What small household fixes have made everyday life noticeably easier?

[HardyPinkPanda]

I’m between jobs at the moment and have decided to use some of the time to basically snag my own house.

I’m going through every room and making a note of all the little things that have mildly irritated me for YEARS, but which I’ve somehow just accepted as part of life. You know the sort of thing - not actual problems, just things you regularly curse under your breath and then continue living with for another five years.

So far I have:

1. Ruthlessly slimmed down the kitchen cupboards so I could lose one cupboard and fit a tumble dryer. Every winter I normally spend approximately 46% of my waking hours hanging damp clothes around the house and rotating them like prize livestock, so I’m disproportionately excited about this.

2. Reorganised the Tupperware so every container now lives WITH ITS OWN LID. No more rummaging through 17 lids while slowly losing the will to live.

3. Thrown out about 12 random, ancient, slightly raggedy towels that had been granted permanent residency in the airing cupboard. It now has SPACE. Things are FOLDED.

4. Replaced the sieve that hasn’t had a handle since approximately 2020. Why did I just... live like that?

5. Put bigger shoe storage by the door, so we no longer have the traditional hallway shoe landslide.

6. Rewired a switch so it finally works the way you instinctively expect it to work rather than requiring a tiny moment of irritation every single time.

Honestly, none of this is exactly world peace, but the cumulative improvement to my quality of life is ridiculous. I keep thinking, WHY DID I PUT UP WITH THIS FOR SO LONG?

So humour me: what tiny, boring, seemingly insignificant thing have you changed/fixed/bought/reorganised in your house that has made you disproportionately happy?

I want the really mundane ones. The things nobody is putting on Grand Designs but which have genuinely made your day-to-day life better.

Basically, tell me what else I should be wandering around my house looking for 😂

I'm just here to pick up tips. I seem to live in chaos and I'm all lid no container when it comes to tupperware! Still haven't binned the lids though 🤣

Shoe storage by the back door instead of a collection of muddy, grassy gardening shoes and gloves on the floor in front of the door

Same as you, decluttered the kitchen to be able to swap a cupboard to something glorious. For me, this was a dishwasher

2 rows of coat hooks by the door, top one for coats, one underneath for bags (and kids coats until they could reach the top one). Less bulky than hanging everything at eye level

One storage box each in the bathroom which lives in the cupboard under the sink. Everyone has their own preferences for everything - shamooo, toothpaste, body wash - anyway. So now nothing us communal. Everything lives in your own box and nothing gets left out on the side of the bath/window ledge.

Matching slim velvet hangers in my wardrobe. Everything fits. Clothes don't slip off hangers. Looks calm

Screwed a hair dryer holder on the side of my dressing table for my hairdryer and straighteners to live in instead of them living on the floor or on the surface

Bought waffle bedding which looks lovely without needing to be ironed

Only have one type and size of tupperwear. Every lid matches every bottom

I love the difference that tiny improvements make and it does make you think afterwards "why the hell didn't I do that 17 years ago?" 🤣

Mine are:
Food boxes. Food boxes are bastards but as I ditched cling film years ago they are used for everything. So, after a menopausal tantrum resulting in the whole cupboard being emptied, I had the brainwave of putting a numbered label on each box and lid.

Cutlery. We have allergies in the house and both adults are clumsy, forgetful and disorganised. I could get to the end of making drinks and packed lunches and easily have used 4 or 5 knives because I did things in the wrong order and then didn't have time to properly wash the knife and reuse. So I bought another six knives and teaspoons.

Next step: fix the hot tap in the kitchen. It's been broken for about 8 years. Hence why I don't have time to properly wash my knife pile on a school run morning, as it would mean boiling the kettle to wash up!

Oh I forgot my most recent one.

Now that DS is bigger than me, I have decreed that this is now a household of M&S mens plain black socks and Nike mens white socks. No patterns, no stripes, no embroidery. God, it is so liberating to go to a drawer and just pluck two socks out. DH doesn't even bother balling them into pairs now - just takes them off the clothes horse and divvies black ones up into each person's drawer and all white into DS'. It's saved him hours (well, minutes).

I have arthritis and some days find it hard to pull the bathroom light to switch it on.

I have replaced it with a motion sensor light.

I am LOVING these… thank you!

Bought more storage! Baskets, under the bed storage, shoe rack etc. I need stuff to have a home otherwise it drives me mad!

I’ve given up on the Tupperware drawer. Honestly it makes me want to tear my hair out it’s such chaos but the tidying of it never lasts so I’ve had to give up on that one.

Decided that if I don’t use something/wear something in a year then it has to go. Along the same vein I also semi employ the one in one out policy. So if I buy anything esp clothes I really think about if it needs replaced what else I can wear it with/do I need it/ what can I get rid of to get it.

Storage boxes in cupboard so all the different types of foods are together. Same for under the kitchen sink. Saves hunting the shelves for what I want.

