Dealing with a Clutter Prone Area

Think about your home and where clutter seems to always take over. It could be your kitchen counters, linen closet, or toy area. Each home is unique and the possibilities are endless. These spots can be difficult to declutter because no matter how many times you take care of the mess there always seems to be more to take its place. To help keep these areas clutter-free you should focus on these 2 ideas when decluttering.

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Everything should have a place that makes sense

If you continually notice that the same things end up in your clutter prone area you may need to establish a set place to keep them or find a new place (since the items aren’t making it to their set home anyway).

For example, I used to have a desk in my finished basement where I kept important documents, mailing supplies, and any bills that needed paid. This space ended up being inconvenient because if I tried to do any work during the day my children would follow, and since there wasn’t anything for them to do down there, they would disrupt my work. I started noticing that the supplies that I normally kept on my desk started showing up upstairs on my kitchen counters, creating clutter that got in the way of meal time prep.

I decided I needed to rethink things and I ended up creating an “office kit” that I now store on a bottom shelf in my kitchen so that I can pull it out quickly to take care of my office business and then stash it away again. The kit includes a binder that holds things like my bills and any important papers that I may need when making doctors appointments, checking on claims, or scheduling a service. It also includes a pencil box that has pens, highlighters, my checkbook, and a calculator. My office supplies now take up much less space and are more conveniently located. I was also able to relocate the desk I previously used so my daughter could use it for virtual school!

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Work with the space you have

When I first started decluttering my house, my bathroom was a place that seemed hopeless. In my bathroom (we only have the one) the vanity has two small drawers that pull out and two shelves. The only other storage space is the medicine cabinet. All of the space was packed full of bathroom stuff, as well as the counter top, and about 4 shelves in the hall closet.

I pulled everything out and organized it on my bedroom floor. There were quite a few things where the number of items we had didn’t match our family size. At that point, there were four of us. We had about 12 towels, a whole shoe box full of different body lotions, and a ridiculous amount of stuff that no one in my family even used.

I immediately threw away anything that was expired and looked sketchy. If there was anything that I obviously wouldn’t use I put it in my donate, recycle, or trash box.

My goal was to get mostly everything into my bathroom storage space so that my hall closet could be put to better use. I saved one shelf in the hall closet for the four towels I kept as well as some room that would temporarily be my mini store until I used up the excess of stuff I had accumulated.

That experience of seeing how much space was wasted on stuff that I didn’t even need was really eye opening. I had always thought of my bathroom as not having enough space, but it actually did have enough space for the things I used. I just had to readjust my over-shopping and only buy things when I actually needed them.

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How have you found a solution for a clutter prone area in your house or is there an area that you need help with?

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