bins, why not prune your wardrobe, holiday decorations, and anything else you intend to store, then decide what kind of storage is needed. Spending money on unnecessary bins adds to the clutter rather than reducing it.
Adding storage baskets to closets to hold clothing that hasn’t been worn in years isn’t the answer. I suggest weeding out items that aren’t being worn on a regular basis and reduce the number of storage baskets to de-clutter that closet.
Containers for gift wrap can be a trap. Paper deteriorates with time, so having a large supply, even if it wasn’t expensive, doesn’t serve in the long run. Carefully storing all that paper in containers made for gift wrap is often a waste of time, especially if you run out the day after Christmas to grab more gift wrap on sale to add to the collection. Decide on two containers, maximum. One for holiday wrap, and one for other occasion wrap. These will be plenty for a normal household.
And we can’t forget all those plastic food containers! Whether they’re fancy take-out ones or recycled ones (margarine, yogurt, etc.) or new ones, they’re still clutter if they’re not being used. A rule of thumb for food containers is to have only the number that will fit in your freezer. Logically more than that won’t be used because there’s no place for it. And I won’t even go into the containers with missing lids or the covers with no bottoms. The only thing to do with these is to get rid of them. It’s a well-known fact that they multiply behind closed cabinet doors. Beware the unattached pieces!
I’m not advocating adding anything to the landfill that can be diverted—just saying to think ahead and not bring them into your home at all. We can only repurpose so much in the existing space. To my mind, adding space to accommodate clutter is unproductive and wasteful.
So you have organizing supplies that have become clutter? What’s your plan to eliminate it/them? Please share your solutions—we’d love to hear from you.
© Moreen Torpy
We would be honored for you to reprint this article. If you do, please include the resource box below with the hyperlinks intact.
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Moreen Torpy is the De-Clutter Coach, a Trained Professional Organizer, Author, and Speaker. Her new book is Going Forward: Downsizing, Moving and Settling In. See www.GoForwardDownsize.com for more about the book including where to purchase it, and www.decluttercoach.ca to learn about her organizing services and other books.
It’s been almost a month since Hurricane Sandy blew through the Northeast.
I am thankful that my family came out of the hurricane fairly unscathed. We had power and heat–our only loss was internet and cable for about a week. We know many who slept in chilled houses and went wherever they could to charge their phones and laptops for weeks on end. And that’s nothing compared to people who completely lost their homes…
But I was nervous…
You see, in the spring of 2010, a month before giving birth to baby #2, a storm dropped our neighbor’s huge tree onto our home. It came through a window of our three-season room and took up about 80% of our backyard.
Our neighbor still has another big tree in his backyard and as you can imagine, my husband and I were concerned about Hurricane Sandy causing similar or worse damage to our home.
We hoped for the best but prepared for the worst. And then got organized.
We made ice. And filled ziploc bags with water to make more ice. We bought all the ‘D’ batteries we could find and gathered all our flashlights, candles, and electronics in one place. I also gathered all information we might need in case of an emergency:
-our homeowners and car insurance polices/account numbers,
-our PSE&G account and contact information,
-the telephone number for
News 12 New Jersey to hear news reports if we had no other way to access the news.
I packed a few days worth of clothes for all of us and a weeks worth of diapers for my little guy. This is just the kids’ pile…
I also packed water, non-perishables and made a list of perishables to take with us in case we had to evacuate our home.
I was anxious about another tree falling on my house during the hurricane but I was equally as anxious about the possibility of having to feed my youngest child if we had no refrigeration or way to heat food up. He has multiple food allergies on top of the fact that he’s 2.5 and doesn’t have the most sophisticated palette.
I channeled my anxiety by making lists–a great way to get organized and prepare for an event such as a hurricane. I started on paper but then switched over to my favorite productivity app, Evernote. I use this app as a place to dump my brain and keep information for future use. I started an ‘Emergency Preparedness’ folder in Evernote and created the following lists of items we’d need:
-perishable food
-non-perishable food
-perishable food for my child with food allergies
-non-perishable food for my child with food allergies
-important contact information
-what we’d need to take with us in case we need to evacuate (clothing, cash, medicine, important papers, etc.)
