Organizing and COVID-19

I do hope that you and yours are staying safe, healthy and practicing social distancing.

I wanted to write a newsletter about something relevant but didn’t want to send yet another newsletter about “The Virus”. I guess I just need to address it, like everyone else, so here goes BUT, as it relates to organizing.

I’m sure by now everyone is antsy, stressed out and wondering how and when will we go back to work and back to our normal lives. Will we go back to the way things were? If not, what will the changes look like, feel like, be like? I’m guessing handshaking will be a thing of the past but will we continue to wear masks and gloves? If so, for how long? There’s so many questions and nobody really has the answers yet. Hopefully it won’t be much longer before we all find out.

One thing I do know, is that no matter what happens there will always be things to organize. That will not change. Like Covid-19 (see how I manged to sneak that in?), organizing is something that is universal. Organizing is something that everyone will do at one point or another in their life for some reason or another. Organizing is something we do either because we want to or need to and we do so throughout our lives.

At this point in time, all over the world, people are looking for things to do to keep busy while we’re at home social distancing. A large percentage of articles that I’m reading now suggest some form of organization as part of the recommended “To Do” list both personally and professionally, while we have the time.

FYI, it’s also time for Spring Cleaning as well so you might as well do something, anything, to get organized or better organized as the case may be. Check that off your list!

So, I hope these basic rules of thumb will help you when you decide to organize whatever it is that you want to or need to get organized:

1.Before you start, make sure to have all of your supplies ready. Make sure to have a trash can nearby and a box for donations. While there are so many great organizing products on the market, I like to at least try to use items that I already have. For example, you can use a lazy-Susan to make it easier to reach items stored under the sink. Use baskets for larger items. Small boxes or tupperware containers are great for containing small things. Of course, bins are always a good option as well but, if you do need to buy them, make sure they’re clear so you can see the contents.

2.The first step is “always” to empty everything out completely. Yes, completely. Everything out! This is important as it allows you to see everything. It also provides the opportunity to wipe it down.

3.Now go through everything and purge! Toss out all true trash: anything that is ripped, soiled stained, expired, missing a piece. Of course, anything that you no longer need or use can be donated if it’s in good enough condition.

4.The next step is to sort everything into categories. Keep like items together. All lotions together, all hair products together, all grooming supplies together, paper clips, post-it notes. You get the idea.

5.Utilize your organizing supplies (bins, small boxes, baskets, etc.) to contain the items that are similar.

6.Let the fun begin: The fun part, at least for me, is putting everything back in an organized way. Make sure the things you use the most are accessible. The other, less used items, can go up higher or perhaps somewhere else. Things should be organized in a way that makes sense to you. Everyone has a different way so do what works for you.

7.Wherever possible, label the bins or other containers so that staying organized is easy for you and anyone else in the house. Most people use labels for words, however, consider using photos for the little ones so they can help maintain the systems you put in place.

For those of you who are do-it-yourselfers, I am offering virtual organizing consultations or sessions, if you are so inclined.

How To Organize Your Closet In A Few Easy Steps

Click on this link to watch a video that will demonstrate how to organize your closet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oojwOEk73wc

For those of you who’d rather read about it than watch the video, here’s some tips on how to organize your closet.

1. The first step is make sure that you have the right supplies on hand before you begin. You will need:

· Sturdy bags or boxes for donations;

· A full-length mirror so that you can try things on in the process to help you decide between what to donate and what keep;

· A basket for loose change, papers, rubber bands, hair clips, and other things that you might find in the process. You don’t want to have to stop to put away these small items so just put them aside for now and integrate them into their proper homes later.

2. You might also want to consider investing in:

· Over-the door organizers (check out Stock-It-Pockets below);

· Stackable shoe bins;

· Matching bins for accessories

· Drawer dividers; and

· Under-the-bed bins. (You can store some of the rarely worn or used items that were in your closet under your bed and free up some valuable space).

3. The next step is to empty the closet completely. Yes, completely. Everything out!’ It is best to have a clear, clean space to plan and visualize how you’re going to re-organize your closet.

4. Next, you need to decide what to keep and what to toss or donate. To help you decide, ask yourself these three questions: Do you love it?; Do you wear it? Does it fit?

· If the answer is YES to all 3 questions, then you can place those items into the pile of things to keep.

· If it doesn’t fit, put it directly into the donation pile along with other items that you no longer like or want.

· If you have haven’t worn something for more than 6 months, it is probably time to toss it, sell it or donate it.

5. The next step is to sort through everything and group like items together. For example, put all jackets together, all socks together, dresses with dresses, etc.

