Just 5 Tips for Decluttering

September 30, 2022September 30, 2022 nk330Leave a comment

Ah, decluttering: the never-ending task. I think the big truth that I missed when I first did a solid declutter was this: you are never done decluttering. I’m sure you can guess why, but in case you are like me and aren’t thinking that far ahead… it’s because you are always bringing new stuff in. It doesn’t have to be big stuff. I’m talking mail, school papers, gifts, clothes, even food! I bet you are bringing new stuff into your home every.single.day. So how do you keep on top of it?! Part of my weekly cleaning routine is having a set day to declutter. This is really just a kitchen declutter for me, because our countertops are the main drop zone for everyone in the house, but it could include the other main living areas of our house if they got seriously cluttered on a weekly basis. The less used areas of the house get cluttered slowly. Slowly and sneaky-like. It’s one of those things where it’s fine, and it’s fine, and it’s fine, and then one day you look at it, and it is NOT fine. So now what? Go get a garbage bag, a cardboard box (for donations), and a laundry basket.

Throw away the garbage.

I start with the easiest and most obvious items to declutter: the stuff that is obviously trash. I’m talking receipts you don’t need, wrappers that didn’t get thrown away, expired things, broken items, etc. You shouldn’t even have to think about these items, because there’s no reason to keep it! If you’re going through clothes, toss your damaged items you either can’t or won’t mend. Don’t keep stained things… just toss it. Even if you only have time for this step, you have made progress!

Get rid of the easy stuff.

This might be a little more challenging, but it’s still pretty straightforward. If you’re going through clothes, this is the stuff that’s too big, too small, things you haven’t worn in the last year. Be honest with yourself: are there things you don’t even really like? Put it in your donation box. Maybe you have things that you used to need but don’t anymore (like maternity/nursing clothes, office clothes when you work at home now): donate! If you’re going through toys, this is the stuff your kids have outgrown but is in good condition for another child to use. Another easy thing to get rid of? Stuff that isn’t even yours! If you have to return stuff to other people, put it in your car or a spot by your front door. If you find things that just belong in a different space/room put those in the laundry basket to carry to that room… and then either commit to doing it when you’ve finished decluttering that space or go do it right now.

Do I want to manage this?

I think I heard Dawn from The Minimal Mom use this term first, but it’s the idea that everything in your home is inventory. We all have a finite amount of space in our homes, and it’s up to us to decide what is going to take up that precious real estate. So as you declutter a space, think about if you want to a) find a home for an item, b) keep track of that item, and c) organize that item! Is it important enough to manage it? Here’s an example I just went through: I have a planner that I use daily to keep track of events in my family’s life as well as my weekly menu and daily chores. One of the things I love about my planner is decorating it. It’s like reliving my sticker obsession from childhood… it makes using my planner FUN for me.

Now there are not just a few simple stickers out there… there are TONS of them. And I am guilty of impulse buying these sticker pads. Often. When I sat down the other day to just peruse my sticker stash, I was embarrassed to see that I had way more than I needed. In my head, when I bought another set, I told myself that I’d use it eventually. That it was nice to have options. But when I saw ALL of my options, I realized that owing so many meant that I had to store them, organize them, and actually use them. And I honestly didn’t want to do that. I didn’t want to manage that many stickers. Thinking about it that way made it easy to pare down to just the ones I honestly saw myself using in the near future, and stick the rest in my donation box. Was it a waste of money? Yeah. But I’m not going to get that money back, and I’d rather have a tidier, well-managed space.

Does it bring me joy?

I feel like everyone in the world has heard this phrase used by Marie Kondo by now! And we may joke around with it a bit, but it really is a helpful thing to think about. We all have necessary items that we own that may not particularly bring joy (like a spatula or a garbage can) but we can think about the “do I want to manage it” question for those things. The joy thing comes into play with some of your extra items: your decorative items, the knickknacks, artwork, photos, items from your childhood. When you pick up an item that doesn’t really have service value, does it bring you joy? This can be a good question to ask yourself with gifts too. We often feel guilt when getting rid of something someone gave us, but the joy is in the giving. Once it’s yours, you decide if it brings YOU joy. Does that sweater bring you joy? Or are you constantly fiddling with the sleeves, pulling at the neckline, or feeling itchy? Does that angel figurine bring you joy? Or did you buy/receive it a decade ago and hate having to dust it? Think about what truly makes you smile or gives you warm fuzzies when you look at it, and get rid of the excess. If everything is special, nothing is special.

