Creatively Organized Spaces for Organizing & clutter clearing tips for simplified living

Flip out of that Back-to-School funk!

August 21, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Closets, Organize, Systems & Techniques, Tips & Resources 1 Comment

Does back to school have you in a funk?

For much of the country, school is already back in swing, and many are feeling overwhelmed. In this post, I hope to help Flip that Back-to-School funk. Last week, I shared some tips (here) for back-to-school scheduling.

This week, I’m tackling systems for homework stations, wardrobe organizing, and taming lunch/snack time stress. One suggestion all around is to involve your kids in at least part of each of these projects. You might prefer to just do it yourself and not have the hassle of the kids’ opinions and distractions, but honestly, when I work with kids, they love to be involved and tend to do a much better job of maintaining it. Most kids love order and organization!

Homework Stations

They don’t have to be fancy or complicated, but carving out a specific area where your kids know they go to do their homework is an important part of their school routine. Every child and household is different, so your system might differ, but the main components needed are pretty simple.

What’s most important is a distraction free zone with a surface, quality task lighting and a comfortable chair. Depending on the kids’ ages, this might be in a family room, off the kitchen, at the dining room table, or in their bedroom. It’s excellent to incorporate permanent and convenient storage for standard supplies: calculator, ruler, pencils, pens, erasers, notepaper, art supplies, books, and anything specific to your kid’s classes. A rolling cart and some bins may be a good solution if your kid’s homework space doubles as a family area. Kids will often find a lot of excuses to keep them from doing homework, beat them to the punch, and make them feel comfortable and supported for this essential daily task that will help them build lifelong skills!

Kids’ Wardrobe and closet systems

KIDS capsule wardrobe

Have you heard of a Capsule Wardrobe?

I hadn’t until I ran across this article. I love this idea, and I’ve naturally done this to some degree on my own (gravitate towards colors I love, etc). The full article is worth a read, but I’ll give you a quick 5-step summary:

1. Clean all the clothes and gather them 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 and style your kids gravitate towards, and start grouping them into categories, eliminating duplicates and oddballs that don’t fit with the scheme.

4. Put clothes away, hang them, and fold them. Try the Kon-Marie folding method (See the tee-shirt video here) or use a folding board. Arrange them by category (shirts, pants, shorts, etc.) and color to make it easier to mix and match outfits.

If you find wardrobe gaps, you may have to fill in some pieces to make this work. 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 kids’ wardrobe, and from there, the closets and clothes storage might be a little easier!

Easy lunch and snack time

Cat Bento Box Instructions

This category would require many posts to cover, and I’m sure I’ll return to it because my clients often struggle with food prep and meals. Here are a few ideas for easy make-ahead lunches and snacks. Please don’t feel bad if you don’t have time to make kitty bento boxes daily!

Start with a well made, insulated and cute lunch box that’s easy to clean!

[Cute lunch boxes via honest.com]

Stock up on snack friendly foods (pre-packaged if you must or make ahead portions) and create snack stations in the fridge and pantry. Contain items that are snack friendly in bins, baskets or boxes and label them so everyone knows these are mom/dad approved. These should be age appropriately placed (lower shelves for smaller kids) and available with supervision and permission. Older kids can help themselves.

[tons of lunch and snack ideas via realsimple.com] Make lunches ahead and stock up on easy-to-prepare lunch foods. There are a million or more ideas on Pinterest and entire websites dedicated to kids meal prep. So many great ideas that I’m really just passing them along here!

I hope you no longer want to pull your hair out or flip at the idea of returning to school. If you can’t get it ALL done before school starts, remember it’s a process you can ease into. Pick the one or two areas that drive you the most nuts and tackle them first. Once you’ve got a handle on them, add on other systems. Remember to keep your kids involved, and most importantly, have fun with them!

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Organizers party tricks!

August 14, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Organize, Systems & Techniques, Tips & Resources Leave a Comment

My entire house was packed into boxes…When we moved to Charleston from MD several years ago, we had packed everything and were having a going away party, upon realizing my yoga teachers husband and I went to high school together I walked over to a particular box and pulled out our yearbook. It was like a magic trick and everyone just stood there kind of stunned that I knew were the darn thing was and with everything packed I could still go grab it in less than 30 seconds. This is probably one of the moments that will stand out in my mind forever and when I knew without a doubt that I was destined to be an Organizer! (and someone got a picture of it!)

