Creatively Organized Spaces
No matter where you live, it’s practically impossible to ignore and vital to prepare for natural disasters! With the change in our climate, especially if you live along the coastlines, it pays to get organized, ‘Just in Case’ there’s a natural disaster!
Do you have a plan i, know your evacuation route, and have supplies ready?
Having missed traveling over the past year I’ve needed to hone my travel organizing skills with useful Travel Tips and Tools. Some things get easier when you do them more often and a little rusty when you get out of your routine. I’ve been on the road a lot with things opening back up, visiting friends and family, and traveling regularly for business (1 week a month), so I’m sharing a few of my favorite, tried, true, and new products, tips, and tools for day to day travels and longer trips.
For more ideas check out my Pinterest board Ideas for [Travel] and here are a couple of my new favorite travel pins…
I’m sure you have your own favorite travel tips and tools and hopefully, I’ve shared a few new things to consider for your next trip. What are your favorite Travel Tips and Tools?
Spring fever and the extra hour of daylight spur many of us onto spring cleaning, especially right now while we are spending more time at home! We are still in the height of Spring Cleaning frenzy so if you haven’t yet tackled the closets, there’s still plenty of time before the heat of the summer and seasonal vacations and kids summer breaks are upon us!
More than once, I’ve walked into clients who were nearly in tears or having a meltdown over their kid’s rooms and stuff everywhere. This can be utterly frustrating, especially with most of us at home, almost all the time right now, living, working, eating, schooling together! Kids and their stuff, their messy rooms, and their over-bulging closets and drawers filled with way more clothes than needed can create the perfect storm for overwhelm and overreacting. Sadly what can often happen is parents beat themselves up, thinking “this is my fault, I let them have all these things and I don’t have the time and energy to manage it all!” No, No, No, it’s not all your fault!
I’m thrilled to work with parents who want to model and teach their kids how to manage the stuff overload. This is not just a problem for parents and kids, it’s something we all are dealing with to some degree or another.
Today, we will tackle one category of stuff that tends to make a lot of work for all of us, our clothes! There are strategies for parents and kids to help make it easier to choose what to wear. A kids capsule wardrobe can help reduce decision fatigue, save money, and the time it takes to get ready in the morning.
Here’s a step by step plan which works best when you can involve your kids, even the little one’s can have a strong opinion about the process!
Start with clean laundry that’s been sorted, and purged in each kid’s room which will give you a wardrobe to “Shop” from. The process isn’t that different than any other organizing one, where donations, trash, and items to keep are sorted into categories. The main thing to do differently is to create a simple and easy kids wardrobe for them to look through and purge further. Count how many items in each category of clothing they have and established some guidelines for what seems reasonable for them to pick their favorites from.
Create a Kids Capsule Wardrobe in 5 easy steps:
1. Clean all the clothes and gather in one place.
2. Sort and eliminate any that are not in good shape, don’t fit, or are impractical.
3. Look at the overall colors, styles your kids gravitate towards, and start gathering them into categories eliminating duplicates and oddballs that don’t fit with the scheme.
4. Put clothes away, hanging, and folding. You might want to try the Kon-Marie method of folding (Tee-shirt video here) or use a folding board. Arranged by category (shirts, pants, shorts, etc) and color to make it easier to mix and match outfits.
To make this work you may need to fill in some pieces if you find wardrobe gaps. Now you have the makings for a funky, fun, and easy mix and match wardrobe system! This could be a great way to simplify your kid’s wardrobe and from there, the closet’s and clothes storage might be a little easier!
Here is a general idea of what categories you might find helpful and how many of each item seems appropriate, some of these might differ for your kids:
If your kids go to a private school or wear uniforms, that will be a separate category but manage the number of each style needed. They may also be very involved in sports and have a lot of gear, so count that as another category and keep the number of items per sport manageable.
These guidelines should help you create a basic and easy kids capsule wardrobe. These categories and quantities are a starting point for you and your kids if you think it’s still too much then whittle it down further. Less is more when it comes to maintaining an easy kids wardrobe, especially when kids grow quickly and tend to need things replaced more frequently than adults. Have fun and maybe this will inspire you to create a capsule wardrobe of your own!
This year, in particular, transitioning to or back to college might feel particularly overwhelming for both in-person and online classes. There is a lot that has changed over the past year but keeping organized is a strategy that will help improve study skills, lifestyle habits, and time management. These skills become more important the more we have at stake and college is a time where we are asked to juggle building new relationships, living independently or with new extended families, and building knowledge. Any of these on their own is a considerable undertaking, so approaching this transition should be undertaken with a good dose of strategy, support from people who care about you and want to see you succeed and a large heaping of self-care. If you’re feeling overwhelmed already, break it down into smaller manageable tasks and be mindful of your emotions! It’s a big change in the midst of an already crazy world, so don’t dismiss how you feel!
The intention of this post is to share some helpful strategies for getting and staying organized for both new and returning students. Some of you may have eagerly planned, shopped and packed over the summer and are settling in or getting ready to. There are still lots of folks preparing for the new school year, either in dorms or online. No matter where you are taking classes (in person, online), these Essential Organizing tips will help you get a handle on planning for and transitioning into this experience!
By now you should probably have the school year calendar and have a target date for the start of classes and moving to campus. The following categories as they relate to routines and schedules can help make this a more mindful transition for life schedules and productivity.
This is always a big part of school preparation. If you need to order equipment, uniforms, supplies, books, etc you may already be in the process of doing so. If your state (or the one the college is in) has a Tax Free Weekend (usually in August), plan accordingly so you can make major purchases over that weekend.
These are great resources to have on hand and will be helpful for a variety of uses in the dorm. I’ve created an Amazon Shopping list with suggested items here.
There are a ton of great resources and lists over on Pinterest, so I won’t recreate them but here are general packing categories. It’s best to wait on things like a mini-fridge, microwave, dishes (other than a cup/mug, plate and one set of silverware), Iron/Board (unless fashion is your thing!), vacuum (maybe a dustbuster and mini broom), TV and Printer. These are all things that others or the school will have. Besides, you might not need it at all or you can get them later.
This is a lot of info in one place! I hope these Off to College Essential Organizing Tips will help prepare for schedule and lifestyle changes, supplies, and shopping, and finally packing before this next adventure begins!