Give yourself boundaries.

We all need boundaries in the various areas of our lives, but in this case, I’m talking physical boundaries. Let’s go back to the sticker hoarding issue I was having. I have a collection of stickers that I have out to use often. They’re my go-to ones that I am working through before moving on to a new sticker pad. I have an organizer for them, but the container was getting pretty snug. I knew I needed to get rid of some because I was moving outside of my boundaries. Same with the extra stickers: they were in a shallow drawer that was getting hard to close. I needed to get rid of some so the drawer could close comfortably. On one hand, I could have found a bigger container for both sets of stickers. But on the other hand, I could respect the boundaries I put in place for myself. Because those boundaries are there to keep myself in check.

There are boundaries everywhere: a closet is a boundary, a drawer is a boundary, a basket is a boundary. Do you have an area that frequently gets cluttered? Try putting a container there; once it’s full, go through it. If you already use a lot of containers to organize, make sure you’re respecting the boundary you set for yourself.

One thing I’m still working on is boundaries with my things. Some areas I struggle with are big open areas. One spot in particular is the cupboard I store containers in. I recently made my boundaries tighter, because I wanted to store my husband’s rice cooker in the same cupboard. I got rid of some extra plastic containers, but I struggle to let go of my Pyrex ones, even though I don’t use them as often. So what to do? First I’m going to try adding a boundary: I’m putting a basket in that cupboard to help corral my containers. If I can’t fit all of the Pyrex containers in the basket, some will have to go. Maybe after downsizing both my plastic & Pyrex containers, I’ll be forced to use both, and then I can decide if I really have a preference. Either way, it’s another area I’m decluttering and making my home work better for me one area at a time.

Daily living

My Cleaning Schedule

September 27, 2022 nk3301 Comment

I said I would share my cleaning schedule, so here we go!

I somewhat jokingly referred to my cleaning style as ADHD cleaning, because I’ve found that I can’t handle anything overwhelming. If you tell me that Monday is the day I dust every room in the house, I’d say, “yep, I can do that.” But when Monday rolls around, I’ll think, “nope, that’s WAY too much dusting… and I hate dusting.” But then maybe you try telling me, “okay, don’t do all the dusting… just clean the living room.” Again, I’d go in thinking, “Just clean the living room. It’s just one thing!” But then I’d look at the living room and think, “ugh, that’s a big room to clean… it’s going to take me forever.” Anyone else out there like this? Or am I just super lazy??

So I finally tried something new. First, I listed everything I need to do in a week. Here’s an example:

vacuum (upstairs & downstairs)
mop (downstairs & bathrooms upstairs)
dust (upstairs & downstairs)
laundry
write menu, write grocery list
clean bathrooms
change sheets

If you look at my list right now as it is, there are seven items there. Seven tasks and seven days of the week. Perfect, right? Weeeellll…. I think we established that I can’t handle something that simple. Plus… are YOU able to get by with vacuuming just once a week? Do you only do laundry on one day? If you do… that’s awesome. I’m impressed! But my main living space needs to be vacuumed way more often with daily cooking and messy kids. And letting the laundry accumulate over the week would stress me out and overwhelm me. So I had to break my list down more:

vacuum upstairs (1x a week)
vacuum downstairs (3x a week?)
mop downstairs (1x a week)
mop upstairs (monthly)
dust upstairs (1x a week)
dust downstairs (1x a week)
laundry (3x a week?)
write menu, grocery list (1x a week)
clean upstairs bathroom
clean master bathroom
clean downstairs bathroom
change our sheets
change the boys’ sheets

That’s more accurate for me. I even found more things to throw in: water the plants, rotate kids’ books & toys, declutter, sanitize the kitchen, empty all the bathroom trash cans. Basically anything I didn’t want to forget to do on a very regular basis. Now we’re up to roughly 21 tasks each week. Divide that number by 7, and we’re at 3 tasks per day. Now THAT sounds doable to me.