This popped into my mind after reading a recent discussion on the NAPO forum…all of these are true experiences that I’ve had as a professional organizer and they make me laugh! Consider this a You might be a Professional Organizer if (or destined to be one) kind of list…

You create lists of things you’ve already done so you can cross them off.
Friends (especially new ones) are afraid to have you over because they don’t think their house is organized or tidy enough (don’t worry, were use to worse and we don’t judge!). Alternately…
Your friends, family, clients start a conversation with “you would be so proud of me because…” I purged my wardrobe, got rid of half my books, de-stashed my fabric in my craft room etc:)
Friends come over and want to look into your closet and cupboards to get organizing ideas and see if you are really as organized as…A Professional Organizer, and they leave feeling happy to realize you are organized but not Martha Stewart perfect!
You can retrieve just about anything in your home if someone needs you to, in 30 seconds or less.
Your clutter is categorized and labeled.
Your spices are alphabetized.
You don’t let anyone else load your dishwasher or put your dishes back because they just won’t do it right (my husband has all but 2 cabinets down-the remaining items he leaves for me:)
Your magazines are arranged in the rack by subject and date.
You eat your bag of M&Ms according to color.
Your socks (underwear, bras, etc) are lined up in neat rows in your dresser drawer.
You always have a donation bag of items to get rid of.
Your car contains clients donation items (in an orderly fashion).
You can properly and neatly fold a fitted sheet and know what hospital corners are (and want to teach others this too).
You re-arrange the hotel room, putting everything “where it belongs.”
You don’t have containers with missing lids, if you damage a part-you recycle or dispose of the partner.
You carry a label-maker, tape measure, sharpie and post it notes with you.
You show up at meeting with printouts and a checklist of questions.
You leave every meeting with a half-dozen pages of notes.
Your personal library is organized by category, size (and color).
You categorize groceries into the cashier’s belt (or better yet self check out ) & bag your own groceries by categories.
You can spend an hour or more at The Container Store or IKEA scouting out organizing products.
Your friends and family send you loads of Pinterest organizing pins!
You rearrange cans, boxes, clothes stacks, etc on store shelves as you shop.
You wipe off the sink counters in public bathrooms.

I hope you got a giggle out of some of these! I’m not perfect, seriously Y’all but I do have my organizing compulsions, I just can’t help it:)

Nothing’s worth anything…your sticky stuff

August 10, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Organize, Systems & Techniques Leave a Comment

I hate to break it to you but your possessions have no value unless they sell! This is true for anything you create or acquire (clothes, household items, electronics etc). Lets really think about this a minute okay? We don’t give much thought to the VALUE of STUFF until we are ready to part with it or part with money to acquire it. Sometimes though, certain things resonate with us so deeply that it isn’t about the money at all and we attach an emotional value to things.

When we do this our stuff becomes sticky. It sticks to us, maybe longer than we would like! It becomes harder to part with, we justify the amount of money we spent, we connect with the feelings attached and we can’t let go…so then what do we do when we feel that nudge to finally let go?

We might think that taking items to consignment, trying to sell them via ebay or a yard sale will ease the separation anxiety…it might, it might not.

Here’s an extreme example; I recently worked with a client who had the contents of her entire home damaged by water, mold and construction debris…together we created an inventory of everything in her home-actually 3 homes, and this list was used to assign replacement value for her insurance claim. In the end I’m not sure if it was worth the time it took to unpack, list, photograph, research and provide documentation but the tragic circumstances made this person feel they had to do something and surely they couldn’t sit back and let the insurance company assign value to their stuff-or could they have? Would it have been much different? Maybe it was an important part of the process for this person to really see their stuff for what it was, just stuff…in the end almost everything was damaged out and replaced. Most stuff is replaceable or not needed to begin with.

I’m often asked to take things to consignment, having first scrutinized them for any imperfections, considering brand, age, wear, and style, only to have them sell for practically nothing. Same goes for the effort of selling on e-bay or a yard sale, it’s usually not worth your time (or what you might pay someone else) to sell these things. But if you really LOVE having yard sales, do it because you love connecting people with the treasures they are out to score, and give them a great deal, it will make their day! Usually though, when we dig deeper there is usually some type of lack mindset lurking beneath the surface.

I never tell someone what to do with items they want to get rid of but I do ask them to consider the value of their time when choosing how to release stuff. When we are really clear about why we bought something it might help us break the cycle.

