Earlier in the week I wrote about How Do I Start to Get Organized (Part I) and I gave you a couple of tips to get moving on getting your home or office organized. These tips were really the logistics and the first part of the planning. That was the easy part! After you have taken care of Part I you will be ready to move on making a dent in getting organized.

1. Have a Vision-Take some time to evaluate what your room looks like now and what your vision is for the space once it is organized. I love using Pinterest to pin ideas of what I would love a room to look like. It's a goal to keep you motivate to get organized!
2. What's the Purpose?- I find many of my clients don't have a purpose for their space and that is why a particular room, closet, table or cabinet becomes a catch all for stuff and gets cluttered. Define the purpose of every space in your home.
3. Be prepared– If you have followed the steps in Part I, you have a day and time scheduled to get organized. When the day arrives you want to be prepared. Make sure you have plenty of garbage bags, containers to sort, post-its and sharpies to categorize items, and cleaning supplies. If you are organizing paper I recommend having colored file folders on hand.
4. Get Started– You have already decided which room to start in. Now, where to start in the room? Many times this is what is overwhelming. I always start at the doorway and work from right to left or left to right and work around the entire room in the same direction. If you start working in one area of the room, then bounce to the other side, then start working in the middle if you have to stop and come back in a week you won't remember what you have organized and what you haven't. If you work your way around the room in a strategic manner you will have a defined place where you stopped.
5. Maintain what is organized-If you don't make it through the entire space in one organizing session; work hard until the next session to keep what you have already organized, organized! This is a little test on maintenance.
6. Touch Everything-As I'm working around the room, I make my client touch everything. Touching each item is very powerful. My clients also have to make the decision on what to keep, why they are keeping an item and if they keep the item how they are going to use it and where is it going to be stored.
7. Piles and Sorting-We usually work on creating piles and sorting by category items you are keeping. Here is a list of typical piles. You may have more or less. 1) Keep items that stay in the room you are organizing; 2) Keep items that go in another room 2) Items to giveaway/donate (try to put these in your car after the organization session. If not, they will creep back into your home); 3) Items to throwaway; 4) Items to Recycle and 5) Items to shred
8. Containerize– For the items you are going to keep, do they need to be put in a container? If so, is there something already in your home you can use? If not, then buy what you need. Make sure to measure you don't want to buy a container to small or too big for the item or space. I buy most of my organizing containers at Dollar General, the Dollar Tree, Walmart and Target. For more specialized products I love the Container Store.
9. Clean and Label-Clean the space and once you have the proper container, add the item and label if necessary. If you are filing papers, labeling is a must!
10. Everything has a Home-Place the item or container where it goes. Everything in your home should have place to live.

Obviously, hands on organizing sessions are more intensive than 10 steps and things will come up throughout the process that may not be mentioned here but this should give you a good start. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask.

Be Bold. Dream Big. Bless Others.

Stephanie

*Please subscribe to this blog by entering your email address on the home page in the bottom left corner. You will receive a confirmation email to accept. Thanks!

Do you have clutter in your home? Do you need to get organized? This week is National Clutter Awareness Week and what better way to celebrate than to start getting organized!

As a professional organizer I understand that getting organized can be overwhelming. One of the top sayings I hear from clients is, "I just don't know where to start. It is overwhelming. "

Yes, if you think about trying to organize an entire room or even your entire house by yourself it is very overwhelming. I recommend a couple of things to get you started:

1. Seek help. This could be a friend, family member or a professional. Having someone guiding, encouraging and holding you accountable through the process is going to help you stay on track. You will get more accomplished than if you did it on your own.
2. Prioritize. Don't try to tackle the entire house in one day. Think about the area that needs organizing most and start there. Once you complete that area then move on to the next area on your list.
3. Make a date. Schedule time on your calendar to get started. Block off the time you want to spend organizing. If you are hiring an organizer this will be easy. If you are working with friends and/or family, make sure to get them to commit to showing up at your home at a specific date and time.
4. On the dates you don't have help there is still a lot you can do by yourself to make progress. I tell my clients, set a timer for 10 minutes. Start going through your stuff for 10 minutes. When the timer goes off you are done for the day. The two reactions I get from clients that have done this is ,"I can't believe how much I accomplished in just 10 minutes and I was in a groove and worked well past the 10 minutes I set."

These are just a couple of tips to get you started. I will be sharing more over the course of the week about now that you have a plan and someone to help how do you actually get rid of stuff and get organized!

Enjoy National Clutter Awareness week! Don't hesitate to post questions or email me at stephanie@givinggal.com as you start the process of getting organized.

Be Bold. Dream Big. Bless Others.

Stephanie