Simplifying to organize

The other day I read that to truly organize your home, it is easier to just simplify what you have.  The author (and I can’t remember where I read this) said it much better than I did but the gist was this:  instead of repeatedly organizing stuff, just simplify the amount of stuff that you have.  I believe that the author was talking especially to the stuff that we don’t use or that we are holding on to use one day – the stuff that takes up space but gives us little return because it’s not likely to be used.

Since our family lives in a small house, it seems that we always have to organize.

Always.

Seven people bring in a lot of stuff.  And it seems to easily get out of control and take over our home.

We seem to always be organizing our stuff.

Always. (I seem to be repeating myself too…)

It’s time to end the cycle.  Time to quit just putting stuff into a new container, box, or whatever and just leaving it there until the next time we organize {again}. 

This month I am starting a purge of the extra stuff and have started small.  I decided to simplify and organize my recipe binders.  If you look at them here, they don’t look so bad – just a little untidy and well-used.

But then you open them up and

It’s crazy chaos that’s quite hard to use.  Who has time to leaf through pages and pages of unorganized recipes?

So what steps am I taking?

• Purging recipes that we aren’t likely to try or recipes that we didn’t enjoy. (I am being very ruthless with the culling and am going to keep those that we know we like…this step is in progress)
• Reorganizing recipes into useable groups {main dishes, side dishes, desserts, canning…}  (coming soon)
• Making a section for recipes to try (these are recipes that I want to try before I put them into the binder.  If the recipe is not well received then it will meet the recycling bin.)
• Setting a budget for how much to spend on the simplifying/reorganization project  (I’m going to try to keep it at $10 for a new 3 ring binder and some scrapbook paper.  Planning to try to use dividers that I all ready have)
• Setting aside some time to make new, functional, and pretty recipe binders (still to come)

I’d like to have this project finished by the end of this week because the next area up for simplification is a biggie:

 The closets and the clothes!

Now you know that I’m keeping it real around here because I just showed you our messy master bedroom/craft/sewing/catch all closet.

(Can not believe I just showed you that! {smile})

In addition to the recipe binder and closets, I am trying to clean out and organize one drawer a day.  By choosing just one drawer a day, I am not quite so overwhelmed with the task at hand.

Before I go, I’d like to tell you about a great book that I am reading.  I have wanted to read this book a while and the other day it ended up being a free Kindle download.  The book is Organized Simplicity.

I’ve not completed the book but so far it has been quite an inspiration to continue on the path of simplifying in order to organize. 

Unfortunately, the free Kindle download version of this book seems to not be available anymore. 

**I also want to say that I am an Amazon affiliate.  I’m not entirely sure but I think if you purchase an item from Amazon through a link on my blog posts, I will receive compensation.  I’ve put a little note on the sidebar about this.  All money made will be used to support our homeschool.  I would still recommend this book even if I were not compensated for it in this way.  {smile}**

Do you have any areas in your home that you feel would be more organized if you just simplified the amount of stuff in those areas?