Organize Archives

Paperless organizing; Going digital

January 10, 2022 by Heather Filed Under: Digital Organizing, Organize, Paper management, Systems & Techniques, Tips & Resources, Uncategorized 1 Comment

Are you digital with some, or all of your “paperwork”? Get started with paperless organizing; going digital might help you cut down on paper clutter. For example, some people try to be totally digital and do almost everything on their computer, phone etc. Others are totally uncomfortable and will never go paperless. Most of us fall somewhere in between.

Ready to go digital?

You might still be a little tentative, that’s okay. Dip your toes in the water and acclimate as you go.

8 Questions to assess if your ready to go paperless (less paper)

Answer these questions to learn how comfortable you are with technology. Keep track of how many of the following you answer yes to.

I read books on my kindle or another electronic reader.
More of my shopping is done online than in stores.
I access account like my banks, utilities and others I use frequently.
Paperwork is piling up everywhere!
My calendar is digital (on my phone, computer or both).
I check my emails regularly (more than once a day).
I’m on social media like Facebook, Twitter etc.
I read blogs or other media online to stay informed and connected.

Digital Novice or Paperless Pro? Where do you fall in the Tech Savvy Spectrum?

If you answered yes to 3-5 of these then you are definitely ready to go digital, at least partially!

The most frequent concern I hear is the issue of security. Your personal information could be stolen via many online sources. Assessing your adversity to risk will help you determine which accounts you are more comfortable with going digital. Large financial institutions and municipal utility companies have comprehensive systems in place to protect your identity, but nothing is fullproof! The great thing about going digital is that if you do encounter a problem with your account security, you will be able to respond to it more quickly. Which’s often the best defense!

Where to start? Based on your answers to the questions above, pick one or two areas to add to your “digital” workspace.

Getting started with digital organizing:

Go to the business website, create an online account and save your username and password in a secure location.
Go through a “tutorial” or just click around until you are familiar with the basic layout of the pages. Look for “tabs” or hyperlinks that will help you navigate the different menus and tools.
Find your profile and settings. Often they are near one another and settings sometimes look like a little gear wheel. Check your personal information in your profile to be sure it’s all correct.
“Go paperless”-this is usually under settings and you can choose all or nothing depending on the company.
Check your email and “verify” your account (sometimes you must do this before you can even log in and navigate around).
Check your account regularly and download statements or pay bills online. In some cases you can set up a bank account to do this, in other cases (financial institutions) you can link utilities and other bills to be paid to your checking or savings accounts.

Site specific resources are usually available for setting up varius online accounts, such as tutorials or videos. In general, most banks, financial firms, utilities and phone companies have probably sent you “go paperless” inserts in your snail mail. If you have one of those handy, that’s a great place to start! This simple guide to paperless organizing will help you to determine if your ready to go digital. Try setting up a digital account or two to reduce the paper clutter in your home or office. Once you’ve transformed your paper clutter to digital, keep you digital files organized with my helpful guide to creating a digital file structure.

Healthy Cleaning Tips: Greener ways to Clean

January 6, 2022 by Heather Filed Under: Health, Inspiration & Education, Organize, Tips & Resources, Uncategorized 1 Comment

The beginning of a new year is the perfect time to de-clutter, organize your closets and create a clean and fresh start in our homes. The following healthy cleaning tips are meant to help you understand what your putting into your homes and bodies.

There are so many cleaners and cleaning products on the market but do you really know what’s in them?

With the recent focus on sanitizing since Covid, it’s important to understand how to make cleaning choices that will keep our homes and bodies healthy.

How healthy are the cleaners that you use?

Non-toxic, more healthy cleaning should be part of your everyday home cleaning routine – and especially if you have small children. The benefits of these healhty greener cleaners include; fewer toxins and chemicals being absorbed into the skin, less damaging to the environment and better air quality in your home and they are less expensive in some cases (DIY cleansers!). If you want to better understand the toxic chemicals to look out for in your cleaners, check out my previous wellness post on the subject.

GreenWorks Multi-Purpose Cleanser is a great cleanser to use for virtually any room in your house. It can be used for a variety of different tasks and is safe for your home and your children. Not only is it made with 97% organic materials, but it also works on those stubborn stains or hard to handle messes.

Method is another cleaner that has the environmental seal of approval. The method product line comes in a variety of different cleaners including hand soap, dish soap, laundry detergent, bathroom cleaners, all-purpose cleaners and even a body wash for men and women! They come in a variety of scents and uses all biodegradable materials. They’ve thought of everything!

Mrs. Myers is a wholesome midwest cleaning brand started by Mrs. Thema A. Meyer. She created Mrs. Meyers because of her penchant for keeping things neat and tidy and the scents were inspired by her garden. Her line of cleaning products which range from hand soap, body soap, laundry detergent and air fresheners are all made with natural scents like mint, basil, and lavender. If you want your home smelling like a bouquet of roses this Spring, you better get cleaning with Mrs. Meyers!

For those who want to know EVERYTHING that is in their cleaners, DIY is the way to go! Many homemade cleaners are made with ingredients you probably already have around your home. Vinegar, essential oils, baking soda, olive oil, and water are the key players in most of your homemade cleaners.

