LITTLE things that help keep you organised?

[starrychime]

There's a lot of threads about cleaning routines, 15 min sessions etc which I love to read but never get round to following (one day, one day I will!)
Wondered if anyone has some little hints and tips that make things just a little bit easier about the house?
I use paper plates for morning toast, lunchtime sandwiches etc as I HATE washing up (no washer) - and it keeps it down a little bit.
Also keeping a small Ikea drawer sorter in the bathroom with DD's bobbles and clasps so they're to hand in the morning helps a bit.
Anyone else have any little tips?

I dont follow flylady but I was led to the link by the good housekeeping thread on mumsnet. Most of the time I still do 'babysteps' ( ie shine my sink, put out the hotspots: I have to say I already did the wash and dress thing) as I work full time and I really think any person who follows all of flylady's guidance must spend their whole life cleaning and organising:

But just following 'babysteps' helped a lot to transform my home, and every so often I choose a 'mission' or do a '27 fling boogie', the name of which I find hilarious.

A '27 fling boogie' is when you go round a room and fling 27 things you don't want and don't use into a black bag and then get rid of the bag and its to take you no more than 5 mins. It is so doable. SOme one like me needs ideas but not too much structure to housekeeping.

Bin in each room.
Laundry basket in each room.
Complete laundry operation done every day, nothing left hanging over to the next. I always use the dryer. I find this is one thing it pays to be ruthless about.
Laundry sorted according to owner. Owner then puts away (so goes the theory).
No sock or underwear sorting -- all underwear for the DDs in one clean laundry basket and all socks in another in the bathroom.
No ironing of anything except at Christmas.
Only one set of sheets and pillowcases per bed. Washed and dried and replaced in one day. Big sheet/towel/shower curtain washes on hot once a week.

I make dinner for 5 every day there is nothing by way of leftovers that can be used. If it doesn't all get eaten that day it gets served again stretched out with a loaf of bread the next day, or it goes in lunchboxes and flasks.
Meals planned in a general way by the fortnight.
All empty cereal boxes must be placed in the recycling bin by whoever uses the last helping, and milk cartons running low left on counter so I am not bamboozled by empty boxes left back on top of the fridge and empty cartons left back inside it.
Master shopping list on fridge (dry erase board with printed list stuck to one side and everyone is welcome to mark the board if they notice something needs replacing)

Large calendar in central place with everyone's life written down.
Bill box for all bills and tax stuff and receipts for things that might need to be taken back or warranty info.
Post opened beside kitchen bin.

All loose sports gear is kept in the car (kneepads for volleyball, mouthguards, shinguards).
All sports footwear also in car, in a bag, always.
All sports uniforms must be put in sports drawer by owner. I am not responsible for lost uniforms. If you can't find it that is your problem and you can explain it to your coach.

kickass I think you can still plan with a DH with erratic eating patterns. I am responsible for weekday meals in this house. I expect DH to inform me in the afternoon if he isn't going to be home/hungry for the evening meal.
If I know he's going to be late, I might wait to eat with him or eat with the DCs at usual time and leave him some to microwave later.
Occasionally he's caught out by a last minute crisis at work where they all stay late and order food at the office, but the food I've made is rarely wasted.
We have leftovers meals at least once a week with whatever is hanging around in the fridge. If there isn't enough, I bulk out with soup or salad.

mathanxiety - ironing only at Christmas...

flylady never mentions ironing and I just don't get it - our clothes look terrible if they haven't been ironed. Some stuff we could probably get away with, and of course I never iron underwear, pyjamas, bedding, etc but DH's shirts for work? Am I missing something? Or do you just buy clothes that don't need ironing?!

Ironing, its about shaking clothes out before hanging to dry, then folding well or hanging. Think somepeople take out of td early to do this.
Shirts well you need ( or he) needs to iron those.

I never iron but i have a range to do it. Also sahm so don't care so much.

My biggest tips are:
Washing two loads a day, always hung and previous days away. Never loose control of washing....ever!
Dw loaded all day, switch on in evening, emptied morning.
Bathroom swish every day and shower squeezy- amazing.

The biggest thing that changed my life is never leave a room a mess, always put things back. It makes a huge difference as you become trained to have a mega tidy house. Im training the children, husband well he's harder to break but has got way better over the years.
It only works in an organised clutter free home, so thats the first stage.

