18 Home Organization Tips and Tools
on Jan 30, 2024
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It’s a new year and time for a fresh start! If you’ve been following me for a while, you I’m not always the most pulled together person. Home organization is hard with four busy kids, an active schedule, taking care of lots of animals, and working from home. There’s just always something else I’d rather do than clean and organize my house.
But I am slowly learning that organization systems can save me big! I’ve put together my best home organization tips and tools for you here. I hope they help you gain a little order and control at home.
Table of Contents
Basic Principles of Home Organization
We all have areas of our houses that tend to get more cluttered than others. It could be your kitchen counter, a mud room, or end tables. Things get dropped on them and then never put away.
There are a few key principles for home organization that work no matter which area needs the most attention.
Decluttering
Having fewer possessions is key to a tidy house. I can’t say I’ve got it under control, but decluttering is a priority in my life and I add things to my “get rid of” pile every day.
We donate, recycle, or trash things we don’t need. Old product boxes. Dried up nail polish. Greeting cards from 10 years ago. Keep the things you love, but you don’t have to keep every drawing your kids ever made you.
Start with one drawer or one cabinet at a time. All you’re doing is looking for things to get rid of. Clutter tends to hang out in products we tried but never used like cleaning supplies or craft suplies. You’ll be surprised how much clutter you can get rid of in just a few minutes every day.
Declutter Digitally, Too
Don’t forget to declutter your inbox, too. Have you opened a Walgreens ad in the last few months? If not – unsubscribe. Are you still getting emails from a freebie you signed up for 8 years ago? Unsubscribe!
I’m afraid my house would look like something out of Hoarders if I didn’t actively work on decluttering. I make choices each and every day about what to keep and what to get rid of. Having fewer possessions means fewer things to pick up and put away and keeps the daily crap shuffling to a minimum.
Everything Has a Place
Is organizing your home expensive? No, but if you are starting at zero you might want to invest in a few home organization products to make your life easier. Make sure you have a place for everything.
Appropriate storage bins, caddies, and cord control make a huge difference to how well you stay organized. Keep frequently used items accessible. Less used items can go up higher or to the back of a drawer.
Quick Tidy Up Sessions
Once you have all the best storage solutions in place and you love the way your home looks, maintain it through simple tidying sessions. We often put less desirable tasks off because we think they are going to take forever.
Organizing your home can truly be done in 10 minutes a day. Get your family on board, set a timer for 10 minutes, and blast some music. In just a few minutes of laser focused tidying, your house will be organized just like it was on day one.
Focus on one area at a time. I usually choose the most lived in areas and the areas any unexpected guests might see such as the living room or kitchen.
Affordable Home Organization Ideas
I am going to share with you some of my favorite home storage and organization hacks. If you’re on a more restrictive budget, don’t be afraid to DIY it. A cardboard box covered in scrapbook paper is just as lovely as a more expensive bin from Target!
Look at some of that clutter you have and think of ways you could reuse it. Shower caddies, lazy susans, hooks, and magnetic strips are great for DIY home organization.
Consider how you can make best use of the storage space. For example, could you use a vertical shelf or attach something to a wall? These are great ways to save space.
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The Ultimate Home Organization Tool
For some of us, getting our brains organized is the biggest obstacle to home organization. 🙂 In the past, I used slips of paper, post it notes, a variety of notebooks….. and then misplaced them all. Has that happened to you?
Having one place to organize and track our to dos is a huge step to keeping everything on track. For me, it works best to just have one notebook that I always put back in the same place.
I have friends who use “brain boards” to keep track of logistics, meals, and home maintenance tasks. We are all wired a bit different so find the system that works for you and stick to it!
Once your brain is organized and you have routines and systems, everything else will fall into place.
Home Organization Tips and Tools
Do feel like you're drowning in chaos and overwhelm? Organize your home this year with these tips and tools. Break your organization goals into manageable tasks and don't give up!
Do not underestimate hooks. They are so handy for cord control, hanging up dish gloves, organizing toys in the bathtub. . . literally there is a use for them in every room of the house. They come in all sizes and several color options as well.
Home organization is not just for your home. These days my car is an extension of my home. Having those emergency items or toys to use on detours can make or break a family outing.
No more brooms and mop handles tripping you on the way out your door. I love wall mounted hangers as they save space and give you a place for everything.
Here are several unique ways Alexa helps you organize your life. She's in your house anyway - put her to work.
Another often overlooked tool for home organization is a magentic strip. These come in a variety of shapes and widths. Personally, I like a bar like this for knives, scissors, and other items that are easy to lose. It works great for bobby pins or tweezers in the bathroom, too.
Books, more books, and random science experiments. Homeschool clutter can quickly overtake a corner of your house or dining room table. Use these tips to stay on top of all your kid creations, literary adventures, and paperwork.
I was initially a skeptic about using refrigerator bins. They really do keep your fridge tidier, though. I group like items together in the bins. It's easy to pull them out and grab what I need without having to rearrange the whole fridge!
Do you have a house full of water bottles too? Ours are all different heights so they fit in the cabinet wierd. This water bottle organizer is the perfect solution as it keeps lids with the bottles and it doesn't matter how tall they are. It's easy to find the bottle you need.
Do you just shove clothes in a drawer and hope for the best? I used to do that, too. Now I love how my drawers look organized and they actually stay that way!
Maximize the space you do have by getting creative with your organizers. Backs of doors are often left untouched, but they offer a lot of space. Over the door organizers like this one are great for spices, tissue boxes, First Aid supplies, etc.
Is your to do list overwhelming you? This post walks you through the steps of building your own cleaning schedule. It's 100% customizable so you can truly make it your own.
How handy is this? The organizer stys in your drawer and refill it as necessary. No more getting the drawer caught on the flap of a box or having bags spill out everywhere. There's a spot of different sized bags plus rolls of food storage like wax paper or parchment paper.
What's for supper? How many times have we all heard these words? If you struggle deciding what to make on a daily basis, use this method. It minimizes decision anxiety and you can have a whole week planned out in literally minutes!
Lazy susans are helpful for every room of the house. I keep one in my fridge for condiments, in my bathroom for skin care, at the card table, etc. I prefer the style that has a little lip around the edge to keep items from falling off.
Here's another great DIY menu board. I love this setup where all you have to do is pick a card from each category. Bam! Dinner is served!
I'm a huge fan of making my furniture multitask. End tables like these serve their obvious purpose, but can also be used as a blanket or magazine storage.
Before you invest in bigger organization products, make sure they are somethign you'll actually use. Are the shoe cubbies big enough for adult shoes? How many people can feasibly sit on the bench and put their shoes on at the same time? My pro tip is to think through your home organization tools and invest in what you will use and need.
How cute is this little wooden crate for a bedside basket or corner of the toy room? This post contains instructions for making the box by hand.