Bathroom

Vinegar is a key ingredient to getting rid of bathroom dirt and grime! For tough toilet stains, add ½ baking soda along with a few drops of essential oils into your toilet bowl when you’re ready to tackle the toilet add ¼ cup of vinegar and scrub away the mess as it works its magic.

A spritz of pure vinegar can be used in your shower and sink on soap scum and hard water residue. Add it to a spray bottle and spritz it on, letting the vinegar soak for 20-30 minutes before wiping off. If that doesn’t work, add baking soda to the mix and try again in 15 minutes.

Kitchen

Most kitchen surfaces can also be treated with vinegar, but if your surfaces are made from marble, granite or stone stay away from the high acidity and use vodka or rubbing alcohol instead- which both have anti-viral properties. Mixing equal parts water and vinegar/alcahol will make a very effective multi-purpose cleaner that can be used on most surfaces including countertops, floors, and walls. Add your favorite essential oils to increase the anti-viral (think tea tree, thyme, lavendar or citrus sents) properties and make your home smell wonderful!

More healthy cleaning tips

To tackle greasy frying pans just add salt – and give it a good scrub! If you need to clean a cast iron pan add olive oil and a teaspoon of course salt and rinse well with water. The best way to sanitize surfaces is with a lemon, simply cut it in half and run it over the surface you would like to disinfect.

Having the right ingredients is only half of the job, having the right cleaning tool is the other half. Sponges that have a harder edge are good for scrubbing stubborn pots and pans. Rags or microfibre clothes are excellent for disinfecting surfaces and the magic eraser is great for removing soap scum, scuff marks and any other war wounds your child puts into it!

Laundry

Click to view image and recipie larger

The laundry room is where most people run into trouble with the homemade detergents because if you throw a cup of vinegar in with your clothes, they wouldn’t come out smelling very nice. Laundry detergent is a bit tougher to make, only in the sense that you have to add more ingredients. Combine bar soap (chopped and processed), baking soda, essential oils, vinegar and washing soda and you will have created a very effective and pleasant-smelling laundry detergent.

Instead of using dryer sheets that lose their scent after one use, try using laundry ‘scenters’ that will stay fresh for up to 30 loads of laundry, or more! Add your favorite herbs or loose tea to a sachet (one that has holes that the herbs can aerate is best). For more laundry organizing and cleaning tips, check out this post.

Floors

Every room in your house has one and floors can be tricky to keep clean. Anyone with hardwood floors can keep it simple by washing (or steam cleaning) with warm water, just be sure not to over soak your mop when washing the floors.

Click to view image and recipie larger

If your floors still aren’t looking as clean as they should, add a bit of dish soap in to bring out the dirt and let those floors shine.

Laminate floors are very delicate and steam mops shouldn’t be used on them. When cleaning a laminate floor clean with a light mop and spray the cleaner onto the mop, not directly onto the floor. Using a mixture of three parts water, one part vinegar and a squirt of dish soap should do the trick.

Most other floors are easy enough to care for and don’t require any special precautions. A typical all-purpose floor cleaner is a cup of water, ½ cup of vinegar and a tbsp of vegetable oil to bring out the floors natural glow.

There are hundreds of different homemade cleaner recipes out there, all have different purposes and work differently for all homeowners and their grime, but the one thing we can all agree on is that they are made from natural ingredients and have a positive impact on your home and the environment. If you have any recipes you’d like to share, please leave them in the comments below!

Fuzzy Goals-Smarter than SMART?

December 9, 2021 by Heather Filed Under: Art & Design, Home, Inspiration & Education, Organize, Wellness & Mindset Leave a Comment

Recently, I learned about Fuzzy Goals!

I have been so accustomed to SMART Goals I had never heard of this contrasting term.

But, I liked the sound of it enough to do a little research. I think of Fuzzy goals as a spectrum.

Fuzzy Goals: A different strategy for goal setting

At one end there is a quantifiable goal (such as a SMART Goal) and at the other end, there is something vague you might wish for but have no idea how to achieve. At this end of the spectrum, there might be an emotional or intuitive feeling that motivates you to act in a certain way and gives you a sense of purpose.

They land somewhere on the spectrum I describe above and you can work through them using the following tips.
They align with your sense of passion or purpose, giving you an emotionally compelling feeling that motivates you.

Fuzzy Goals consist of several elements

They are sensory, they elicit a visual or imaginary reaction that gives you something concrete to recreate.

You can enact these sensory components by drawing, mapping, or collaging your ideas, dictating them into a voice recorder, singing them, writing them in poetry, whatever creative sensory expression that helps you get your ideas flowing.

They can change due to their nature of being fuzzy- they may shapeshift or morph from what your original vision was into something slightly different, and that’s okay!

Think of fuzzy goals as progress over perfection. Perhaps what is perfect is not what you originally envisioned and that the outcome might be even better than what you could imagine.

This might be just the right thing to explore if you’re struggling with goals, now or in the future.

I love the creative, flexible, forgiving nature of fuzzy goals. Sometimes you just can’t force clarity and there is no sense in trying to, but that does not mean you have to remain stuck or paralyzed.