Draw up a quick weekly chart, and start plugging in tasks. Think about how busy your days are. Do you have extra time on one day or a super busy day every week? What days do you typically get the most done now? How much cleaning do you want to do on weekends? For me, my boys are both in school all day on MWF. Those are my “heavier” days for cleaning. I have minimal motivation on Saturdays, but I have a little more on Sundays. I ended up with this:

As you can see, I have monthly things in there that I added after I got my weekly schedule in place, and I even put deep cleaning on there. But let’s focus on the weekly stuff for now. This is pretty well broken down, but if I started finding that, for example, dusting the whole downstairs was too overwhelming for me, I could break that down even further. I paired some things together because I found that I preferred to do them together: when I’m watering plants, it just makes sense to me to dust those surfaces as well. And after I dust and drop bits of dead leaves or maybe spill some dirt, it just makes sense to vacuum it all up. And this all takes awhile! So I do it on a day that my boys are at school and Andrew is at work. I prefer to change my boys’ sheets on a day that I know they’ll get a bath. I found out that with laundry, it’s best for me to just do one load a day from start to finish. But I put “laundry catch up” on Thursday in case it was a crazy week and I fell behind on my one-load-a-day plan. I declutter my kitchen countertops on Friday evening after the school and work week is over so we can start fresh on the weekend with no paper on those surfaces. And once they’re decluttered, it just makes sense to sanitize the kitchen.

Do you see how my weekly cleaning schedule is VERY specific to me? And yours may look totally different! If you are at work all week and don’t have kids, you probably don’t have to vacuum 4 times a week. If you cook every night and make a bit of a mess (I totally relate), maybe you need to vacuum/sweep/mop every night when you clean up the kitchen. I used to only have one day that I went grocery shopping, but I’ve found that I often go out on the weekend for a few things we ran out of, so I started just planning on a weekday and a weekend shopping trip. Maybe you’re the same way, or maybe you prefer to only go once a week. Make your schedule what works best for YOU.

Wait, wait, wait… did you think that was it? I have one more thing! I got to the point of having a weekly cleaning schedule nicely typed up and displayed in my kitchen command center, but I still found myself unable to keep up with it. So I highly recommend having a planner, notebook, dry erase board… something to write out your tasks each week. Because guess what’s going to throw a wrench in your lovely weekly cleaning schedule. Life. Things will come up, people (including you) still get sick, you may need to cancel all of your big plans for a mental health day… this stuff just happens. You need to be able to move things around and keep things flexible if you have any hope of staying on top of things on a regular basis. I have my weekly cleaning schedule written down in the back of my planner, but that’s just my starting point. When I plan out my day or week ahead, I scooch things around to accommodate things that come up like appointments, coffee dates, etc. Here’s my current week:

As you can see, I have my daily list of things to complete set up in checklist form, because I LOVE being able to check things off my list and SEE that I’ve accomplished something(s). I also put in my weekly menu (tips on that to come) and events for that week. You may have noticed that I didn’t check off “dust upstairs” on Monday. And that’s because I didn’t get to it. So I will either slide it to Tuesday, or I’ll just cross it off if I don’t get to it again. I know, I know…. once in awhile I don’t dust every week! But I usually do, which means skipping a week here and there is NOT a big deal. I also can look back and see that I crossed it out, so next week I’ll make a point of getting it done since I skipped the previous week. I also like writing non-weekly tasks on little sticky notes so I can easily move them ahead to the next month. Things like cleaning out the vacuum cleaner filter (once a month) or returning library books (every other week) get written on movable notes so I can fit them in as they come up in my weeks.

I hope this wasn’t overwhelming. Cleaning used to be overwhelming for me, which is how I ended up in my “ADHD/divide & conquer” cleaning approach to begin with. I feel like it can seem like a lot to go through all of these steps just to get a schedule in place, but breaking things down into bite-size tasks and spreading them out over the week has made a world of difference for me. Checklists have made a world of difference for me. Giving myself grace and being flexible with my daily chores has made a world of difference or me. So if your current way of doing things isn’t working for you, maybe you should give my method a try. It could make a world of difference in your home!

