I don’t know about you, but my bedroom is often the messiest room in the house.  I try to keep my things put away, but if I’m in a hurry I just shut the bedroom door.  And if someone is coming over and I need to do a quick clean-up, it’s just too easy to toss things onto my dresser and the chair and… shut the bedroom door.  In fact, I shut the bedroom door after getting dressed for the day and I don’t go back in unless I need something (because if I do, the bed looks too inviting to my sleepy body.) 

So out of sight, out of mind.  I don’t think about picking up any mess in my bedroom until I’m getting ready for bed, tired and done for the day.

Today’s mission is to spend just 15 minutes in your bedroom.  I spent my entire 15 minutes putting away clothes and hauling my kids’ things back to their bedrooms, but if you’ve kept up on your room pretty well, then do something extra in the room that’s supposed to be your sanctuary.  Like one of these:

*dust the dressers and nightstands

*put candles out and light them tonight!

*look at what’s on your dresser-top.  Anything that you haven’t touched in the past month needs to go!

*switch to flannel sheets or add an extra blanket for these colder nights

*vacuum!  I seriously vacuum our bedroom only about 4 times a year because there’s not much (noticeable) need, but if you think about dust and dead skin cells… ew, I’m getting my vacuum out right now.

*If you’ve actually got all of these things done before or during your 15 minutes, then please come to my house and give me a hand with my room!!!

To-Do List on Tuesday: Clean out bathroom cupboard.  To-Do List Wednesday: Clean out bathroom cupboard.  To-Do List on Thursday: Clean out bathroom cupboard.  To-Do List Friday: Forget the cupboard, there’s too much going on with Easter.

No, it wasn’t the only thing on my to-do list, but it was one of the things that kept NOT being crossed off, NOT getting done… didn’t I just have this same situation with a drawer in the bathroom?!  But look at this mess; can you blame me for just shutting the door and trying to forget about it?

Today I determined to clean it out, and it took me ALL OF FIVE MINUTES.  For real!  Most of it didn’t even belong in that cupboard, and a lot of it was trash. 

Now look how nice.  In the back are new towels that are always clean, to hang prettily when we have a house showing.  In front are my travel bags, filled with plastic baggies and product lids for quick packing.  And yes, that’s my basket-o-pads-n-tampons.  Even the mundane can look nice, set on the back of the toilet.  It’s also a more gracious way of telling my hubby: no sex this week.  :)

What job has been on your to-do list lately?  Set the timer and spend 15 minutes on it TODAY!

Do you have a spot in your house that is bugging you?  A spot that is messy and seems too overwhelming to deal with?  Or maybe like me, you’ve got several spots in your house like that? 

Today I want you to tackle at least one of them, but only for 15 minutes.  If you’ve never tried this trick, today is the day!  Determine which spot is irritating you the most right now; if they’re all equal, then pick one that is in the highest traffic area. 

Then set a timer for 15 minutes and put things from that spot back where they belong (or in the trash!) working as fast as you can.  When the timer beeps, stop working.  If the area is not clean at that time, you can set a timer again tomorrow and give it another 15 minutes. 

I did this today on my dresser.  I’ve got several places throughout the house that are piled up and bugging me, but I chose to clear my dresser-top because I couldn’t use the mirror with the piles of clothes and junk stacked a foot deep.  I worked as quick as I could and, lo and behold, I actually beat the timer with 4 minutes to spare! 

That annoying mess on top of my dresser has bothered me for several weeks.  Every time I went into my bedroom I’d feel overwhelmed and tired… and all it really took was 11 minutes to change it!

Find a spot right now, whether it be a drawer, counter, table-top, or shelf… and spend 15 minutes cleaning it off.  Go!  Now!

Okay, I just spent 3 minutes digging around my ‘hair’ drawer in the bathroom, looking for Tea Tree Oil… it  doesn’t belong in there, but neither do a lot of things I found.  Rummaging around in that nasty drawer prompted me to do a cleaning mission TODAY.  Among the necessary tools (hairbands, clips, brush, combs, mousse, gel, hairspray) was a ton of junk that should be either in a separate space or just thrown out! 

Join me in this purge-and-clean; take 15 minutes to clean all the floating hairs, un-used haircolor cartons, hairbows (!?) and bobby pins out of one of your bathroom drawers.  Wipe it out with a damp rag or paper towel, and then arrange only what you need and use back in the drawer; everything else goes!  Put like things together, preferably in containers of some kind: hairbands and clips can all go in tiny baskets so they don’t slide all around the drawer; I used pretty boxes left from Christmas that are too cute to toss.  Brushes, combs (pare down on these– how many do you need?) can go in a small plastic basket that’s made for office supplies, and then place any gels and hair products that you use in a neat little row.   

