Have you grabbed the book?? For the cost of a cup of premium coffee you can enjoy reading and learning how you can declutter your entire home and start enjoying life in simplicity.
I hope you have been busy decluttering your kitchen. It only takes a few minutes each day or a couple hours on the weekend to get to a life of simplicity. This week we will be focusing on the dining room.
Remember that no amount of decluttering will ever stick, if you don’t change your HABITS of how you go about in life. If you are in the habit of putting things wherever you want to…then your home will soon become cluttered again within a matter of weeks. I am trying to get you to focus on HABITS so that your decluttering will actually STICK in your life.
For most of you, the dining room table is probably a catch all for papers and objects that you bring into the home. It is easy to be in a habit of setting things down when you first come home and the table is a convenient place to do that.
To declutter this area, start by taking things off your table and put them where they belong. If you have old mail, throw it away. Office paperwork, put in the office. Children’s paperwork, give them a spot to hang a few papers up and the rest goes into the trash—probably when they are not looking. Don’t put miscellaneous things into the junk drawer. Remember you NO LONGER have a junk drawer, put it where it goes!!!
Use your table for eating on. If you use it for projects like school, crafts, or sewing as soon as you are done, clean up and put everything away right then and there. Do not leave it for a later time. That time may never come and then you are left with a cluttered table.
We need to get into a habit of NOT setting things down wherever we want when we first get home. Bring in all bags, papers, and things and put them away immediately. It only take a few extra minutes to do that, but it completely gets rid of clutter that is left lying around.
Remember the saying “a place for everything and everything in its place?” It is a classic because it WORKS.
Have a place to store your keys, purse, or other items that you need to walk out the door with. Some choose to put these near the door so that they can grab everything when leaving out the door. Have a spot that you put them in EVERY TIME. If you put them there every time you will never have need to search for them when pressed to get out the door.
If you bring in paperwork such as mail when coming home, have a place for them like a drawer or basket that is out of sight. If you see junk mail in your pile, immediately throw it away without looking at it. Don’t just set it down on your clean tabletop.
Make this a habit that sticks. Each time you come home, put your keys, purse, and other items in the SAME place. Put away your mail and other paperwork immediately. Do this over and over each day to help it form part of your regular habits.
If you find that you are still putting your items on your clutter free tabletop find out why. Sometimes when I organize an area, I find that it still gets messed up and I realize that I need to change the way I organized it or find a new home for things. If it continually gets messy then I need to find a NEW place for the items. If you still put your purse and keys on the table, find a new spot for them. Maybe a more convenient area to store them in.
If you keep up on these steps they will eventually form habits in your life and you will be able to enjoy clutter free tabletops.
Here is our table. It almost always looks like this unless someone is eating on it or doing schoolwork. Immediately after meals, I have children clear the table and put away water bottles and we wipe it off. When school is completed I have one child pick up all papers and throw them away while the other grabs any type of writing utensils–crayons, pencils, etc. They have to search under the table as well. This keeps our tables clear always. I don’t dare leave my purse or keys on this table or I am opening up the door for curious toddlers to go through it!! I don’t normally have anything in the center, but this was a gift from a neighbor for Christmas. As soon as the pine needles fell, I threw it away to avoid more work in cleaning.
If you bought the book, there is one more step for this room. We will skip that and go onto the next room…living room.
Keep working on decluttering your home. Remember you just need to START somewhere and then EVENTUALLY you will get there. It takes time, but in a few months you will be able to look back and SEE how far you have come instead of looking at the present and seeing how far you have to GO. Be blessed.
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