Please let me know what you think of using Fuzzy goals for planning your future!

7 Simple Steps to Tidy Your Kitchen

December 2, 2021 by Heather Filed Under: Organize, Organizing Projects, Systems & Techniques

Start the holidays with a Tidy & Clean Kitchen!

This time of year is great to deep clean the kitchen and fridge. Especially after summer and fall trips to the farmers market and before all your holiday cooking, baking, and entertaining. This year, it’s especially important to keep our homes and kitchens cleaner than ever! Any time is a good time to take a deep dive to tidy your kitchen. I recommend it at least a couple of times a year.

7 easy steps to your most Tidy Kitchen

Re-arrange as needed for things that might not be working well in their current spots-I just moved appliance I don’t need further out of the way and made baking items more accessible over the weekend.
Purge– including out of date food (toss), things you don’t like (give away) things like plastic cups, containers-missing lids (recycle), and cozies that somehow made their way home from summer festivities. No thank you Freebies!
Tidy and sort food and other items by category. Add containers to corral and labels to identify items as needed. Post purge is the best time to do this!

7 easy steps to your most Clean Kitchen

Give everything a sanitizing wipe down including the cabinets, switch plates, counters-moving everything out from the walls, and wiping the backsplash.
Clean out appliances such as the microwave, oven, toaster and make note of anything broken or missing that I might want to add to a wish list.Take a quick look through the pantry and make a list of staple items needed for upcoming baking and cooking (sugar, flour, chocolate chips, spices, herbs, etc), this way you can be spontaneous when the urge to get creative in the kitchen strikes!

Finally, the Fridge! Remove and wipe everything including contents, the shelves, and drawers. Toss expired food (see gide below). If you can, remove “parts”, clean and scrub the crevices with an old toothbrush and baking soda. Repeat the process for the freezer, defrosting according to your manufacturer instructions if needed. If you have a water filter built in, it’s a great time to check and replace that too.

Break each step down over a weekend or a whole week (7 steps-7 days!) depending on the time you have. As you pull things out, use up leftovers (especially in the freezer) to make room for all the great food you’ll prepare and eat over the holidays.

If you ever question keeping or tossing, HERE is a great list of food expiration. Learn how to read these labels for safety and to prevent waste. Common sense should prevail. With a “toss it” mentality there are probably lots of things you-should-never-have-bought. These things can be donated if you hate to waste but know you won’t use it. Use your judgment, and follow your intuition…and FYI-Sugar never expires!

Happy pre-holiday cleaning!

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There SHOULD BE no judgment about organizing

November 4, 2021 by Heather Filed Under: Inspiration & Education, Organize, Tips & Resources, Wellness & Mindset Leave a Comment

There should be no judgment about organizing. Unfortunately, there are a lot of very distinct ideas and stigmas about what it means to be organized. When I tell people I’m an organizer it prompts many conversation and comments like, “I’m totally organized, I love to organize, it’s in my nature” or “I NEED YOU”, or “really, you like peoples closets?” Yes, to all of that. Then there are those who shy away from saying anything. Their quiet hesitance leads me to think they feel less than organized or feel others might judge them (or maybe the subject just BORES them:).

It makes me sad when people feel ashamed about being or not being organized; there should be no judgment about organizing.

A space like the one above might make us feel ashamed but sometimes, this happens and it’s okay!

When I start working with someone new, I asess their organizing style and needs through both conversations and a tour of their spaces. An asessment includes alot of questions about how we learn our organizing habits and how we feel about being organized (or not). I never want someone to feel they are being judged for how they organize their life!

Wouldn’t you hate someone coming into your home and telling you that how you’re doing something is WRONG?

I work with many clients who are chronically disorganized. It’s a real thing, and it’s not a judgment. There’s a non-profit dedicated to better understand how different people think about organizing! ICD does a great job of dispelling myths about disorganization through both education and research.

How did you learn to organize? Did someone teach you and if so, how (through words or actions)? Most of the time, we pick up habits around organzing and they are neither intentional or necessarily the best way for us to organize. That’s exactly why we need to go easy on ourselves, and others when it comes to how we organize.

There is no RIGHT or WRONG, there are just differences! There should be no judgment. I feel nothing but compassion for anyone who wants to learn new organizing skills. This can be through a combination of hands-on, one-on-one training with an organizer, reading books, watching video’s etc., it’s all good!

Your home or business doesn’t have to look like a magazine to be functionally organized for you! We all get messy, clothes pile up, kitchen counters get cluttered (my kitchen is tiny and this can’t be avoided) and tables and surfaces are rarely bare.

Being messy isn’t the same as being disorganized.

If you know where things go and are able to maintain, than organization isn’t too far away.

The example above is better. It migh not be perfect but it’s functional with room to breath, space to find things & work. It’s all about how you feel in the space.

Once you have successful systems in place, it’s not too difficult to keep things in order. If you’re looking for help in creating systems because what your doing is a good fit, or you don’t think you ever learned how to be organized… please send me an email and lets talk. Even if we don’t work together, you will learn something helpful and I promise, there will be no judgment about organizing, I promise.