6. Now you’re ready to put everything back.

· The important thing to remember is that you should put things back in a way that makes sense to you, utilizes all of your available space and is easy to maintain. For example, you might want to reserve the front and middle of your closet for clothes you wear most often, making sure your work clothes are easily accessible. Lesser-worn items like formal dresses may be put towards the back of your closet, out-of-season clothes towards the back or on the upper shelves.

7. Make sure to get all donations out of the house, into your car and off to your local donation drop-off to avoid the temptation to change your mind. Go with your initial intuition.

8. Finally, I highly recommend completely re-organizing your closet either once a year or, you can break it into smaller pieces by organizing seasonally.

· If you choose to reorganize once a year, choose a date that you’ll remember and make a habit of sticking to it the same time each year.

· If you choose to do it by season, the first day of each season should make things easy to remember!

If you want or need assistance or another perspective about ways to organize your closet, give us a call. We’d LOVE to help!

How To Deal With Sentimental Clutter

We all struggle with sentimental clutter. However, if we’re being honest, objects are just objects and their value doesn’t magically change just because you have a history with them. Try to remember that the value you’re assigning the object comes from your memories, not the object.

Whether you’re having trouble letting go of old love letters from your high school sweetheart, your children’s artwork or struggling to let go of countless items following the death of a loved one, purging items that have sentimental value is extremely difficult.

Making decisions about emotionally charged objects is tricky. It may bring up emotions, good and bad, reminding you of happier times with family members or memories of those who have passed away.

Then, there are times when you’re forced to make decisions. For example, when you’re moving to a smaller home and have to downsize or if you have to sort through the belongings of a loved one who has passed away.

Whether you’re ready to purge or forced to make decisions,
striking the right balance between how much to keep and how much to let go of can also be difficult.

If you keep in mind that you can’t keep everything, then you’ll be able to part with items that are truly clutter and keep the ones that mean the most to you.

How do you decide what stays and what goes? Here are some ideas for how to keep sentimental items from getting out of control:

Keep the best and let go of the rest.
• Save heartfelt letters, not every card everyone ever sent you

Only keep items you want to display/use.
• Then…display/use them.

If you must have a keepsake chest, limit it to one box and only keep things that can fit inside that box.
• When your box is full, you’ll need to remove something when adding something new. DO NOT ADD ANOTHER BOX!

Be sure the keepsake chest/container is sturdy, pest and water resistant.
• Once you decide to keep an item, take the steps necessary to store it the right way. Do a little research to determine which containers to use to preserve the items. Please note that just storing items in plastic bins is not enough to keep things safe from the elements. All plastic bins are NOT equal.

Keep the memories and let the objects go.
• Photograph or take a video of the objects you want to remember but don’t want to keep. One digital photograph saved on your computer (and backed up in the cloud) is all you need.

Don’t feel obligated to keep something just because it was a gift.
• There’s no obligation to keep things you don’t like, don’t need and/or won’t use.

Avoid feeling guilty.
• It is your home and you have the right to make room for what matters to you most.

Share heirlooms with other family members.
• If you inherited something and no longer want it, ask your family members if they might want it.

When saving items for family members ask yourself these questions:
• Will they want this?
• Do they have room for it?
• Is the item valuable only to me?
The answers will help you decide to save or let go.

Repurpose a keepsake into something new if you’re crafty.
• For example: You can repurpose your children’s baby blankets into a quilt.

Keep one if there are multiples.
• If you know that you won’t use all the holiday wreaths your mother gave you, just pick one that you’ll display during the holidays.

Don’t keep anything you wouldn’t want anyone else to find.
• If something were to happen to you, your friends and family will eventually sort through your things. Don’t keep anything that you wouldn’t want them to see or that would cause them pain or embarrassment or damage their memories of you.

If you need help with this process, give us a call. We’d love to help!

Top 10 Times to Hire a Professional Organizer

“Organization isn’t about perfection; it’s about efficiency, reducing stress and clutter, saving time and money and improving your overall quality of life.” ~ Christina Scalise ~

If you are going through a major life transition that’s left your home in disarray, have a big move in your future or are simply overwhelmed by clutter, a Professional Organizer could provide the help you need.

Here are the 10 top reasons/times why people should consider hiring a Professional Organizer:

1.You Want to Get Organized But Don’t Have The Time:
· Decluttering and organizing, whether a single room or an entire house, are time-consuming.
· If and when you are able to devote time to your organizing project, it’s always better, quicker and more fun with help. It also helps to get another perspective.
· If “getting organized” has been on your to-do list for weeks, months or even years, consider whether it’s time to finally make it happen.
· A Professional Organizer can guide you through the process, handle the removal of unwanted items and put systems into place so that you can make the most of your space.

