How to Keep Your Home from Being Overtaken by Clutter

It isn't difficult to find your home overtaken by clutter, especially if you have a family. When you add in all the things that kids and even adults have these days from DVD's to CD's to books, games,toys, and paper clutter can overtake your home in a heartbeat. However, it doesn't have to be that way, it is possible to have a relatively clutter free home if you employ a few of these easy techniques.

1. Make sure everything has a designated place. When objects don't have a home it is much easier for them to just wind up on the floor or somewhere else where they are going to be in the way. So, with the help of your family designate a place for everything in your home and that way it will be easier to put things away.

2. Designate 15 minutes every day as pick-up time. Before bed is the best time that way things get put where they belong for the next day. Involve your spouse or significant other and children in this as well.

3. Donate clothing and other items that aren't being used by you or your family to Goodwill, Value Village or anywhere they will be recycled. This way these items get recycled, but you don't have them cluttering up your home.

4. Have a filing system for important papers, and file important papers as soon as you receive them. This is a good way to ensure that you don't lose bills, or important receipts, and will also keep such things out of the way of prying eyes when you have visitors.

5. Teach your children the importance of keeping their rooms picked up, and items put away. You can make a rule that if you find a toy or item laying around that it gets taken away and put up for a few days. This will quickly teach your children about the importance of putting something away once they are done with it.

6. Go through you mail as soon as you receive it and either file, shred or recycle items as appropriate. This will ensure that you don't have piles of papers laying around eating up space with junk mail that you will not even want to keep once you really look at it.

7. Use storage containers as appropriate. You don't have to spend a lot of money on fancy storage containers to have an organized way for things to be put away. I have used plastic milk crates for files, and luggage to store seasonal clothing in to name a few examples you can probably find already around your home.

8.When you buy a replacement for anything, recycle the old one. This may sound like common sense but you would be surprised how many people keep old items. For example a person buys a new scanner for their computer, but they keep the old scanner as a back up. This may sound like it makes sense to keep the old item but the truth is the chances of you ever using that item again are very slim. Recycle any items that have been replaced and are not going to be used again, rather than hanging onto them "just in case."

9. Make straightening things up a daily practice; make the beds, straighten the cover on the couch, or chair, center that lamp on the table next to the couch. Just doing these little straightening things will help to make your home look less cluttered.

10. Have a place for your kids to put their papers that need your signature. Before bed check this place, sign all items, and return them to the same place for your kids to pick up in the morning. This will make sure items get signed that need to, as well as cutting down on paper clutter.

11. Don't keep every piece of schoolwork your child brings home, or picture they draw. It's ok to keep the special ones that have meaning for you, but if you keep everything, you are going to be fast overrun by loose papers. File what you do keep in a designated place.

Clutter is a fact of life, but it doesn't have to overrun your life. So, if you are having trouble staying on top of all the clutter in your home, try a few or all of these techniques and your home will be clutter-free and organized in no time!