When considering if you want to consign/sell or donate something I hope you will think about the joy that item might bring someone if you just give it away freely with no strings attached. Release things from a place of abundance and you will surely find the joy in sharing and your stuff will carry on that legacy!

A Playful Makeover Monday

August 3, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Organize, Organizing Projects, Systems & Techniques Leave a Comment

I love to work with kids toy spaces and create storage systems that are fun to look at and fun to play with! So many families I work with have a great room space (open) where the kids can play while food is being prepared in the kitchen and other household activities are going on. This is great for keeping an eye on the kids and letting everyone share time together but it can be frustrating to have toys strewn everywhere from the kitchen counter to the hallway, dining room and family room. For this family we were able to start with a small but designated area where toys could be stored and we found the right type of storage to fit the toys that needed to live in the space.

Kids Playroom Makeover

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When starting a job like this follow a few simple steps.

Take “inventory” of what containers the client has and look things over to decided what needs to be stored in the space.
Pull all the toys out and sort them by types (music toys, books, puzzles, cars, blocks etc) removing any damaged or unwanted items.
Take measurements of the space; shelves, drawers, cabinets etc with width, height and depth.
Identify types of storage containers needed (if any) and locate them (I love Amazon, Container store and Ikea).
Purchase necessary storage pieces (and schedule for delivery) by your next appointment or work session (DIY or with an Organizer).
Contain toys by category (containers and shelves).
The finishing touch-Label, both on the shelves and the containers, so that parents, kids and anyone else helping with child care or cleanup will know where things belong. A common mistake

I find is that people don’t label because they think they will remember but if you have a housekeeper, nanny, babysitter or family members who come regularly they will not know where things go unless you make it simple and clear.

*Quick tip-schedule your organizing time, put it on your calender!

I have a variety of “go-to” favorite containers that I find work well for a variety of needs but we will also take into account what the client likes and if storage will be visible we look for more decorative containers that fit in with the clients decor. In this case we found cute canvas Toy Chest for larger storage under the stairs at 3 Sprouts. This job also required re-thinking the built in storage and making some changes to fit the needs of the space.

We created a “parking garage” for all the larger cars and trucks under the stairs (just simple shelves that were large enough to accommodate the largest vehicles). Other changes such as removing a dangerous cabinet door (pinched fingers-no good!), fitting bottom boards into lower shelves that were missing and adjusting existing built in shelves to fit the containers were made by a local cabinet maker. We stored “less messy” toys including books, puzzles and music instruments in the family room on both sides of the lower book shelves. Anything that requires more play space or the table (like blocks, cars etc) went into the cabinets by the stairs.

I love how this space turned out, it’s both beautiful and functional and it gives the kids the freedom to have fun in their space but makes it super easy to clean up when needed. Do you have a space that serves multiple functions? If you find these kinds of spaces challenging or need help with set up, I’d love to help you! Visit my contact page and we can schedule a time for a free”get to know your organizing needs” call.

Friday Fieldtrip::East Coast Adventures Part I

July 31, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Inspiration & Education, Museums & Galleries, Photography Leave a Comment

I spent the better part of late June and early July in the car and adventuring up and down along the east coast (PA>MD>SC>FL>GA). I spent a grand total of 64 hrs at home over a four week period! The adventures began outside of Philly with a long weekend packed with family fun! In 3 days we had a memorial service for my husband’s late and wonderful grandmother, followed tby a cousins family reunion and we rounded the weekend out with a celebration of my in-laws 50th wedding anniversary! When we left Charleston temps were in the triple digits and for the duration of our trip to PA & MD it was in the 70, what a relief from the heat! Fun times were had by all, despite pouring rain and the intensity of so much family for a sustained period. We had a lot of laughs, reconnecting with family we don’t get to see often and meeting new members of the family. We took in a Phillies game (die hard fans can’t be stopped) and we ate our way through hoagies and cheese steaks. On our final day in PA we took a trip to Longwood Gardens, long on my list of places to visit and I was not disappointed.

Longwood Gardens

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The rest of my east coast adventures included a visit to see my family in MD, where we spent the 4th of July, a trip to FL to help my grandparents prepare for a move and a trip to GA for a business symposium. While I was in Atlanta I had a chance to visit two incredible fiber art exhibits which I’ll share with you on the next Friday Fieldtrip. I have an album of even more pictures from Longwood here if you care to spend a bit more time looking at details of this spectacular garden. It was a long day of walking and there was so much visual stimulation I left feeling completely inspired and filled up by natures beauty. I find I often need to escape and recharge someplace tranquil following being surrounded by lots of people, no matter how much I may love them! What do you do to recharge after intense time around a lot of people, or does that fill you up? What are some of your favorite “Field Trips” or vacation plans?