I buy clothes that don't need ironing (or dry cleaning either - too expensive in the long run) and take anything that does out of the dryer the minute it stops, then fold carefully and hang.
I always sent exH's work shirts out to be dry cleaned (very cheap in the US, something like a dollar and a few cents per shirt, but women's clothes were much more expensive for some reason) - and I don't even have that chore to see to any more. A week's worth of shirts would cost probably about $6, and with a few trousers too, the bill might come to about $12. The time I would take to wash and dry and then iron and hang up these items was worth more than $12 to me.

Brilliant thread.

I been doing the washing in the evening, hanging it on hangers when it comes out and most things are dry by the morning.

I always replace the water in the kettle and waterfilter after I have used it.

Whilst waiting for the kettle to boil I put away the dry washing up and wipe down surfaces. I have decided that life is too short to dry up!

I never iron either - agree with pp that timing, shaking out and folding nicely is the key. Also, I think I have just one shirt, otherwise my clothes are generally non-iron. It was a priority thing - I'd rather forego stuff that needs ironing in favour of extra time to myself and less stress lazy If dh needs a shirt ironed for work, well he's a big boy and he can do it himself :o

But the definitely the biggest thing - as someone upthread mentioned - is making sure that everything has a place. Took me years after living with DH to get to that stage, but life is so much easier when you do. And yes, simplify - one folder for paperwork (I work on a similar principle with work email) etc.

With a husband and 2 sons, I worked out early that one day there would be a huge pile of socks and underpants that had to be sorted back into their owner's draws. So I got organised. My solution.....

One has briefs and blue socks
One has boxers and grey socks
One has trunks and black socks

Simples!

Kickassangel can you make up big batches of spag bol, soup, stew etc. and then portion it out into individual containers so that you can reheat just one for you or two if you're both eating?

Also my DH is pretty good about the housework so I consider myself very lucky but as we both work 40-hour weeks and he travels a lot, we just can't keep up with the chaos.

I like the bedding in the pillow case idea and I was wondering about putting a towel in each set as well and just changing them all together.

I am not very good at getting things done. I have 2 young dcs and 2 horses so I need things to be quick and easy otherwise they get put off.

Some things that are really helpful are:

Meal planning - I can never understand how anyone can do a shop without. I can do a months worth of shopping with 2dcs in tow in 30mins.
Going to bed with a clean and tidy kitchen - doesn't always happen tbh, but if I wake up to a tidy kitchen, everything runs more smoothly the next morning.
A washload every day - again, something I struggle with, but makes a huge difference with very little effort.
Putting clothes out for the next day - makes getting out of bed easier.
Cleaning wipes - I keep some in the kitchen for wiping grotty patches off the floor, and some in the bathroom for cleaning loo, sink, floor etc.
Get up 15mins earlier - this is my new goal as I am running out of time in the mornings.

Like the idea of a towel in each set of bedding - we only have one towel each, which forces me to wash and dry them all in the same day!

I have 3 washbaskets, for whites, lights and colours, when one is full it goes downstairs to be washed.

I buy cards a month in advance, write them and have them in date order ready to be sent.

Calendar with columns is a must for me.

Keep a shopping list on my phone and add to it.

I'm fairly disorganised but muddle through best I can thanks to flylady.

Already do do the bedding in a pillowcase, it's v good.

Our ironing used to get done at the weekend- all school uniform and work clothes for the week- the rest would be folded and put away unironed.

I have to say I had an ironing lady from the moment I had my first DC. If one works full time there are some tasks which one doesn't have the energy to do and ironing is one. Cleaning the kitchen floor and bathrooms once a week is another. As a minimum. Any DH who expects a lady to work full time and do all the cleaning and ironing needs re-educating fast in my opinion. The budget for it needs to go in the household budget. Otherwise you wont have the energy to - organise- and, more importantly, love your family.

This was taught me by a very manly man who had to clean his own house!

1. Ask all boys in the house to SIT DOWN whilst using the loo. This requires great tact, as the only reason men/boys stand up is to prove they are not girls. Maybe have an agreement that they can choose to stand up but they have to clean afterwards and that includes the floor. You would be amazed at how clean everything becomes and there is none of that awful loo seat up stuff...