Your drawer should be orderly and you should be able to see all of your supplies without having to move anything.  Now stand back and smile.  And fix your hair.  :)

If you are anything like me, your computer area is almost always in chaos.  My desk is just off the kitchen, right where we walk in the door (hence a major drop-off,) and where we do bills, so it gets it’s share of junk that doesn’t belong there.

Here’s my area; let’s play I Spy!  Can you find hidden in this picture: 2 Christmas ornaments, a camera (need it to take the picture,) 14 writing utensils, 4 cell phone cords (!?!?) a spy-shooter, 3 Bibles, a card from my Grandma, and the coupons for Going Bonkers that my sister Shelby left at my house for the second week in a row.  Speaking of going bonkers…

Today’s Mission has to be to clean up around the computer area, otherwise I’d have to give up the computer– that is noh-h-h-t going to happen, so I set the timer for 15 minutes and ended up spending only 7 minutes putting things where they belong. 

Ahh, much better.  I even dusted!  Stop reading and take a look around your space; see if a few minutes wouldn’t make a difference for you, too.  :)

I have always been a slob an untidy person.  I put my mother, sister, and various roommates through countless ‘inconveniences’ (I’m remembering as a kid cramming everything my sister and I owned into the closet to ‘clean’ our room, and having so much junk on my bed in the dorm at college that I’d squeeze in my roomie Holly’s bed at night,) and I can’t even begin to tell you all that Nate had to put up with.   And it was all because I really didn’t know how to clean up and keep things cleaned up. 

If you don’t understand that last sentence or never related to it, just skip the rest of this post; you are a Born Organized person and have the blessing of not knowing the frustrations of the rest of us.  If, however, you felt an immediate kinship with me when you read it, I have good news:  I not only feel your pain, but I have found the answer!

After sharing my ‘always-messy-house’ stories with my (ex) sister-in-law several years ago, she told me about flylady.net  THIS SITE CHANGED EVERYTHING for me!  Flylady is a woman who had lived within a mess for years, and as she figured out how to climb out of it she began sharing it with others.

Her basic philosophy is: it took years to get your home in the state it’s in now; it will not become clean and organized overnight, so you have to work by Baby Steps.  I was frustrated when I first began because I really wanted that quick fix.  In fact, I gave up many, many times; but the small changes I made really did make a difference, and over time my home has become what I want it to be.

Don’t get me wrong, we’re pretty much never prepared for a magazine shoot, and if you came over right now you’d see some messy spots and lots of dust.  But overall, things get picked up and put away; dishes and laundry get done and rarely piled up; beds are made each morning, and the floors are swept daily.  Our house is lived in, but it’s not an embarassment like it was before I began following Flylady’s principles.

If you have a spare 15 minutes today, check out flylady.net and just look around the site.  I use the Baby Steps approach in other areas of my life, too– see the Journey to Health on this blog for details.  Happy cleaning!!

I used to dread Mondays– the beginning of another work/school week, the end of the relaxing weekend.  Since becoming more dependent on a schedule, though, I really like Mondays.  I like getting back to the things that got off of routine over the weekend (like the kids doing chores!) and getting everything and everyone back on track.  Things are truly less stressful around here when routines are in place and boundaries are kept.

Mondays not only get me back into our regular schedule, but I also like to add on a Mission: something that doesn’t take too long but that needs to be done.  Today my Mission is cleaning under the kitchen sink. 

I’ve known for a while that I needed to clean under there, but it can seem so daunting.  In reality it took only 15 minutes!  And you’ll never guess what I found: 3 spray fresheners, 2 spray glass cleaners and 1 refill glass cleaner, 2 spray disinfectant and 1 refill disinfectant, 16 rubber gloves, and mouse poo.  Yuck-o.

I’m thrilled that I have an abundance of cleaners, and now that I know about them, I won’t be going to the store and wasting money on something I already have.  I’m also thrilled to know that we have a mouse– not that we have one, but that I know about it and can put out some mouse poison.  There were actually only a few of the little droppings, and after my initial freak-out I remembered that I had put the cleaner-bin under the sink straight from storage when we moved in.  I’m hoping it’s leftovers (ewww) from ’storage mice,’ but if not there was such a small amount that I think I’ve found out about it pretty early on and can take care of that business.

I wish I had thought to take a ‘before’ picture of under my sink, but I didn’t, so just the ‘after’ will have to do.

Notice the neat little rows of ‘extras’ behind each cleaner.  Now I can get what I need from under my sink and not be overwhelmed or grossed out– well, except for the possibility of that stinky little mouse…

Why don’t you give it a whirl today– set a timer for 15 minutes and see what may be lurking under your sink!