We use old takeaway boxes for food storage, all stacked in a small basket. All the same type so no matching needed. Most recent fix was clearing everything off my kitchen windowsill so I can wipe it easily. Nothing sits on there now.

Have a nice big rectangular basket on the cupboard just outside of the bathroom where the towels are neatly folded and ready for use. Isn't really space in the airing cupboard (need to tackle that at some point).

Colour coded cleaning cloths for the bathroom and kitchen. Cutting down the various cleaning products to a minimum (ongoing but getting there).

We recently replaced a vertical blind (think office style) in our garage conversion that was here when we bought the house (18 years ago) with white pvc venetian blinds. We also put the same pvc blinds in both bathrooms and kitchen and I can't even begin to tell you the difference it has made to the whole room!

Who would have thought window dressings were so important to the aesthetics of a whole room?!?

I solved the Tupperware issue. I bought a job lot of 20 mid sized ones from Amazon which hold approximately 2 regular portions or 1 large (the sort you would get from a takeaway). They sit in the cupboard with bases in one stack and lids in another. If I want to freeze 4 portions it goes in 2 tubs. My freezer is also tidy because the tubs are all the same size and they stack.

Coverless duvets, the whole thing goes in the washing machine and dries in no time.

I just bought a bed with built in storage drawers so I now can’t see any of the stuff I keep under there. Very soothing!

I love the idea of a hairdryer holder.

Not really a great hack but my robo-vacuum cleaner. Set to automatic at 5am and come down to the whole downstairs floor clean every day. Best purchase ever.

I recently chucked all the crappy kitchen ware I had put up with for years.
Now all my baking trays are a super non stick dream the whole process from cook to wash up is soooo much easier.
Replaced all tatty t towels, the potato masher that I have hated passionately now gone and a sieve with a hole gone !
I will no longer continue to make do with things that are worn out and past their sell by date.
I feel strangely liberated with my new attitude .

I’ve been meaning to start this very thread as I’m so impressed with mine:

Spray mop - don’t have much lino here so proper mop and bucket not really needed, don’t have the space for them and my last one disappeared into the shed a long time ago. Recently I’ve been needing to clean the floor more often as my elderly cat is using her litter tray more and I often get wet papers over the floor. Thought about replacing the mop and bucket but it would take longer to fill and
empty than to actually clean, so I have been spraying surface cleaner into the floor and wiping by hand. Bought a spray mop and it’s magic! So quick! Plus my dd loves it too so the floors are extra clean now!!!

Kallax - I bought a Kallax unit for the wall near my bed and have dedicated one cube for those clothes that are clean enough to wear again but don’t want to get mixed up with all the totally clean stuff. Means they’re not on the floor / on top of the Kallax. Am most impressed with this one!!!

I got rid or the ironing basket.

Dry washing from garden goes in over my arm (I've got good at folding as I go or there's a bench next to the line if I want to fold properly).

I put it away straight away or spread it on our bed so it has to be dealt with that day but doesn't crease.

Vast majority of things don't need ironing if going straight from line to hanger (and they've had a good shake before pegging out). Even if it does it goes on a hanger at one end of wardrobe and I do it as needed.

No more creased shirts stuck in the bottom of a basket forever or kids (and husband) dislodging a whole pile to find things).

Internal drawers for more of our kitchen cupboards. No more emptying the contents of the baking cupboard and then leaving it on the counter to try find the tin I want

I roll towels not fold them, much easier to stack and see which one you want from the cupboard.
I don’t iron.
black socks for everyone in the house so no more trying to match up socks.
hooks and pegs in every room to hang things.
shoe rack that fits all of our shoes.
key hook in the kitchen for keys.
storage basket on wheels for under the beds.

Oh my god. ‘Only have one size and type of Tupperware’ - this is mind-blowing. I can’t believe it’s never occurred to me! I have a mixture of cheap ones, takeaway containers, ones bought from Aldi. It’s a nightmare even though I store them with the lids like the OP.

Honestly, the biggest thing I did to make life easier was to get rid of loads of stuff, I know that’s not a top tip exactly but when everything fits in the cupboards and drawers, it’s so much easier.

Over the door hook to hang the ironing board on the back of a cupboard door.

Cat water fountain, holds lots of water and they prefer it (plus I don’t kick it over)
Multi USB adaptor, a tiny thing but I don’t have to keep unplugging things to charge them, they can all charge at once. See also - getting one of the kitchen electric sockets changed to include a USB slot.

Suggestion to OP…

Get a modern boiler and, hey presto, you’ll have a whole airing cupboard’s worth of extra storage.

What tog rating are they, please?

I moved recently, and deliberately left all the small kitchen items in the packing boxes. I moved them as I used them, and after a while discarded the remainder.
Egg slicer, rusty hand whisk etc - about 30% went !

Do you have a link or a picture please? We are looking for the same thing.

A fast phone charger with a longer cable. Getting rid of lots of stuff. And not reselling it. Just giving it to charity.