Tuesday Quick Tech Tip!

July 7, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Digital Organizing, Organize, Organizing Projects, Tips & Resources Leave a Comment

I come across a lot of digital files that need purging and organizing and though I’d share this Quick Tech Tip…

I’ve been working with a client recently who use to own several art galleries and is in preparation for re-launching her career. Anytime we want to share our “stuff” with our “peeps” we need to gather those peeps into a list…so for this client list-building meant reaching back into the archives of her old gallery and customers to retrieve their info.

Part of what I LOVE to about what I do is researching new/better solutions and systems for maximizing our efforts. In this case with just a bit of research I found this portable floppy drive that plugs into a USB port so we can retrieve all those old files quickly and easily.

This little device is only about $10-15. Floppy disc’s contain such a small amount of info compared to what we store today. It takes practically no time to copy this stuff onto a new hard drive or just quickly scan the files and determine if you need anything.

I’m really happy with this small tech tool! Now I have an easy solution to help you part with all those old floppy discs sitting around that may or may not have important info! Yes, there are services you can send your disc’s to to retrieve your info but some people are not comfortable with sending personal info to strangers (not unreasonable in the age of ID Theft!). I’ve established my clients trust and this solution gives me the method to solve this for my clients quickly and without getting a third party involved.

Once you have what you need, find the best solution for recycling these floppy discs and get rid of them! This is an easy project you can do for yourself. Do you have old floppy discs sitting around?

Textile Tuesday::Mill Village Mandala’s

June 16, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Art, Inspiration & Education, Textiles & Pattern 5 Comments

I’ve been pretty inconsistent about blogging lately and I’m not sure if I should be blogging about my art, my organizing, organizing tips, project’s I’ve been working on, the direction I’m headed (Organizing for artists!) or what??? So many questions and I’ve been super busy so I’ve just fallen silent. I will figure this out, it will emerge and hopefully my customers and readers can help me figure it out! Tell me what you want to see and hear.

In the meantime I’ll share something I’ve been really excited to be working on. I was selected to be an Installation Artist for Enough Pie Awakening III:Solstice event in Charleston this coming Saturday. Here’s a little about the pieces I’ll be installing on site for the event, how they came to be and why I gave them the name Mill Village Mandala (s) (Detailed views below).

In my current work I spend a great deal of time helping clients find order where there has been chaos. I look around their personal universe for patterns and clues, noticing areas of chaos and order. I use the information that I gather in their universe to help them re-define a new sense of order in their space and life.

In essence I help transform chaos to order with them and for them.

Helping clients through the cathartic proc

ess of releasing things is essential to the work we do together. These wire hangers symbolize the release of excess “stuff”, the waste and neglect of our valuable resources in our lives. As the idea to use them emerged, they began to quite literally represent a tangled past and what beauty can emerge when we begin to re-vision our future with more order.

The mandala is a beautiful and sacred example of how form and pattern can emerge from all the microcosms of the universe. My vision for sharing this mandala installation is to create a metaphorical gateway for our community to come together through place making and creative expression. Tapping my “eye” for creating patterns, I used recycled materials – cast off from the bi-products of the textile industry like hangers, recycled tee shirts and natural indigo dye – to realize this artistic vision.

The Mill Village is a reference to the history of the textiles industry which migrated from New England to South Carolina after the industrial revolution. In these Villages the ‘Patterns of life’ were dictated by the mill owners including the currency used, religious practice and places of residence and business.

I hope to ‘let the sun shine in’ on our wasteful appetite for textiles and share the beautiful patterns these cast off materials can create as a metaphor for how we can re-envision just about anything to transform it from overlooked to beautiful and useful.

Minimalist Madness-who says you should be one!?