Daily living · House & Home

Just 5 Tips for Housework

September 26, 2022September 27, 2022 nk330Leave a comment

Okay, so I’ve been a housewife for the majority of my married years. Andrew and I have been married for over 11 years, and I only worked for two of them! I never thought I’d just be a housewife and stay-at-home-parent, but here we are. I enjoyed working when I did, but once I had Gerrit, I knew I wanted to be home with my kid(s) in those early years. Part of being at home all day, in my mind, is taking on the bulk of the housework. And over the years I have tried many different things for staying on top of it. It wasn’t until the past couple of years that I finally found something that worked for me! I’ll share in a separate post what my cleaning schedule looks like, but these 5 tips have really helped me:

Consider Your Phase of Life

When we first got married, I had oodles of time on my hands. We had just moved to a new country, I was giving myself time to get settled before looking for a job, and I probably could have had the cleanest house ever. I had OODLES of time. But I also didn’t have a clue how to keep a clean and tidy house. I stuck to a cleaning schedule here and there, but I struggled to stay on top of it. The thing about this phase of life? You don’t really realize how much time you really have.

Next I moved into two-full-time-workers phase of life. When Andrew and I were both working (and sometimes had different work schedules), we cleaned minimally during the week. When we didn’t have weekend plans, we did heavy cleaning on the weekends or did panic cleaning before we had people over to socialize. It worked because it was just the two of us. I don’t think things ever really got deep-cleaned, but the house was usually fine.

Then there’s mom-of-a-newborn phase. I realize that there are some newborns that are blissfully easy to care for: they eat quickly without spitting up, they sleep easily and for long stretches, and when they’re awake, they’re perfectly content to lay and look around. I’ve heard stories of moms of newborns who don’t know what to do with themselves because they have a lot of free time on their hands. Then there are moms like me: your newborn wants to nurse around the clock, they spit up a lot so you’re always changing clothes and bedding, and don’t you dare put that baby down: they will loudly protest. If you are like me, housework falls to the bottom of the to-do list. This is survival mode. In this phase of life, you are not allowed to get down on yourself for the state of your home. You’re keeping a tiny dictator alive, and that’s all you can handle. If you get a pocket of time and your energy is there for cleaning, I always say just get the dishes and laundry done. Keep it simple.

When you start to catch your breath and move into mom-of-young-kid(s) phase, I feel like you can start to tackle a cleaning schedule. Sometimes. There will still be times when someone is sick or the toddler isn’t sleeping again, and then you slide right back into survival mode. Back to just dishes and laundry. And that’s okay.

I’m in a phase of life where I’m getting large chunks of time to myself for the first time since Gerrit was born. Gerrit is in 2nd grade and in school 5 days a week, and Berend is in preschool doing 3 full days a week. It’s been nice to really feel on top of housework and decluttering for the first time… ever!

You may find yourself in the working-parent phase of life. I haven’t been here yet, but I imagine it’s a mix of survival mode and weekend cleaning phase. You do what you need to do during the week (which is probably fine, because your kids likely aren’t home during the week either), but you tackle bigger tasks in the evenings or on the weekends.

Whatever phase of life you’re in, accept it and do your best with it. If you have a lot of free time, take advantage of it! If you’re stretched super thin? Be okay with just-the-basics cleaning or see if you can hire someone to help (I’ve been there).

Declutter

It’s all well and good to go into a cleaning plan with high motivation and good intentions. But take a look around first. Are you really ready to clean… or do you have way too much stuff laying around?

I first seriously decluttered after reading Marie Kondo’s book. This book really was “life-changing” for me. I looked at decluttering in a completely different way, and I purged seriously for the first time. This big declutter happened before our move to Texas in 2016, and it was definitely needed since we were downsizing. But I continue going through phases of accumulating and purging (kids seem to need a lot of stuff), and I’m getting better at knowing when I need to do a good declutter.

During Andrew’s 2nd deployment, I wanted to do better with keeping up with the housework. I decided I wanted to hire someone to come clean the house for us. It seemed a little frivolous, but I knew from deployment #1, that keeping up our home AND keeping up with our boys (5 and almost 2 at the time) on my own was challenging. So we agreed that we’d hire someone to come clean just the main rooms of the downstairs (kitchen, living room, dining area, half bath, & hallway) every other week, which left just the upstairs and our office (aka “room of shame”) for me to deal with. Besides the actual cleaning (which was ah-maaazing!), the best thing I learned about having a cleaning service was the importance of decluttering. They couldn’t clean quickly and effectively if there was stuff everywhere. Having to declutter the night before the cleaners came was annoying, but it was necessary and became a good habit.