You can access Evernote from any computer or your phone–the information is all in the cloud. I HIGHLY recommend this app. My desk would be overrun with papers and post-its without it!
Now that I had made my lists, I felt more prepared for the upcoming storm. What I wasn’t prepared for was my 2.5 year old getting his foot stuck between the slats of a dining room chair as the wind was howling and the trees were swaying. Days later, people asked us if we had any damage due to Hurricane Sandy. I laughed and said to them, “one chair–and it was INSIDE the house.”
It was repaired the next day and now our son’s booster seat sits on this chair. I think we’re going to be telling this story for years to come…
After the storm blew through, we touched base with family and friends discovered that we were one of the few homes around town that had power. We had no TV or internet access but I was grateful that we had heat and a fully working kitchen.
Our preparedness helped us as well as with others. We shared extra batteries, extra room in our fridge and freezer and gave out food, ice and a warm place to hang out to those who needed it.
School was closed for seven days. What kept my kids most occupied during the no-school days following the hurricane?
Is it possible to be thankful for a bag of balloons? Why not?
We also had nieces and nephews stop by to play and warm up. We had fun with stickers and crayons and other non-electronic toys. I will say–despite the fact we did not have cable, our DVR worked. So, we did have a bit of television to keep the kiddies occupied.
During this time, I also taught my kids how to use the Swiffer. They loved pushing it around, especially my 2.5 year old. He and my 6 year old had a competition–who could pick up the most dirt and dust with it. I had very clean floors after the hurricane!
Slowly we heard about more and more people getting their power back. Schools were opening again. Gas lines were getting shorter. Everyone from celebrities to relief organizations were collecting for Hurricane Sandy relief.
My son’s school sent a note home that they were collecting items for the towns of Little Ferry and Moonachie, NJ. I used this event as a lesson in gratitude/being thankful. My six year old and I talked about how we were very lucky that nothing happened to our house during the hurricane and how others had not been so lucky. We collected items from the list, labeled the bags and he helped me take them to school.
Three cheers for Warren Point Elementary School of Fair Lawn, NJ!
Three more cheers go out to Girl Scout Troop 445 of Fair Lawn. They made up a list of food items they wished to collect for those affected by Hurricane Sandy and were nice enough to staple a plastic bag to the list. Very organized, ladies!
Once again, I took my son into our pantry. We had another talk about people affected by the hurricane that need food and how lucky we were to have what we need in our house. He read the items from the list and I put them in the bags–a lesson in literacy and gratitude. I recycled the plastic bag, and used paper instead…
Other companies/organizations involved in collecting for Hurricane Sandy–
Deposit A Gift, an online cash gift registry service, has partnered with The Foundling Hurricane Sandy Relief Fund and is donating an extra 4% for every dollar given. Here’s how you can help. People have even created ‘registries’ for family/friends who have lost much to Huricane Sandy. Here’s an example of how one couple is raising funds for their Aunt Pat who lived in the devastated Breezy Point area of NY.
Whole Foods near me in Paramus, NJ is collecting coats through December 7th for New York Cares 24th Annual Coat Drive. According to the NY Cares website, “the storm created an unprecedented demand for warm coats.”
The Container Store is partnering with One Warm Coat to collect gently used coats, hats and mittens, sweaters and sweatshirts.
Please take a look in your closets and see if you have any outerwear that is in good enough shape to donate. This is the perfect time to de-clutter and help others.
Hurricane Sandy blew through town a few weeks before Thanksgiving–a time when most of us have more of an awareness of what we’re thankful for.
I’m thankful for much but in terms of the hurricane, I’m thankful…
-we had power, a working kitchen and didn’t need to leave our home.
-that we were able to help others after the storm.
-for my husband being home from work for a week and the time we got to spend as a family.
-for the break from the internet. As wonderful as it is, sometimes my eyes and brain need a rest…
-for the little time we got to organize. Not always easy with little kids around but we tackled a few -hot spots in my house.
