This gives me hope that in five years, I may have a less disgusting house (my son is 3, so 5 years to go). I’ll be having another one this year; I’ll have to figure out what to groom him or her for. Should it be floors or bathroom scrubbing?
Seriously, I used to be a complete neat freak. I hated every second of cleaning, but I’d do it anyway when I lived alone. Then I moved in with my husband and all my neat tendencies were overwhelmed by the mountain of crap my husband is capable of producing in a short 24-hour period. Add a toddler to the mix (whose hero right now is the Swedish Chef, who throws things everywhere), and you have one hell of a messy house. I’m determined to get it all organized - or at least moderately organized - before the baby comes.
This is true, though I can only take so many beency bouncy burgers. I swear, he’ll try to launch anything with a tennis racquet these days. His socks are a particular favorite.
Another more general tip that works for me is to decide where stuff “lives” and then make a rule that you will keep the stuff there. Books live on the book shelves. Shoes live in the closet. Tools live in the tool box, which lives in the garage. Keys live in the bowl on the little table by the door.
If you can get in the habit of putting stuff away as you go, you’ll automatically be less disorganized. And if you can focus on just doing one little task at a time, it shouldn’t be overwhelming. All you have to do right now is put this wrench away where it goes. Sure you’re inclined to just leave it on the counter, but it will take 10 seconds to walk it to the garage and then you’ll know where it is. All you have to do right now is kick your shoes off into the closet instead of in the middle of the floor. Sure you’re tired, but it will take five seconds.
“A place for everything, and everything in its place” is actually pretty good advice.
Jodi makes some good suggestions. My problem comes from the SO and I having complete different opinions, which we have never been able to reconcile, on where stuff goes. Eventualy I just surrender to the chaos that ensues. We don’t agree on how the kitchen, bathroom, closets, fridge, garage, etc. should be organized. Part of this is our large difference in heights. I tend to put things up high; she tends to put them down low. Unfortunately she also thinks that any empty horizontal space is fair game for laying stuff “just for a sec” which ends up being about forever. When it does get cleared, cleaned, sorted and disposed of, the horizontal spaces just get reoccupied almost immediately.
I attempted to short circuit this by getting a smaller house than we’d previously had when we moved a few years back. My logic was that if had less space she’d have less opportunity to pack rat. I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s backfired, but it’s definitely not worked out as planned.
Last winter I bought some containers so we could organize and store away anything that needed to be kept but wasn’t essential to keep in the day-to-day living space. Naturally she packed away stuff I tend to use and didn’t pack away the stuff I’d hoped she’d pack away. So now the bins sit on the floor, since I often need to rifle through them to find something I need (like cookware, clothes, etc).
::sigh::
Morale of the story: having two people that tend towards slobbiness does not help the equation.
Sorry for taking so long to reply, but I could not find my keyboard because of the mess on my desk…lol, but I’m serious. I have been a slob all my life. Growing up my best friend and I could be doing the exact same thing, he’d go home clean and I’d be filthy. When I worked I would constantly get little reminders of the mess around me when I was working on a project. I have seen cleaner cars in a junkyard than mine is. Up until the spring I could not get a car in my 24 X 24 garage because of the mess. That being said I knew exactly where everything was as long as nobody touched it and to honest I would not have it any other way. Messy desk…Brilliant mind!