2.You’re Moving:
. Hiring a Professional Organizer to help before, during or after a move can be a lifesaver. Leading up to a move, an organizer can help declutter and organize your home and stage your home for sale which can, in turn, help you get more money for your home. A survey by Coldwell Banker Real Estate Corp. found that staged homes spent half the time on the market than non-staged homes and sold for more than 6% above asking price.
· Scaling back before moving also means less weight and less space in the moving truck, which results in a less costly move, something that can have a significant financial impact, especially if you’re moving long-distance.
· Finally, an organizer can help you unpack your belongings in your new home and set up systems so you’re organized from the get-go.
· We make sure that your new home is organized so that things are accessible, functional and look great too.

3.You’re Remodeling:
· Make the most of your new space by hiring a Professional Organizer to optimize every shelf, cupboard and drawer so that your new space functions as beautifully as it looks.
· As much as we’d like to believe that our gorgeous new kitchen will never have piles of clutter on the counters, the truth is that without a plan, we’ll just fall back on our old habits.
· An organizer can make sure your space is set up in a way that encourages order, so it’s easier to keep things organized, even months or years down the road.

4.You Work or Run a Business From Home:
· Whether you telecommute one day each week or run a business from home full time, staying organized can help you stay at the top of your game.
· Office workers waste an average of 40% of their workday. Not because they aren’t smart, but because they were never taught organizing skills to cope with the increasing workloads and demands, Wall Street Journal Report.
· A Professional Organizer can help you rein in a messy home office, organize files and paperwork and set up your space to best support your business.

5.You’re in a Major Life Transition:
· When big life changes are happening — health challenges, the death of a loved one, divorce, the arrival of a new baby, aging parents — the last thing you may want to focus on is organizing. Yet when you have other things going on that leave you without the physical or emotional energy to keep your home life running smoothly, that only adds to the stress and chaos.
· A Professional Organizer can help bring a sense of order to your home when you need it most. Here are just a few ways we can help in a trying time:
o Organize baby gear for new parents
o Help aging parents who need to downsize
o Help you sort and organize a deceased loved one’s belongings
o Get a fresh start and reclaim your space after a divorce

6.Your Papers Are a Complete Disaster:
· Are piles of unsorted papers the bane of your existence? Instead of putting off organizing them yet again, consider hiring a Professional Organizer to help you sort through them.
. Paperwork has been voted the biggest burden for small businesses.
· A Professional Organizer can help you figure out what needs to be kept and which documents can be safely discarded. We can then set up a filing system uniquely tailored to your needs and help you discern which paper management system works for you.

7.One Area Is Driving You Nuts:
· There might one area in your home that just feels disorganized. It could be the garage, attic or basement — or even a storage unit you’ve been renting for so long that you hardly remember what’s in it.
· Professional Organizers are not fazed by overstuffed spaces! We can help you tackle even the most daunting storage area and transform it into a functional space.

8.You Want to Make Everyday Tasks Easier:
· Proper organization can go a long way toward making everyday tasks and routines run more smoothly.
· If you want to eat more healthfully or cook more meals at home, a Professional Organizer can whip your fridge and pantry into shape, making it easier to find ingredients and prepare meals.
· We can also help create a neat laundry room, streamline cleaning supplies and set up routines and systems to make your household run more efficiently. You can then spend your time doing more of what you want to be doing and less time managing your stuff.

9.You Need Accountability:
· If you really want to get organized but you’re just not getting it done on your own, accountability could be the missing piece.
· The great thing about hiring a Professional Organizer is that this person can also act as an accountability partner. Simply knowing that someone will be checking up on your progress can be enough to spur you into action between visits.

10.You’re Totally Overwhelmed:
· If clutter is taking over your home and you just can’t take it anymore, a Professional Organizer can immediately begin to ease your burden.
· You don’t need to feel embarrassed by the state of your home. Most Professional Organizers really have seen it all. Further, as a Member of NAPO, the National Association of Professional Organizers, we abide by a code of conduct and ethics. We do not pass judgment. We’re there to help you.

Clutter: Hidden in Plain Sight

As you can imagine, my job requires me to be in other people’s homes on a daily basis.

Before starting work for the first time, we do a walk through so that my client can show me around, show me what’s bothering them and talk about what they want organized or “better” organized as the case may be.