-for Evernote which got me organized for this storm and prepared for a similar emergency in the future.
-that the only storm damage we had was a dining room chair!
A hurricane is a powerful reminder of our need to express gratitude and desire to be of help to others. Just because Thanksgiving has passed and the holiday season is upon us doesn’t mean we should forget about those who were affected by Hurricane Sandy. Please consider de-cluttering your closets, buying an extra holiday gift for a displaced child, or donating food to a local food pantry. Keep thankfulness and gratitude on your mind and in your heart this season and always.
I’m guilty.
Guilty of not being able to keep up with reading my magazines. I’m now down to one subscription and I have a stack that I’m slowly chipping away at. See, even Professional Organizers get behind on tasks!
I just finished reading the March 2012 ‘De-clutter Your Life’ issue of O “Oprah’ magazine and really enjoyed reading an article called, “Journey to the Center of Gayle’s Closet.”
In the article, Adam Glassman, O Magazine’s Creative Director along with a small team of helpers assist Gayle King (Oprah’s ‘bestie’) with a closet intervention: sorting, purging and organizing her clothes closet.
It’s a great piece written by the very talented Lisa Kogan. She is so funny, I’d read the phone book if I knew she wrote it…
There’s a section at the bottom of the article showing products to help to organize a closet–that’s where I got the following quote from…
Quote: “What good are boxes and bins if you can’t easily tell what’s in them?” says Adam Glassman.
“People can last a day or two without food and water, but no one can live without a label maker!”
Loved that. Had to share. Who is running out and getting a label maker?
I’m not sure what happened in the universe nine months ago, but it seems as if everyone is having babies this spring. I have bought a bunch of baby gifts over the past few weeks and my mother just took three pink and blue packages to the post office.
It’s raining babies!
Babies are cute and sweet and smell great but they come with A LOT of stuff–A LOT of stuff that needs organizing! Clothes, toys, gadgets, and equipment are only the tip of the baby-belongings iceberg. Papers, feeding/sleeping schedules, and the baby gift/thank you note list need to be organized, too.
Whether you’re expecting or your bundle of joy has already arrived, what parent can’t use a few baby organizing tips?
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With that in mind, I’d like to offer a few valuable pre-baby organizing tips and “can’t-live-without-them” organizing products to assist in creating a clutter-free environment for you and your new arrival.
Pre-Baby Organizing Tips
Sort and Purge—your own stuff
Get rid of the old to make room for ‘the new’ (your little one needs a lot of room!). Sort and purge through your own clutter in your:
Closets
Discard or donate any clothes no longer worn or usable. The clothes in your closet (whether they’re maternity or regular-sized clothes) should fit and flatter you and be easily accessible. There’s no time to pull together an outfit when your baby is crying in the next room. In addition, if there’s stuff in the closet that is designated for your child, sort and purge that one, too.
Kitchen cabinets
Clear out items such as old containers and expired food and relocate anything you use once a year to make room for bottles, baby food and sippy cups.
Linen closet or bathroom
Toss expired medicine and remove worn out linens to make room for baby’s linens and medical supplies.
Create lists
Whether your ‘womb-mate’ is depleting you of your brain cells or not, you still have plenty to remember. Write down everything you need to recall. Make lists. Here are a few examples of lists you may wish to create prior to your due date:
To-Do List
There’s so much to do! Register for necessities, write thank you notes, interview pediatricians, look at baby furniture and keep up with the rest of your life at the same time. Keeping a to-do list will help keep you focused on what must get accomplished before baby arrives.
Gift list
Unless you have many enemies, your child will receive gifts. It’s important to have a ‘gift’ list ready so keeping track of who gave you what and writing thank you notes will be a less chaotic task. Create the gift list on a legal pad or on the computer. Designate one place to store it so can find it when the UPS guy rings your doorbell.
Birth announcement list
If you’re planning on sending out a birth announcement, generate an address list of people you’d like to send an announcement to. The addressing of the envelopes is a perfect task to delegate. When friends and relatives ask how they can help you—hand them a pen!