So is your house ready to clean? Or do you have some decluttering to do? If you have a LOT of decluttering to do, just start with your flat surfaces (floor, countertops, tables) so you can do some cleaning and feel accomplished.

Know Your Cleaning Style

I’ve read the books, watched the YouTube moms, read the blogs, and tried the Pinterest things. I’ve had chore charts for myself, daily schedules, and times of completely winging it. What I’ve learned? What works for me might not work for you.

My mom would tell me about my grandma always having her daily task housework: Mondays are for laundry, Tuesdays are for floors, Wednesday is bathroom cleaning day, etc. I think this works really well for some people. It’s easy to remember, and it’s just one day of whatever chore you have to complete. Once it’s done, it’s done until next week.

Then there are the room-by-room people. These are the ones who tackle a whole room at a time: dust, vacuum, wash, scrub, etc. This is also a great method; once you’re done with the room, you’re done!

Some people don’t do much daily cleaning at all. They prefer to set aside a day or two to deep clean. I’m sure deep cleaning means different things to different people, but I understand it to mostly be room-by-room… but you’re doing EVERYTHING in that room. Top to bottom, dusting ceiling fans, wiping baseboards… methodically working through rooms until everything is cleaned up or they run out of time/energy.

And then we have combo people: you tackle x chores every day, then do a few y chores from a list. This way you’re staying on top of maintenance cleaning but also moving through a list of bigger jobs or just seasonal tasks. If you’ve heard of FlyLady, this is pretty much what I think of as her method of cleaning. She tackles daily tasks but adds in zone cleaning as well. I know a lot of people who love this method and highly recommend it!

Finally, we have me. I’m calling myself an ADHD cleaner. I have found that I’m very easily overwhelmed by cleaning (something I really don’t enjoy doing). If there’s a long list? I probably won’t do it. If there’s a whole room? Nope, I can’t do all of that… it’s too much. So how do I stay on top of it? Divide & conquer. More on this soon.

Keep it Simple

Whatever type of cleaner you are, keep it simple. Just one room, just one task (like dusting the whole house), just a short list of things. Unless you absolutely love cleaning, you probably won’t want to do it if it feels overwhelming.

I choose to keep it simple by only having three or four items on my to-do list each day. The tasks I choose for a day depend heavily on how much free time I’ll have, who will be home with me, and how high priority my tasks are. As soon as things on my to-do list aren’t getting done, I know I need to reevaluate.

Time Yourself

Do you ever find yourself putting off a household chore, a cleaning task, or an errand because of how long it will take? If you’re nodding, you may be like me in that you really don’t know how long things take you to do. One thing I always put off doing is going through the house on Sundays (garbage day is Monday) and collecting the trash from the small bins in the bathrooms. Guys… it takes me less than 5 minutes to do this. We have three bathrooms on two floors, and it’s honestly a very quick chore to get done. When I remind myself of that, I’m way more likely to just get up and go do it. Because then it’s done! I can check it off the list. So next time you have a chore that you’re always putting off, set a timer and see how long it really takes you. You may be surprised at how little of your time it takes up and find the motivation to just get it done and out of the way.

I hope these 5 tips are helpful for some of you! Something else I thought I’d share is something that I want to improve on with housework:

Deep Cleaning

Guys, I hate cleaning. I mean, not as much as I used to, but it’s still not something I look forward to doing. Getting into a cleaning routine has been wonderful for my maintenance cleaning. But I still have those things I should probably be cleaning once a month or once/twice a year. The last couple of years, I’ve done fall and spring cleaning. And it’s a LOT. I usually start out strong and fizzle out over the course of it.

So now I’ve gone so far as to break it down even more… my current plan is to tackle the downstairs (the main living space) in my Fall Cleaning & Spring Cleaning and then go through our bedrooms and upstairs bathrooms in winter & summer. Stay tuned to see how that works out for me. When do you do deep cleans? Do you schedule them or just get the urge to do them?