By Ann Springer

My husband and I are both highly competitive by nature so it’s no surprise our children have inherited that same love of friendly rivalry. We’ve decided that regular board game battles are a great outlet at our house. Subsequently we have a large assortment of games which require a smart storage system.

First, we try to place games with lots of small pieces, like Clue or Monopoly, on high shelves. I figure if the game requires adult supervision to play then I think it should require adult supervision to reach the game. Other games such as Boggle and Jenga are kept at a lower level so the kids can easily play a game when they’re looking for an alternative to watching TV.

We also keep a ziplock bag filled with notepads, pens and extra dice in close contact. It seems like it’s always a scramble to locate enough pens and paper for everyone when we’re trying to get game night rolling. Who wants to write down their answers for Scattergories with a broken orange crayon from under the couch? It really doesn’t give you the competitive edge you’re striving for. That’s for sure.

We also keep a basket on a top shelf to temporary give random pieces that get misplaced a home. These are the fun little gems your feet magnetically locate in your home when you get up in the middle of the night with a sick child. When we open up a board game and notice we’ve got a missing piece we always check the mystery basket first to see if that thimble from Monopoly or those extra little pink and blue stick figures from Life are waiting to be retrieved.

Granted, it’s better to not lose the pieces in the first place. So, we try to use as many Ziplock re-sealable baggies to keep our game pieces gathered. No matter how careful you are a game piece will be dropped and roll under the couch, or a child will drop one game while trying to get another down. When these mix-ups happen you’ll find yourself on all fours trying to determine which marble-like pieces go with Mancala and which belong with the Chinese Checkers. It’s bound to happen, so do what you can to minimize the potential mess.

By Ann Springer

People frequently ask me what products I recommend they purchase to get organized. I think it’s a common misconception that getting organized costs a lot of money. In reality, I think you need a few great, inexpensive products and the motivation to work hard to complete the task.

Below are a few items that can help convert any cluttered and messy room into an organized and deliberately, designed retreat. To begin, you can remove the excuse of a lack of funds from your list of reasons why you haven’t started organizing. All of these items combined total less than $100.

1. Shelving. You can find beautiful and functional floating shelves at any hardware store these days. Shelving frees up space in a room and adds interest on a bare wall. You can use baskets to store away items on the shelving and then intersperse show pieces (candles and small frames photos) amongst the baskets. Closets and garages will double or triple in storage capacity once shelving is installed. Standard shelving can be used in these areas to save money.
2. Baskets. Beautiful baskets in natural textures bring the outdoors in and warm up a room. They also provide a space for storing small items that would otherwise clutter up and overwhelm an area. In the bathroom you could use it to keep beauty products together or hair accessories for young girls. Baskets can be used in an office area to gather papers or supplies. The possibilities are endless. Nice boxes, or attractive plastic bins, can also be used if baskets aren’t your thing or if you’re working in a kid space.
3. Label makers. I love my label maker and feel like no organizational project is complete unless you can find the stuff after you’ve organized it. Attractive labels that actually stick to the storage bin they’re intended for can help you locate objects faster than forging around each bin individually.
4. A trash can. The secret weapon to winning the war against clutter is the trash can. You need it to get the renovation rolling and you need it to maintain minimalism. I can’t think of many rooms in a house that couldn’t benefit from a waste basket. Whether it’s the laundry room, office, a bathroom, or a kid’s room, all have a greater chance of staying orderly if you have a system for disposing of unwanted items.

By Ann Springer

Piles and piles of new recipes you’ve been wanting to try? Endless cookbooks but no place to store them? Do you have recipes scrolled out on 3 x 5 cards and others torn from the pages of a magazine? Most people have more recipes than they could ever cook in a lifetime, and the Internet has made cookbooks almost obsolete because they make recipes so easy to locate. However, everyone has their tried and true family favorites or recipes that have been passed down for generations that they cherish. The Web won’t replace these classics.

Your desire to try new recipes probably doesn’t match up with your hectic weekly routine and real-life plans. Once you compile them from all the nooks and crannies in the house in which you’ve stashed them, you may realize that you have more recipes than you could possible ever try. It also consumes greater energy to put your brain to use on a new recipe than to just whip up a meal you’ve made a million times.

Before you toss out all of your cookbooks or give up hope that you’ll ever try one of those new recipes that caught your eye, just remember that you need to get organized before you can be a culinary success.