What I find interesting is that I see things that they don’t even though to me, it’s obvious.

I think we all, myself included, get so used to our surroundings that we no longer see what others see when they walk into our homes or offices for the first time. Clutter is basically hidden in plain sight:

The books on the shelf can’t be seen or retrieved because there’s too many framed photos in front of them.
There are so many papers or mail on part of the kitchen counter that those living in the home no longer use that space for what it’s intended…LIKE a place to eat.
The shelves on top of the cabinets or bookshelves have decorative items that are there because it never occurred to anyone to change them (or, please forgive me … clean them).
The garage is full but nobody seems to care because it’s been that way for sooooo long and, isn’t that what the garage is for anyway?
The files are exploding in the filing cabinet so you just start putting files elsewhere because there’s no more room.

It usually isn’t until the walls are closing in or someone brings those things to our attention that we do something about it.

FYI, I am one of the most organized people I know (if I don’t say so myself) and it happens in my home too. Even though my home is extremely organized, once a year I have one of my assistants come to my house to assess and provide some suggestions as to how things might work or look better. Each and every year something is changed and the change is always for the better. For me, it makes a world of difference.

These are just a few of the many reasons why hiring a Professional Organizer is helpful. They see things with a fresh set of eyes, provide a new perspective and then implement those changes to maximize efficiency and productivity. Better yet, having someone else help you is much more fun and is so much quicker.

If you are feeling cramped in your space (any space), need an update (think filing system) or a do-over (think garage), give me a call and let’s talk about the many ways we can be of service!

We’re ready when you are.

Bins, Bins and More Bins

Bins, bins, and more bins. Seems like every time I speak to a prospective client one of the questions is inevitably going to be “How many bins should I get”. The next question is usually “Where should I get bins?”.

As a Professional Organizer you would think that I would love bins. For the most part I do and they do serve a purpose BUT, bins can also create more problems than their worth. Here are some explanations that I’m guessing most of you haven’t considered:

The downside:
• Bins typically become dumping grounds for all kinds of random items, even if the bin is properly labeled.
• Bins, especially large ones, are too cumbersome and usually wind up at the bottom of a heap of other bins and are not easily accessible.
• Bins that aren’t stackable create problems when dealing with limited space.
• People don’t understand the different types of bins and falsely believe that if something is contained in a bin, especially a plastic bin, then it must be protected (Note* See below for additional explanation). This can be problematic when someone discovers, after storing something valuable, that it was not protected as they had thought.

Obviously, there are many good reasons for having and using bins. Bins are one of many tools/supplies that people can use for organizing.

The upside:
• Bins can serve as great storage solutions.
• Bins can maximize your storage space (for example, under the bed storage bins).
• Bins, if you choose the right ones, can protect and preserve important items.
• Bins, if and when properly used, can help keep small items together and from getting out of control (ie, hair accessories, small office supplies like staples, paper clips, push pins, crafting supplies).

It is important to note that all bins are NOT created equal. Believe it or not there are many types of plastic bins. Just because you put something in a plastic bin does not mean that the contents will be protected. For example, if you want to protect memorabilia and you’re putting it in the garage, you may want to consider a bin that is “air-tight” or “water-tight” depending on what you intend to store. They cost more than a regular plastic bin but they protect the contents from moisture and critters.

Quick question: How many of you reading this even knew that air-tight or water-tight bins were an option?

Explanation: Airtight storage bins prevent items from water damage. Watertight storage bins work well in a moist basement or in a humid attic where items may become damp over time. These airtight storage bins have a foam strip in the lid which prevents moisture from getting in. The latching lids work to suction the lid onto the air tight container, to secure the lid to the top of the airtight storage bin. You can use airtight plastic containers for important files, clothes, family photos, collectibles or any item that you wish to preserve. You can also get extra piece of mind knowing that items in your basement or garage are being stored properly and protected from the elements.

As a rule of thumb, we usually suggest that people first use what they have before buying any more bins. In fact, that most people usually have whatever we need on hand (other than the air-tight/water-tight bins) and don’t even know it. We make use of many household items that serve as bins and work just as good. For example, we use the boxes that checks come in for office drawers to organize small items like pens or binder clips. We can use egg crates to store earrings, tupper-ware for small items that need to be contained. This list goes on.

So, next time you feel that you need to run out and buy a bin to help with an organizing project, remember to check first to see what you have on hand. If you determine that you might need a bin or two, think about out what you intend to use it for so that you get the right kind, size and color.

As always, if you are in need of any assistance with your organizing project, give us a call. We would LOVE to be of service!