For many of us, dealing with a cluttered house becomes top priority in January when it is time for New Year’s resolutions. That makes Organize Your Home Day on January 14 a national day that is very timely.
Organize Your Home Day was started to urge homeowners to think about ways to get their homes into shape and to make their life more livable without all the clutter around them.
It’s easy to just close the door on a messy room and leave it for later but letting this sort of thing accumulate makes for a bigger task later when you decide to deal with it.
Once you get used to it, de-cluttering your life makes you actually feel less burdened overall.
For another national day that talks about de-cluttering, check out National Old Stuff Day.
How to observe Organize Your Home Day
Did home organization end up on your list of to-dos for the year? Getting organized in the home is more than just opening a closet and throwing things away that you don’t use.
In order to really be clearing out clutter, you will need a plan to make sure your home stays organized. These 11 household organization ideas are sure to help.
Make it fun!
Adding a job to your to-do list like getting organized at home may not seem like fun, but you can make it so. Just get the family together, put on some music and see what happens when each person tackles just a small part of the job.
Even small children can be taught to take part and have the task made into a game!
You’ll end up with a de-cluttered house and have a box of goodies to donate for someone in need. In my house, the rule is, “if you haven’t used it in a few years, it’s time to donate it!”
Give yourself plenty of time
The house didn’t become cluttered overnight, so don’t expect it to get it tidied in just a few hours.
I devote a half hour or so each day to small jobs. It’s much easier to clean out one dresser drawer than to tackle the whole office to organize those saved handwritten letters that mean so much to you.
You’ll still get the same end result, even though the job will take longer. But most importantly, you won’t hate your house (and the job) when you are done.
Take inventory on Organize Your Home Day
Sometimes, what seems like clutter is actually just misplaced items.
This is very true in my house. My husband tends to “drop things” in handy spots. Over time, this ends up with a whole room full of things that don’t belong where they are supposed to be.
A lot of de-cluttering can happen just by moving items to the place where they actually belong.
Take stock and have each family member remove their own misplaced items and return them to rooms where they belong.
Keep your house size in mind
No matter how hard you try to keep it tidy, a smaller house is likely to end up more cluttered than a larger one, simply because there is more room to store things.
Think of ways to optimize small spaces. I used to have a pantry in my kitchen which was the size of a closet with shelves that fit the whole closet.
I had lots of things in it but it was a jumbled mess. I asked my husband to come up with a plan to make it into a mini walk in closet.
The result was this pantry closet makeover that stays neat to this day – three years later. Now that is what I call a pantry closet organizer!
Make use of shelves
If you don’t have a lot of room in your house, extend your organization efforts upwards – towards the ceiling that is.
Floating shelves give added storage space to even tiny areas of the kitchen. This group of shelves is around the corner from a doorway in what used to be an unused area of my kitchen.
The shelves are now home to my canisters and some essential baking and cooking items that I use every day.
The end result is more storage space and more counter space as well since I was able to move my canisters.
Add some wheels on Organize Your Home Day
I have a galley kitchen with no room for an island. I solved this problem by using a small island on wheels that sits just outside the entry to the kitchen in a hallway.
It has a drop leaf side so that it can be extended to add some additional counter space in the kitchen when I wheel it in.
And it also gives me two more lower cupboards to use for storage of frying pans and other items I use often.
Be flexible on storage solutions
Sometimes the only way to get your home better organized is to use home storage solutions.
There are lots of home storage solutions out there but the main thing to keep in mind is flexibility. You should choose one which can be adapted to multiple uses in case your needs change.
Look for adjustable shelves that you can reconfigure when you need more or less space for your storage.
Use every inch of space
Look around your house to see what areas are unused now that could be put to use for storage.
In my case, this was the back of the cupboard doors. I previously kept my cutting boards on the counter tops and they were always in the way when I needed to use the counters for cooking.
My handy husband made me a back of the door organizer that takes up no outside the cupboard space but now keeps my cutting boards AND my wire baking racks in order.
See the project for the cutting boards storage here, or you can purchase these online as well.
Invest in drawer organizers
No matter how tidy of a person you are, it’s hard to keep drawers organized without some extra help in the way of drawer organizers.
These handy small sized trays can turn a truly messy office drawer or kitchen drawer into something that you will WANT to keep organized.
Many are the mix and match style which allows for interlocking according to your drawer needs.
No more “out of sight, out of mind mentality” with this tip. Give each of the items in your drawers a smaller place to live and up your productivity level when you don’t have to search for items.
Go for see through containers
When storing things that you want to keep organized, be sure to go for see-through storage containers.
Doing this insures that you won’t have to waste time opening up the containers to see what is in them.
Another tip is to choose containers of the same size which allows for easy stacking and makes the most out of any storage space.
Don’t forget your bookcases!
All parts of the home can be organized on this day but we often forget book cases. Don’t just add your books and forget it. There is actually a whole day devoted to them. It’s called Clean out Your Bookcase Day. Get some tips for organizing your reading material and learn more about the day.
Think outside the box on Organize Your Home Day
When it comes to large or items with bulky or weird shapes, getting them organized can require a bit of creativity.
Check out this post for storage ideas for large and unusual shaped items. It covers everything from frying pan lids, to linens, and candles and ribbons.
No matter what area of the home you are trying to de-clutter, or the size of your space, if you follow these simple organizing tips, you’ll have a well organized home in no time at all.
And be sure to use the hashtag #OrganizeYourHomeDay to spread the word about the day on social media. Here is a tweet to get you started:
January 14 is #OrganizeYourHomeDay. It's time to get rid of clutter and get things in order. Check out some tips on Always the Holidays. Share on XWhat is a national day?
National days of the year are a fun way to celebrate odd and unusual foods, animals and items that you come into contact with. Be sure to check out my national day’s guide for more fun days to celebrate.
There are close to 2000 national days in the year and over 150 of them are celebrated in January. Be sure to check out this post to discover more about the national days in January, as well as the January word search printable of national days.
Be sure to also check out these other national days this month:
- National Sticker Day
- National Bittersweet Chocolate Day
- National Spaghetti Day
- National Disc Jockey Day
Pin this post for Organize Your Home Day for later
Would you like a reminder of this post for with these home organization ideas? Just pin this image to one of your household tips boards on Pinterest so that you can easily find it later.
You can also watch our YouTube video to learn more about the national days in January.
Check out these products to get the most out of your home organization project.