1. 'Lavatory etiquette': 'After using the loo, please look down. IF you have created a skidmark, get some paper, wipe it down and flush away'.

These two things really work. We (4 males) are the cleanest neatest family in this area and I can always tell when visiting boys have used the lav (and they are a messy pain).

Also: iron whilst you watch telly. It turns it into a guilt-free experience! I'm not watching Noel, I'm working!! This tip was given me by my ironing lady, who promptly did herself out of a job.

15 minutes? Please explain? My house is awash with paper.

Marking my place, as I definitely need help! I am looking at this thread in awe

Have been lurking on this thread and it's brilliant! I already use some of the things on here, but would love my DH to use fewer hotspots! Am going to suggest to him a daily 5 minute sweep up of all his papers etc. I like to do a monthly inventory of the dry store cupboards and freezer and top up as and when. Am also a good list maker and find they do help. Also phone calendar/diary for alerts and appointments are invaluable. I'd love more space, so am always on the lookout for tips for better storage solutions apart from getting DH to chuck more stuff! We're having a baby in August and want to move over to more online deliveries for groceries etc by then.

YY to ironing on front of the TV too!

been reading this thread...
just been to charity shop and found a really cool receipt storer pretty folder thing for 50p... with pockets and you write on the receipts that are in the pockets.

we are about to move house (fingers crossed) so, i guess we will need to buy a fair few bits of stuff where we need to keep the receipts... and i plan to be organised and use it

The first thing to go in will be my washing machine receipt which is only a few months old, and will be coming with us.

I sit down during the weekend and review what needs to be done during the week. These items get added to my to do list (pay bills/send birthday card etc).

I have a to do list for each day that lists any job that I would not normally do (I.e. I don't put shower/feed children etc on it).

I do errands in batches so that if I'm going to the post office, I'll also buy extra stamps or envelopes etc.

We have a timer on our fridge and use these for our 5 min tidy up before school. I then use it throughout the day, for example when I think I'll just pop onto MN to check something. This ensures I'm not still on here four hours later.

Load of washing in as soon as I'm up. This is ready to go out when I get back from school.

Everything is ready the night before. Bags are packed, uniforms laid out inc underwear and shoes, homework is done and packed away. Forms are signed immediately and dates written in calendar. Anything needed for after school activities is ready and by the door.

I meal plan for the week. Even if we go off-plan, I know that I've got something for each and every meal for the week. Anything leftover is carried over to e next week.

It's still chaos 50% of the time.

i have two boys and i pre-empted the future splashes when ds1 was toilet training so now i have a packet of flushable toilet wipes in a drawer beside each toilet (only 2) and they both know (ages 6 and 2) to wipe round the rim after peeing, put the wipe in the toilet and put the seat and lid back down. sometimes they forget and i remind them but they are still young so i forgive it. i think i might implement the sitting whilst peeing but how do i do that so as not to make them hate it? their dad (who doesn't live with us) would tease them about it i think. maybe i'll just leave that one actually.

also WRT washing (this is my achiles' heel) we have a gazillion towels but i try to insist we each use the same one for a week before it gets washed. i had the idea of buying us all a different coloured set so we know who owns which and then that person would be responsible for putting it in their own washing basket. the thing is, as well as each of us having our own washing basket, i laso have one in the bathroom and two (colours and whites) in the kitchen and i'm the only person who is taking care of it all. have i got too many baskets? should i take the bathroom and kitchen ones away and just tell teh dcs that their clothes will only be washed if they bring them down and out them in the machine themselves? at the minute i feel like i have washing in every room waiting to be dealt with and it never gets completely cleared.

OMG I love this. DH & I work full time and have 1 DD and 3 other DCs for weekends and holidays. Need all the help we can get!
But this thread has inspired me to clean out my airing cupboard!

I am def going to do a folder for paperwork. I will also do a reminder page for birthdays which can then go in the folder, so that 2 weeks before I need to send a card, it appears.
Am also thinking that I can have a to do and to buy list in there.

One thing I really want to do is have a proper desk on the main floor. The study is in the basement, and it is such a faff going down there to print things out and file them. I really want the study on the main floor, but where it is now looks out over the garden, so Dh wants to keep it there.