Tag: #cleaningandorganizing

1/15/23. Tiny tip-Don’t use valuable real estate as storage.

I teach teenagers for a living. If you live with a teenager, you know what I am about to say-their bedrooms are disaster zones. (Unless you are super strict and require it to be clean all the time.) I think the problem is that they are trying to cram too much stuff into a small space. I think that is what we sometimes do with our houses as well.

For example, my husband and I received a blender for our wedding. It is great and we use it a few times a year (I just made Cauliflower soup with it this week.) However, we do NOT need to store it in our kitchen-it takes up valuable space 98 percent of the time-space we just don’t have. Same with Crockpots and fancy dishes and platters and bread makers and muffin tins and… The list goes on and on! So, this Christmas break (we got snowed in for 3 days), I decided to move EVERYTHING we don’t use daily to the basement. It has made a world of difference in my kitchen. It goes back to the saying, “a place for everything and everything in its place.”

I have room in my cupboards. I have room in my drawers. It is a tiny little change that has made a big difference in my kitchen. Now when I tidy up the kitchen, I don’t have to shove things into places and hope the doors close. (I took out unused Tupperware and glasses a few weeks ago)

This tiny action has reaped big rewards. When I need my blender or crockpot, I will walk downstairs to the basement and get them. They just don’t need to be stored in the kitchen.

To my 99 followers-THANK YOU! What tiny organization tips do you use to keep your house in order? Have a great week!

1/7/23 Keto/low carb-one week down (how is it going???)

So, I hate to even mention this on this on my blog because this diet is more of a “burst” than tiny steps. Yes, leading up to starting the new way of eating was all tiny steps (more water, cut down on sugar, more steps, cut out chips, etc…) but the actual low carb diet itself is a maj0r “burst.” You have to go all the way to get into ketosis, and so you cant really tiny step your way there (there are other diets like weight watchers that are more conducive to tiny changes) but Keto/low carb is not one of them.

Why do I like a low carb diet? 1. It is easy as far as what you can/ can not eat. 2. It REALLY curbs my hunger. 3. It seems to provide me with more energy than other diets. 4. It brings down my cholesterol, sugar, and triglyceride numbers. (I have been able to avoid medications by eating this way)

Why don’t I like a low carb diet? IT IS NOT FUN-It is boring and repetitive and strict. It is difficult to eat with others (like if everyone is ordering pizza)

So…in order to make it more fun and hopefully stick to it long term, I am trying a technique called the carb nite solution. It is a book that professes you can eat low carb for 6.5 days and have what ever you want for dinner at the end of the week and it wont derail your progress. (I am picking Saturday night.) Tonight will be my first try at this. I will let you know how it goes.

Also, I am taking part in a lot of other bursts today such as deep cleaning the house (need to reset before school starts again Monday), taking down and putting away Christmas decor (including tree), washing all the laundry, towels, and bedding, washing the carpets (our cats like to dribble their food).

Today isnt really a tiny action day. It is a day of many bursts but it is a day I feel needs to happen every once in a while in order to have tiny actions work the other 99 percent of the time.

THANK YOU to my 99 followers-got a new one this morning so thank you to that person! Stay tiny my friends!

December 4, 2022. The start of “Declutter December”

In many parts of the world, people are starting to celebrate the holidays. Those holidays bring parties, food, presents, etc… It is a time of excess and celebration. This year, I started a challenge of decluttering my home, classroom, and car BEFORE bringing in more stuff.

The first day I took tea bags into work that I wasn’t going to use/drink (they disappeared before lunch). The second day I got rid of old receipts and expired coupons in our kitchen. The third day I cleared out a shelf at school and relocated everything back to where it should be or I gave it away. Today I cleaned out my coffee cupboard and found coffee beans from BEFORE Covid-so those went out with the trash.

We don’t have a ton of junk in our house and I am pretty good at keeping things clean and organized. However, the last 4 days have taught me that there is always more that can be cleaned out and donated, sold, or tossed. It helped to reveal things we can donate to others (measuring cups, pens, old towels to the animal shelter.) Hopefully as we come into the holiday season, we can keep ridding the house of excess stuff so that any new presents/food items/clothes/etc… have a place to live.

I really believe this will help with the inevitable holiday stress that always crops up around this time. My goal is to continue each day with one or two items that we can throw away, pass on to someone else, recycle, or just get out of the house.

Next up is Tupperware containers without lids, old bills/mail/magazines, any clothes that dont fit, etc…

To my 96 followers, thank you! How have you decided to handle the stress of the holidays? Remember to stay tiny in whatever endeavor you pursue.

Sept 26-cleaning out the garage with tiny actions

We moved into our new house in the late fall/winter of last year. As with most people, we stuffed a ton of boxes into the garage to “deal with later.” I also cleaned out my classroom and stuffed even more boxes into it. The creme de la creme was when we finished our basement this summer and put a lot of the basement boxes into the garage so that we could drywall, paint, etc… So the garage has become a bit of a disaster.

We could still fit two cars into it (I am proud of that) but EVERY other square inch is taken up with stuff and it needs to be dealt with. I COULD spend an entire weekend cleaning and organizing and getting it taken care of, but I don’t want to do that. Instead, I am using tiny steps to get it cleaned up. Here are the first 5 days.

Day 1. Brought 3 Christmas presents (light up boxes) to basement and stored them with the rest of the Christmas decor. Put winter mats in back of jeep.

Day 2. Two college signs for the basement a paper towel holder and two cooler bags. Silverware from our wedding and two plastic containers that are empty

Also I have some energy and some time while something is cooking on the stove so I took about 5 gallons of paint down to the basement where we are going to store it more permanently than in the garage because we do not need it right now.

Day 3 is five more paint cans, a small bin and threw away some essential oils that were 5 to 7 years old and not stored properly.The goal is to every day put something where it supposed to be one or two things and also throw out some thing or discard some thing that doesn’t belong

Day 4. threw a way two teaching things, put two in my bag to take to school, moved around three shelves so that the more I organize I can start putting things where they belong and I moved a rake and a leaf blower. Also got rid of three shirts that had been peed on by my cat and put some cleaner in the hall closet where the rest of the cleaners are (husband noticed at this point)

Day 5. took some golf signs to the basement. Put tie cables into a bin. Put some shoes on new cleaned off shelf. Threw away 2 books. Hung up blower.

Thank you to my 89 followers! My book will be published to Amazon soon! I will link it here also!