Keeping an organized home with 3 kids can be tough. Over the years I’ve learned a few clutter hacks to keep the clutter from overtaking the house.
Before these hacks became a part of our routine in our household, we would spend an entire day deep cleaning the house only to go back to the way it was a few hours later. Do you know the feeling? It was to the point where I dreaded cleaning because what’s the point? It’s just going to go back to the way it was again.
However, I noticed a big shift in my mood, and my productivity when the house was clean and smelled good. When the house is messy I always felt depressed, and angry that the house was so unorganized. Our physical space can affect our moods more than we think. Not just a mood shift for me, but for everyone in the house. When our home is clean and organized, everyone feels much more restful, happier, and energetic. Keep this in mind the next time you complain about having to clean your home. You’ll feel much better when everything is organized, trust me.
With these hacks I am able to avoid those daily deep cleaning days, and spend only about 15-30 minutes a day doing chores.
I’m the type who likes to do a little bit at a time rather than cleaning a big huge mess all at once. So these hacks really help minimize the clutter and keeps our home organized.
Here our clutter hacks for an organized home:
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Put away shopping bags as soon as we get home.
- Instead of letting shopping bags sit on the counter for hours, as soon as we get home, we empty the bags and put everything away right away.
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Open and handle mail immediately.
- Instead of having to deal with a bunch of ads and papers sitting on a counter for weeks, we like to open everything and trash or file anything immediately. We have to walk over to the mailbox to get our mail, and right beside it is a trash can. I like to throw any ads or newspapers I know I won’t be needing right then and there. It helps keep our house clutter free.
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Cleaning up as you go.
- When working on a project, it can leave the biggest messes. Instead of leaving it out and causing an eyesore in the house, I like to put things away as I use them. Same goes for makeup. I always use one thing at a time, and put them back where they belong after I am done. If it’s a project that I am not done with, I like to put them in my top drawer or a box and label it so that I can work on it later. This way the mess is hidden and organized, but I can still resume where I left off.
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Put clothes back.
- For clothes that I wear and plan on re-wearing, I fold it and put it away instead of just leaving it out as a mess in my closet. This prevents your closet from looking like a train wreck. There’s been so many times where I would leave it out in hopes of rewearing it the next day only to choose a completely different outfit. By putting it away, it saves me the mess and means less laundry. If I know I won’t be re-wearing it then I’d simply put it in the laundry basket. Now if only I can get my husband to do the same…
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Do small loads of laundry.
- I get easily overwhelmed when there is a huge pile of clothes. If it’s really big, then I think that I could never finish it with the little time I have and it would sit in my bedroom untouched for days (or we all just slowly pick at it to get our clothes). That’s why we’ve started doing laundry every day. With a family of 5, our laundry gets massive if we wait any longer. With small loads every day, I am able to do a complete load of laundry from start to finish in just a few hours. & the small loads do not scare or overwhelm me because it’s just a small basket of clothes.
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Load and unload the dishwasher daily.
- I grew up without a dishwasher and never really knew how to use it. For years, we would use our dishwasher as just a drying rack for clean dishes. Once I learned how to use it, it became a game changer. Every morning my boys empty the clean dishwasher, and as the day passes, we would rinse and put in our dirty dishes. By the end of the day, the dishwasher would be full and we’d simply run it. All I have to do after dinner would be washing big pots and pans. Not having to do dishes daily has been such a big time saver! So take advantage of your dishwasher
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Take donations out to your car right away.
- I am constantly decluttering, in fact, I designate every wednesday to declutter one problem area of the house each week. However, when I declutter I used to always just leave it in a box by the front door, but it would be this big messy box that would stay there all week and never usually made it to the donation center. So instead, we started taking it out straight to the car, and now whenever we’re out and about running errands, we can easily take that box to the donation center.
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Empty your purse every night.
- I like to carry my purse for everything, but after a day full of errands, it can get quite messy and hard to find anything in it. I’ve made it a habit clean out my purse every time I get back from somewhere. I file or throw away receipts, I organize my bills, I take out my keys and wallet and put it in the basket by the front door, and take out any other trash that might’ve made its way in. Doing this has made it so much easier to find things in my purse.
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Clean out the car regularly.
- Just recently, we got out car detailed and deep cleaned. Ever since, I’ve made it a habit to keep it clean. It was ridiculous and embarrassing how dirty our car was — sticky stains under the carseats and in the cup holders, food crumbs in between the seats, old coffee spills in the center consoles, dusty dashboards, and so much dirt everywhere. My mom always made a comment everytime I would pick her up.
- But since we’ve got it cleaned, I have made it a habit to vacuum up messes every week, wipe down everything, and pick up things off the floor and take it up to the house every day. We bought a car vacuum from Amazon, that works pretty good. I used it after our camping trip and it was like we never even went camping! Cleaning up little by little makes it less overwhelming and doable.
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Pick up things throughout the day.
- Part of our daily cleaning includes picking up. We do a little in the morning and after dinner. The whole family helps and it takes only about 5 minutes or less! We put everything where it belongs and it really helps keep the house clean. We also like to do a wipe down of the tables and counters every day.
So that’s our 10 clutter hacks that we use in our household every day to help keep the mess of our family of 5 down to a minimum. It helps keep me sane, and things are easy to find. Our home isn’t the cleanest, but it’s semi-organized and livable.