I recommend you begin by streamlining the many recipes you love and compiling them into a three-ring binder. Decorative, fun binders make the final product look more like a cookbook. Or, you can design a cover and slide it in the front pocket. Photocopy each 3 x 5 card or magazine clip out onto a 8 ½ x 11 sheet of paper and slide them into protective covers to prevent spills. Use dividers to separate the recipes into categories: appetizers, salads, main dishes, desserts, etc.

Next, take your pile of recipes you’ve been wanting to take for a test spin and carefully sift through them so you are down to the best 25-30 you really want to create in your own kitchen. Place those on the inside from pocket of the binder. As you plan your menu each week, pull out the recipes and choose one recipe you’d like to sample. It’s probably only realistic to choose one day per week that you think you’ll have the time and the energy to devote to it. If you decide it’s a winner you can photocopy it and add it to your personalized cookbook.

While this initial step may take time it’s worth it to have all of your recipes in one place. You’ll never be hunting down Grandma’s Christmas Cookies again amidst the chaos of preparing for the holidays. Or trying to remember which cookbook has the chicken recipe your husband loves. It also makes it easy to make additional copies which make great gifts for friends and family. Imagine all the recipes you can compile over a 20 year period that you can then share with your children as they start their own homes. It will give them the comforts of home even if they’re miles away.

By Ann Springer

I’d never heard the term “mud room” until we had spent several years living in cold weather country. I’ve grown to appreciate the purpose of a mud room and I believe everyone should have one, even if it’s not actually used for mud.

If you’re unfamiliar with the concept of a mud room, it’s a room that typically sits at the entrance of a home where you remove your muddy boots, coats, and whatever else you feel is too wet or soiled to parade around in the rest of the house wearing. Sometimes you enter a mud room from a side door of a home or near the garage depending on the layout of the home. In rural parts of the country or in areas of extreme weather conditions, these rooms are necessities. In urban areas or those with favorable weather, mud rooms usually don’t exist, but creating a makeshift mud room may make your comings and goings smoother and more efficient.

Like most busy households, finding shoes, coats, backpacks and other needed essentials can be stressful, especially when the clock is ticking. Everything is spread out all over the house and you’re frantically searching for coats and homework as you rush out the door. Or maybe you’re on your hands and knees scanning the underbelly of your couch in search of a mate to your son’s shoe.

No mud room? Look for places in your home that are underutilized and could be easily transitioned into one. Even if you don’t have children, these spaces may be great places for setting down keys, cell phones, and purses. If you have a large enough space you can place a small bench under the coat rack. You can stash shoes and extra clothing items in baskets beneath the bench to utilize hidden storage spaces and keep more items close at hand.

Tight on space? For less than $30, I converted a short hallway area close to the garage into our mud room. I hung a decorative coat rack with drywall screws for extra stability on the wall. Each of my children is assigned a peg for their coat and backpack. We also have a basket of shoes just inside the garage so everyone has easy access to shoes so we can leave in a hurry. It’s also a great place to plunk your stuff down when you come through the door after a full day. My children used to throw their backpacks and coats on the floor wherever they landed on their way to their fridge for their after school snack.

Once you develop a system that meets your household needs, you’ll have a place for everything that is close to your main exit and entry point. Periodically you’ll have to maintain the area by removing excess gear and to re-hang the extra coats and sweaters. Keeping the stockpile of attire down to a minimum helps to keep the walkway functional, but decorative, too.

By Ann Springer

I saw a cartoon recently that was a sketch of a laundry room. It had three machines side by side. The first was labeled “washer.” The next “dryer.” And the final one was “folder.” If this were really the case, the laundry would practically do itself!

Unfortunately, laundry can be a never-ending, time-consuming process. Some families must do multiple loads each day to keep up. Who wants to be stuck inside doing laundry when you could be at the park soaking up the sun or gathered in front of a fire watching a movie together?

Most people would agree that it’s not so hard to start a load of laundry and then transfer it to the dryer. The toughest part is folding it all and putting it away. Many people get stuck in this stage and end up with a pile of clean clothes now wrinkled atop their bed. Then they “temporarily” place them on the floor or in a basket and it’s easy to mix up the clean clothes with the dirty ones.

I’m always looking for ways to do chores in less time and I’ve discovered a few ways to win the battle against the mounds of laundry my family produces. A big key was involving my kids more in the laundry process.

Here’s my three-step system.