Guest list
If you’re having a religious or non-religious post-birth celebration create a list of people you wish to invite along with their contact information.
Set up a filing system for your child’s papers
You’re probably thinking—papers? For a baby? Yes, not only do babies create a lot of dirty diapers they also create a lot of paperwork. These papers need a home so they’re not cluttering up your desk or kitchen counter. Their home could be a space in your file cabinet or a separate file box.
Examples of files for new baby are:
Birth certificate/Social Security card
Medical records/Pediatrician notes
Bank account/College savings account information
Baby equipment instruction booklets (yes—you should keep them…)
Gift list
Buy bins/tubs
Purchase a minimum of 5-7 bins large enough for ample storage but small enough for you to lift if necessary (to an attic space or to stack in your basement). My personal favorite are the Rubbermaid Roughneck bins. Label them as follows 0-3, 3-6, 6-9, 9-12 months.
People are going to give your child clothing as a gift, You may also receive ‘hand-me-downs’ from friends or relatives with older children. If the clothes you receive don’t fit your newborn yet, place them into the bin marked with the appropriate size for future use. Also, designate a bin for maternity clothes storage. As you drop the baby weight, drop the maternity clothes in the bin.
If you don’t have the space for bins/tubs, use Ziploc brand L-XXL bags for storage. They can be easily stored under a bed or at the top or bottom of your child’s closet. A Few “Can’t-Live-Without-Them” Organizing Products:
Diaper Organizer
You’d be surprised to discover how many different products need to be handy while your baby is on the changing table. Depending upon what type of changing table you have, either one of these diaper organizers will work for you:
Prince Lionheart Dresser Top Diaper Depot Organizer sits on top of a changing table or dresser converted to a dressing table
Prince Lionheart Diaper Depot Organizer attaches to side of changing table
Baby Briefcase
If you have no time or desire to set up a filing system for your baby, check out the Baby Briefcase. It is a baby paperwork organizer created by a mom amazed by the amount of documents her new baby generated.
Bottle Drying Rack
Whether you breastfeed or bottle feed, a bottle drying rack comes in very handy. It helps to keep all of your baby’s bottles, nipples and breast pump supplies in one place post-cleaning. As your child gets older, it can be used for kiddie plates, spoons and sippy cups.
Getting organized is essential as you prepare for the arrival of a new baby. You’ll want to be able to find what you need when you need it—quickly—and sometimes in the dark! After your first sleepless night, you’ll be glad you took the time to create an organized environment you and your new bundle of joy.
Share this with someone who is about to have a baby or just had one. Knowledge makes a great gift…
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Maybe you used to work in an office and had tons of professional clothing. Then, you had a baby and decided to leave your job. Or, you lost a few pounds and some items no longer fit you. Maybe your style has changes or your office dress code has been done away with.
Regardless of the reason, today is the perfect day to purge your closet of any professional clothes that you no longer want or need.
Why? Well, it’s for a good cause.
Dress for Success is an organization that encourages the self-sufficiency of women and helps them enter the work force and take charge of their lives. They are partnering this weekend with Dressbarn to collect new and gently used professional clothing for women.
So, I am asking you to go into your closets and look for blazers, skirts, dress pants, suits–anything a woman could wear to an office. This is the perfect time of year (being so close to Spring Cleaning time) and the perfect cause to ‘let go.’
The Send One Suit drive began yesterday and continues through Sunday, March 4th. Besides a tax deduction receipt, I hear you get a 15% off coupon from Dressbarn when you donate. Don’t usually shop at Dressbarn? Offer that coupon to a woman looking for a job. Chances are she’ll be looking for a way to save money on her interview clothes. That’s two good deeds in one day–hurray for you, early Spring Cleaning, Dressbarn and Dress for Success!
It’s rare to find a Professional Organizer that doesn’t follow their own advice…
I’m always saying to clients: “When it comes to your closets, get rid of/donate the old to make room for the new.” I help people (mostly women) clear out torn and stained clothes, too-small clothes, clothes with bad memories attached to them to make room for clothes that make them look and feel fabulous.
