Some people think that spring is the perfect time for cleaning out your stuff and decluttering. While others make it a New Year’s Resolution to have a tidier space with less junk laying around. Regardless of when you plan to declutter, we will give you some of our best decluttering tips below.

About a year ago, decluttering became hugely popular with Marie Kondo’s book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. In this book Marie Kondo detailed her method of tidying. This includes tips such as starting with categories of possessions not rooms in your house and only keeping items that bring you joy.

This book started quite a craze and soon everyone was tidying up around their house according to Marie’s method. Even popular TV shows would throw in jokes about the Marie Kondo method.

 

So, when you are decluttering, it is important to be ready to get rid of items that are no longer serving you, but maybe don’t pull an Emily Gilmore and throw out everything. Check out some decluttering tips below.

Tips for Decluttering and Organizing Your Home:

1. First, think about how you want your space to look. It’s easy to get excited about a home project and jump in before planning anything out. If you do that, it’s easy to get overwhelmed and forget why you started in the first place. Instead, if you take some time and really think about what you want your finished, decluttered home to look like, that can help guide you through the organizing process and have something to look forward to.
2. Have a space for everything. When getting organized and decluttered, it is important to have designated areas for your belongings. For example, keep books on a shelf, keep office supplies in your desk, and keep closets clean and organized, so you are easily able to find things. This step may sound easy, but it probably isn’t. In fact, in order to have a space for everything, you will probably need to get rid of some of the items you currently own.
3. Be prepared to give away items. The fact is, you probably have a lot more stuff than you could ever use on a regular basis. You might even have more stuff than can realistically fit in your house. Part of decluttering is getting rid of things you don’t use or need.
4. Think about WHY you have that item. You might be keeping an item in your house “just in case” you may need it one day, but that’s no reason to have three different toasters taking up space in your kitchen.
5. Think about how often you use that possession. If you haven’t worn that item of clothing or used that possession in the last few months, are you really going to? I used to have a bunch of clothes in my closet in case I needed them, but I never wore them because I didn’t really like them enough to do so. I got rid of them, and you can too!
6. Display sentimental items. It seems we all have that box of pictures or sentimental items from our childhood that we keep in the closet. It’s okay to keep those items, but what good are those items doing in a closet? We all have sentimental items that we want to keep. These items often take up space in our homes where they aren’t even being appreciated. Instead you could make a picture collage or a scrapbook to display your memories. Then, instead of taking up closet space, your sentimental items are displayed through your house for people to see and enjoy.

Use these tips as a guide to get you started on your decluttering and organizing journey. At Everyday Helper, we are happy to help you start of your 2018 with some decluttering and organizing help. Contact us and let us know what your goals are, and we can help you through the process of decluttering and organizing your home. We will even take your unwanted items and donate them to a place where they will be used and needed.

Being more organized and less cluttered will leave you feeling better. Taking some time to declutter your space is a great way to start off the New Year, and we are happy to help!