1. Have the right tools. I have all of my cleaning products and soaps at my fingertips and I keep a trash bag handy for lint and all of the gems I pull out of my kids’ pockets. I also bought a three-bin laundry sorter that matches my laundry room and all items go into either darks, brights, or whites. Above the sorters is a pole with hangers so I can pull items directly out of the dryer and put them onto hangers to prevent wrinkles. It may be tempting to bring the laundry into the bedroom to watch TV and fold, but that typically takes more time because it adds an extra step. (It’s also easy to abandon it and forget about it.) Each time you touch the clothing you’re taking up more valuable time you could be doing something else.

2. No more excuses for socks on the floor. I’ve decked out each bedroom with its own laundry basket to get dirty clothes, towels, etc. in the basket and off the floor. These larger laundry baskets are sorted out once or twice a week into the laundry room sorter. (Even toddlers can help sorting laundry. Sorting laundry is also a handy punishment for kids who are caught leaving their dirty clothes on the floor even though the basket is in their room.)

3. Share the workload. The best purchase you’ll ever make to aid you in the laundry chore are small, stackable, cheap laundry baskets (only $1.99 each). I suggest writing the names of each member of the household with a Sharpie marker. Enlist the help of other family members to help with folding. Toddlers are great at matching socks. Once the laundry is folded, simply put their clean clothes in the baskets and then they put them away in their drawers. When they’re empty I stack them inside each other and set them in the laundry room.

By Ann Springer

Kids are known to be grazers. They’re always hungry, thirsty, or in need of a snack. You can find a toddler at your feet demanding a snack before you’ve even finished cleaning up from lunch. Or an older child who eats three bowls of cereal after devouring a delicious pancake breakfast. At that pace, your kitchen can pay the price for all of that food prep and so can your sanity if you spend all day donning an apron.

Unfortunately, most kids stake a claim on their independence long before they’re really able to work their way around a kitchen. They snack out of the pantry an hour before dinner will be served, or they eat the last slices of cheese you were going to serve atop your cheeseburgers. They are notorious for making food and then leaving ingredients out for hours. And most mothers have quit counting the number of plates that have been sacrificed as a result of a child trying to reach something out of his or her range.

Giving children independence can be confidence building when you set them up for a successful experience instead of just blindly handing over the reins. Here are some ways to help children accomplish simple tasks independently in the dining department:

1. Give them easy access. Place plastic, reusable plates, bowls, and cups in a bottom drawer dedicated just for kid-friendly dining wear. You can find lots of fun, brightly colored dishes that are dish-washer friendly. Replace them periodically as you see wear-and-tear. I try not to use disposable paper products to save the family budget and the environment, but they’re great to have on hand when the kids have friends over.

2. Give them a drawer or two. Filling up one bottom drawer in the fridge and one in the pantry with snacks that you deem as healthy will allow your kids to choose freely what they eat during snack time. Place a fruit bowl full of all of those wonderful seasonal fruits somewhere little hands can easily reach.

3. Give them a drink. Kids never drink enough water, so put a pitcher or a tap in the fridge for them to get to easily. Cold water is more refreshing, tastes better, and tends to be more appealing than regular tap water. It’s great when they can grab a drink for themselves so you don’t hear the repeated pleas crying out, “I need a drink!”

4. Give them a job. Toddlers can help clear the table or push in the chairs. Older children can help slice tomatoes or peel carrots. Everyone can play a role in the preparation and clean up of meals. You should view these as baby steps into teaching them how to cook. Every great chef has a team of people that help to create the feast. Empower your kids in the kitchen by giving them responsibilities they can handle.

5. Give them a list. I like to keep a magnetic dry erase board on my fridge displaying our menu for the week in hopes of eliminating the endless inquiry of, “What’s for dinner, Mom?” It also seems to help cure everyone of the response that usually follows, “I don’t like that. Can I have something else?” Clearly showing the expectation really helps to dispel the whining. I also try to include them in meal planning to help them feel excited about what’s served on their plates.

By Ann Springer

Do you have the mini-van that has empty juice boxes and Cheerios that fall out when you open the door to drop your kids off at school? Or maybe your SUV looks more like a sporting good store than a four-wheel-drive vehicle?

Your car takes a beating because of spills and snacking. As the kids get older, the damage is also caused by soccer cleats making muddy imprints on the leather seats or by science projects that get knocked over in route. Many families spend just as much time in the car shuffling around from one activity to the next than they do gathered around the dinner table.

You are not alone in the quest to have a respectable-looking family vehicle. Here are some steps every family should take in facing this never-ending battle for keeping car clutter under control.

1. Cart in out. All of that extra stuff that gets lugged around from one activity of the day to the next should be removed each time you return home. For example, sweaters, coats, backpacks, sports gear, books, etc. put back in its appropriate spot. Many times trash gets dumped on the floor of the car and left behind. Keeping a trash bag in the garage makes for an easy reminder to all family members to put trash where it belongs.