But, yet another saying comes to mind: “The shoemaker’s son has no shoes.”
You see, although I dispense this advice, lately I have been the shoemaker–too busy to tackle my own closet. My closet has been a hodge-podge of what I wore before I got pregnant six years ago, what I wore between my first and second pregnancies, what ‘kinda’ fits me now and what I’ve bought even though I’m hoping to drop another five pounds. This closet even has some clothes that pre-date my wedding day eleven years ago!
A few weeks ago while the rest of my family was out, I took an hour to sort through and purge my closet. What did I do?
• I took out anything I hadn’t worn in years and yes–literally dusted the items off.
• I made four piles: donate, throw out, keep, laundry.
• I tried on items that I thought might not fit me anymore.
• Anything that I was keeping (that had pre-pregnancy dust on it) I threw in my laundry basket.
• I counted all the empty hangers and made an appointment with myself for a little shopping…
• I donated items that were tight, that I no longer liked or suited my lifestyle.
• I wrote down what items needed replacing (white blouse, green sweater set).
• I created a drawer I call ‘Another Five Pounds’ which means, try these on again in a few months to see if they fit (mostly pants).
I bagged up all purged items and took them to Goodwill.
And I’m not done. I need another hour when the kiddies aren’t home to keep purging. Those winter clothes that didn’t fit me last year will be tried on in the next few weeks and ruthless decisions will be made. I took a quick look in that closet last week. I have a feeling I’m going to have more empty hangers…
I just posted the second of my four travel/organizing tips at my Organized Artistry Facebook page.
If you’re going away for more than a night, you’ll appreciate this week’s tip. Hint: it has to do with footwear…
Wishing you safe and organized travel!
The Memorial Day weekend is finally upon us–Yipeee!
Are you ready?
Do you still have heavy sweaters in your drawers? Is your snow shoveling gear easier to get to than your kids’ floaties? Are your boots blocking your collection of flip-flops?
If you answered ‘Yes.’ then it’s time to do what I call ‘The Winter/Summer Switch.’
Doing the ‘Winter/Summer Switch’ started when I was a kid. With three kids, a small apartment, and very little closet/drawer space we had no choice but to store out-of-season clothing in a place other than our closets. My parents were very creative. They had luggage that they rarely used so our off-season clothing would be stored there. At the end of the Winter and then again at the end of the Summer, my father would take the suitcases down from the top of the closet. We’d try on the clothes and make piles of what to keep for the upcoming season, what to store as hand-me-downs and what to pass on to younger cousins.
That’s just one example. Here are some ideas for jumpstarting your own personal ‘Winter/Summer Switch:’
1. Identify the areas of your home that are in need of ‘The Switch.’ These might be the garage, clothing closets, outdoor storage area, linen closets, etc.
2. Make an appointment with yourself to choose ONE area to focus on at a time. Please don’t spend the entire holiday weekend switching your stuff around. Even most Professional Organizers wouldn’t do that…
3. Gather supplies such as garbage bags, labels, markers (or a label maker), and a pen and paper for jotting down any thing you discover you need or want for the upcoming season.
4. Sort through your items, purge what you don’t need and determine the best way to store what you are keeping.
5. Repeat Steps 2-4 as necessary until you are ready for the Summer. You’re one step closer to being ready for the new season…
OK–Spring is here and although the temperatures where I am certainly don’t feel like Spring, I’ve started to do some Spring Cleaning around my house.
My first big project was kids clothes. I have two boys and I had to switch sizes and seasons for both of them. Besides all the sorting, purging, and categorizing–it was a lot of laundry, too! My sister gave me a ton of clothes for my youngest that her child has outgrown. Whatever wasn’t seasonally appropriate went to my friend who had a baby in January. The rest went into the attic–into tubs, marked by size.
Gotta get the garage ready for summer soon. That’s next on my list…
What will YOUR first Spring Cleaning project be?
Contact Stacey to Get Started!