June 8, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Organize, Wellness & Mindset Leave a Comment

I’m seriously sad to read the article, Let’s Celebrate the Art of Clutter in the NY Times. Here’s a case for Minimalist Madness, lets talk about it and what it means to be a professional organizer…

Where did this author (who I admire for her blogging over at SlowLoveLife) get the impression that the professional organizing industry is there to make clients feel guilty about their stuff? We have an incredible trade organization, NAPO, that works diligently to teach organizers (those who choose to invest in their career by joining) skills and mindset to help clients without any judgement and how to know when to walk away or suggest other professional’s involvement (such as Hoarding situations). Generally I try to alleviate any sense of guilt, it’s does no good for anyone and is not the motivating factor I every try to work with.

Each client and person is different and those of us who are passionate about helping people organize are usually trying to help those who WANT to be helped. Most of us follow ethics that very much frown upon someone else hiring us to work with a family member or friend (best of intentions can lead to much psychological damage), I would never do it! I find the topics of organizing and stuff both very subjective. I agree that minimalism is being “oversold” in some ways but I’ve walked into many a clients homes who are frustrated and overwhelmed about all the stuff they do not cherish, but don’t know what to do with. As long as you are not a slave to “Stuff” that you do not love, want etc then why keep it? I hope Dominique Browning is leaving a sizable inheritance to her children to maintain her warehouse of stuff indefinitely, better yet she should donate it to the Smithsonian archive…I’m sure they would love that!

We all live within a spectrum of chaos and order, collecting and being minimalist…one is not right, the other is not wrong.

Saying that the entire organizing industry is built on trying to make people believe they should live a certain way is uninformed and irresponsible. What is your personal legacy? Do you want to be known for your stuff?

Embraced by the Hands of Chaos

May 26, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Inspiration & Education, Wellness & Mindset

During my transition from Textile Design career to professional organizer I wandered upon a meandering path and came to recognize the beauty of not having an exact direction or total clarity. There were moments of utter darkness and chaos and moments of magnificent beauty and peace.

This transition was a time of loss of lifestyle, community, career, family and of our 3 kitties. We felt very alone, but we wanted something different so we embarked upon an adventure of risk. There was a period of 18 months that I had no JOB, leaving me with a lot of time to feel like all I had ahead was more chaos and lack of direction. I knew with my intuition that this would change and that if I could find a way to embrace the “dark night of the soul” that I could be transformed. This dark period felt chaotic as my mind argued that this was crazy and we would not make it. This poem by the Sufi Mystic Hafiz is fitting.

Love wants to reach out and manhandle us,

Break all our teacup talk of God…

The beloved sometimes wants

To do us a great favor:

Hold us upside down

And shake all the nonsense out.

But when we hear

He is in such a “playful drunken mood”

Most everyone I know

Quickly packs their bags and hightails it

Out of town.

What on earth had we done? We invited ourselves to be turned upside down! We choose to put ourselves on this new path because we had a vision of something better! After darkness always follows light.

Having emerged now from this period of darkness I see how profoundly rich and fertile a time it was. I often think of the time’s of “Darkness” as a time of being empty but I now realize that the process of creativity is one of emptying and giving birth. Darkness is a time to let ideas grow and take root, to find stillness and prepare for the birthing of great creations to come. I am finally learning to embrace the creative process that cycles through chaos, darkness, emptiness and the birthing of new ideas and creations .

The Goddess Chaos (Eris) birthed all of creation and she will tell you nothing is more chaotic than birth but the result is a creation miracle!

Recognizing Patterns in Organizing

May 19, 2015 by Heather Filed Under: Art & Design, Organize

I recently decided to submit an entry for a public art installation piece (I’ll share more about this soon!) and while writing the proposal I stumbled upon a wonderful “ah-ha” about recognizing patterns in the work and art of my life. This is what I realized.

In my former career as a textile designer my eye was keenly trained to notice and create patterns. I see the beauty in repeating forms everywhere I look and the ability to see a pattern emerge is a gift that serves me today in a completely different way as a Professional Organizer.

In my current work I spend a great deal of time helping clients to simplify, de-clutter, streamline their lives and find order where there has been chaos. When we begin together we often set an intention (or goal) to help define boundaries of the order they would like to see emerge. With that in mind I look around their personal universe for patterns and clues, noticing areas of chaos and order. I use the information that I gather in their universe to help them re-define a new sense of order in their space and life.

Above: Obscurely Relevant by Jane Allen Nodine. As objects are grouped into collections order emerges from chaos.

Helping clients free themselves of baggage, past burdens, excess and the cathartic process of releasing things is essential to the work we do together. Have you ever had a realization that helped you understand your gifts in a different way? A shift in perspective can be such a fun experience of self realization if we are open to it!