2. Tote it around. The family vehicle must carry some essential items for road-trip happiness. If you spend a lot of time in the car, it’s like a second home. Take advantage of behind-the-seat organizers or other storage systems in the back of the vehicle or trunk for toys, books, and other supplies. Stash school supplies and snacks for school-aged children to get a head start on homework if you’re out running errands or you find yourself in between after-school activities.

3. Stash it in small spaces. Every car has a glove compartment and other built in storage areas. Utilize these well by stocking them with items such as a notepad, pen, tire gauge, baby wipes, and paper napkins or tissues. I also keep a small makeup bag with lipstick, Tylenol, and other essentials at my fingertips.

4. Be ready to tough it out. In the case of an accident or other problem you encounter on the road you should be prepared with supplies in your trunk. I suggest keeping a blanket, maps, water, snacks, flares, flashlight, help sign, first-aid kit, and plastic bags. Many of these items come in handy when you make a spontaneous outing to the park or when you’re in car longer than you expected.

5. Put everyone to work. There’s no better way to motivate the team to keep the car clean than to have them lend a hand in wiping off their own fingerprints or vacuuming up their own spilled snacks. Make it a habit to do a quick cleanup every time to fill up your tank. It’s a good chance to collect any trash and shake out the floor mats.

By Ann Springer

If your garage is well organized, the rest of your home will be, too. Ideally, plastic Easter eggs would end up in a labeled box tucked away on a shelf in the garage instead of being shoved betwixt vases and plant food underneath the kitchen sink.

In most homes this is typically not the case. Instead of storing coats and shoes in an entryway coat closet, people will store boxes of Christmas decorations there. The excuse? There’s no room in the garage. Where are the coats and shoes? On the floor or hanging over a chair. What about the garage? It’s full to the brim with mystery boxes and items no one has touched in years because it’s a space where everyone piles items.

Instead of running in fear, it’s time to administer a little CPR to the garage and get the blood circulating once again throughout the house.

Here are a few tips to organizing a garage:

Set a date. Commit to a date when you will spend the day clearing out every item in the garage. Give yourself a nice reward when you’re done like going out to dinner (you’ll likely be exhausted, so go ahead and splurge by relaxing when you’re done).

De-clutter. Open the mystery boxes, inspect the tools for rust, and put every single item into one of four piles: 1) keep it 2) give it away 3) sell it or 4) throw it away. The more realistic you are about what you need to part with, the more you can really make headway on your garage being used for its true purpose.

Designate zones. Grouping your items you’d like to keep into zones can help you know where to put it back. Common garage zones include areas for the cars, sporting goods, lawn and garden items, holiday items, and tools. Use large plastic bins and a label maker to keep like items together and then you can easily access all of your items as needed. Be sure to label the large bins on at least two sides so you can see it no matter how you stack it.

Use every inch. A garage is intended primarily to be the home for family vehicles. It is possible to park a car or two inside the garage and store a few items as well. Consider installing overhead storage bins, wall shelving, bike storage systems, and hooks in your garage to use every inch of available storage space. There are a ton of great options out there for maximizing storage space. Check out stores from Target to Home Depot to say good-bye to the chaos and hello to an orderly storage space. Low on cash? Use the money from your garage sale to pay for the new storage systems.

Maintain the order. Once you’ve spent the time and invested your energy to tidy up the garage, don’t let it become a dumping ground again. It’s easy to let it go since guests don’t see it but don’t let that be an excuse for not returning items to their proper place. Remember the garage is the heart of the home, so if you let it clog up you’ll eventually have a heart attack. Sweep the floor, replace misplaced items to their proper place, and sift through boxes looking for items to giveaway that you no longer need or use. Plan on maintaining your garage at least quarterly and look for items to donate or sell that you no longer need or use.

Make it look roomy. Some people prefer to use their garage as an extra room to hang out or as extension of their yard for outdoor parties. You may want to consider painting the walls or putting an epoxy coating on the floor for easy cleanups.

By Ann Springer

I doubt there is a person on the planet who enjoys being disorganized. It’s frustrating to misplace an important document or to pay late fees for bills that get tucked away and forgotten or to lose or damage a valuable item because it wasn’t stored properly.

Here are some tips for getting organized.

