On Monday I have someone coming to look at the house. Squeeeeee!!!!! On Monday I have someone coming to look at the house. Oh No! Okay. Breathing in a paper bag. What needs attention? The den. Which is the second living room. Which is a room that is a giant multi-purpose space and may or may not be clean at any given time. Right now, it is a laundry staging area, den with TV and couch, office, gameroom, sewing room, paper staging area as I file..... And, that's okay.
The keys to all of those things are containment and organization. This can take a lot of forethought. We have one area that is the actual living space. It contains a couch, wing chairs, gaming system, tv. Behind the couch are two large bookshelves plus shelves that line the wall that contain our children's library. At one time we had more than 600 children's books. Over the last two years, I have sorted and sorted and let the kids sort and we narrowed it down to our favorites and are down to probably 350. I know. 350??? There are some things that even an organizer holds on to! This space also contains my office. At one time I needed (or felt I needed) a large office area that was also the holder of my crafts. I've talked about this before. I have purged and purged and purged and now have a small amount of craft items that I really need plus the office supplies that I need to function. Seriously, when you make the decision to begin the purging process, you realize you need much less than you thought you needed. With that said, I have the vision of a dream office in my head and as we move toward this house process, I am holding that dream vision! If you have a living space - a living room or den - that does double duty, I want you to look at that space as compartments. Sometimes we get overwhelmed when we look at whole spaces. I know I have in the past. Then, I realized if I would compartmentalize my multi-space, chunk it down, I could work through it. For example, if I needed to do major work in this space, I would first look at our seating area. In theory, you did that earlier in the week, but I would start there. Can you sit down? Is the TV area a mess? Are the DVD's and games put away? Is the coffee table clear and better yet, is it beautiful? Do you have an office area in this space? If so, remember discussing this in the bedroom? Does your desk have empty glasses, is there paper on the floor, can you actually work in this space? (We'll be doing a full on office clear out a little later). Toys! Oh yes, the toys. Are there toys everywhere? Do the toys have dedicated bins? Do your children know how to put them away? Do they do it? When you approach these spaces in chunks, they become waaaaaaaaaayyyyyy easier to manage! So, below, you'll see an image from a couple of hours ago at my place. I am in a big filing project as I have been looking for an important document, which, BTW, I found, exactly where it was supposed to be except that it had gotten tucked into another document. All of the papers on the floor were recycled and I am still working through filing what is on top. Tonight, I want you to look at your space. If you need to, create a diagram on paper and label the spaces. I find a visual can be very helpful and begin the work of cleaning, clearing, purging and organizing space by space. In the words of Neecy Nash, "Get to Gettin". Dana
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Meet DanaI’m Dana Croy and I am a modern day mama. Balancing family and work is not always easy (not to mention a little self-care). Though being Mama to two fantastic kiddos is a huge part of my life, that was not always the case. I wear many other hats and invite to sit down and find harmony with me. Archives
August 2021
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