1. See your organizational fantasy. Imagine what your ideal bedroom, home office, or garage would look like if it were perfectly organized. How would you feel? What would it look like? What would you see? What would you not see? Keep that mental image with you and jot down a few notes about your organizational fantasy to give you a goal to shoot for when you’re down to the nitty gritty and you need motivation.
2. Pick a room, any room. Instead of overwhelming yourself with room after room of clutter, pick one room that needs the most attention and start there.
3. Set aside time to sort. You may not have an entire day to devote to organizing a room, but you likely can skip your evening sitcom and allocate 30 minutes to organizing one drawer, sorting through one stack of papers, or sifting through a mystery box in the garage. You’d be surprised how much you can do in a short amount of time.
4. Sort items into five piles, boxes, or bags by action needed: 1) throw it away, 2) give it away 3) fix it, 4) goes into another room, 5) stays in the room.
5. Ask yourself questions to evaluate the items as you sort. Is it something I’ve used in the last 12 months? Do I really need it? Do I love it? Can I live without it? Is this item in my mental picture of my fantasy room? If you answer “no” to one or more of these questions you should seriously consider pitching the item.
6. Getting organized is only worth the effort if you can stay organized. A well-oiled machine works well because it’s continually maintained. Remember those lovely words that have stood the test of time, those words that your mother or grandmother repeated: “A place for everything and everything in its place.”

By Ann Springer

Whether it’s a desk tucked into a corner or any entire room devoted to being an office, nearly every American household considers having a home office space a priority. Keeping the office space clutter free can be a challenge, even in the supposedly paper-less world that we now live.

There are many ways office clutter can keep our workspace from actually working for us. It can appear that papers just appear out of thin air and accumulate faster than we can shred or file them. Office equipment can be bulky and take up lots of space. It’s also not very visually appealing and can be hard to blend into a room used for multiple purposes. Before you know it, you have an office that hardly has a room left for work to be accomplished.

First, you should start with a great desk. Evaluate the one you have and see if it works for you. Is it the right size? Is your chair comfortable? Does it have adequate storage space, if used properly? Is it large enough to store your computer, daily supplies, and still have room to spread out a project?

Once you’ve cleared off your desk you can put daily use objects back on the desk or where they’re in close reach. Pens, notepads, staplers, business cards, etc. should make the cut to adorn a desk while other items like stamps, notecards, and extra supplies can be tucked away and out of sight.

Next, look at your storage solutions and evaluate their effectiveness. Look at your bookcase, filing cabinet, or other furniture you use near your desk. Are they really working for your needs? Maybe your furniture was great for you in college, but now that you’re managing a larger household you need a better solution. You have to start with the right equipment in order to be successful. You wouldn’t try to bake a cake on the stovetop. Close isn’t good enough. You need solutions that will work or you’ll be right back to where you started from – a disorganized office that is nonfunctional.

Once you’ve got all the right tools in place you should make a list of what you use your office area for. Most people use a home office space to pay bills, work on the computer, help kids with homework, work on craft projects, organize photos, work on a hobby, store important documents, and work from home on occasion. Numerically order which needs your office space should most fill. This may be different than how it is currently being utilized.

Now that you have a priority system in order you should evaluate how you will utilize your storage space. You should divide your storage areas into zones: bill paying, crafts, kids stuff, etc. This is where your priority list comes in handy to know which areas you need to accommodate and which are most important.

If you own lots of craft project supplies you’d like to store in your office, consider putting large baskets, clearly labeled on a bookcase or in a closet, so you can access them easily but they aren’t in plain view. Or maybe you have cases and cases of CDs filled with saved photos. Make sure you keep them all labeled and stored in dust-free places so they won’t be damaged.

If you don’t own a label maker you should consider buying one. An organized office is only as good as its filing system. If baskets, file folders, and drawers aren’t properly labeled, then items can easily be misfiled in the wrong spots. This is especially important in families where multiple hands may be looking for items and returning them.

Excess office supplies like copier paper and envelopes can overwhelm an office space. If these supplies aren’t assigned a spot in the office, you may also make the mistake of buying multiples of the same item just because you couldn’t find the original one. This leads to excess items to store and wasted money.

The last and most important step to having an organized, de-cluttered office space is to put things away as you use them and that you stay on top of the paper piles. You may have to hold other family members accountable in this regard as well. If they’re old enough to use the office, they’re old enough to help keep it tidy. Just as lawns need to cut and dishes need to be done, office spaces aren’t self-cleaning and they do require regular maintenance. If you’re hitting gridlock again you may need to reevaluate your system and adjust accordingly. If you have the right system in place keeping it clean should be simple.