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 😂

This is the mop I bought. Loved equally by myself and my 6yo who has decided it is her job to
clean the floors at least daily!

If you do this daily would it avoid sweeping? Ie mop and sweep together?

Getting a waste disposal fitted when the kitchen was redone was life changing. Pretty much any food waste except coffee grounds and tea bags can go down it (don't put them down because they sink and collect in the U-bend and you need to unblock it!) - so no smelly bins, no rotting food attracting foxes or maggots. I can't imagine life without it and knowing how amazing it is, it surprises me they aren't more popular in the UK. I think they are still seen as very American?

Another product a Canary box cutter knife for slicing up delivery cardboard boxes. It slices through cardboard and adhesive packing tapes like butter but at the same time has some safety design I don't understand that means you can't really cut yourself with it. I hate the faff of breaking up cardboard boxes for recycling and this makes it much quicker.

penstore.co.uk/canary/box-cutter-non-stick-190-mm

Keter. not the cheapest but really genuinely weatherproof

I bought some Pyrex glass ones, the larger (say, A4 size) were too big and heavy so I used one as a jewellery tray, the other (A5 size) are great.

Yes I have binned all of my tatty tins - including all the bun trays, heart shaped trays etc that my daughters when teenagers at home were always baking cakes. My DH has form for using these grim baking trays for Sunday roasts and putting them on the table for family style dishing up - I have since picked up white ceramic oven to table dishes in charity shops for £2 each - so everything is looking much better.

I cook a lot and my major timesaver was moving all my spices and herbs from a cupboard into a big kitchen drawer and labelling the top of each one. No more rummaging through a cupboard with things falling out. I bought a load of matching jars with labels from Amazon and they are so pleasing to look at! This task also weeded out a LOT of duplicates so has cleared additional space.

I also bought some bigger jars for stuff I use loads of (things like turmeric or coriander that I tend to buy in bags) and also made up “mixes” for all the recipes I cook frequently. So now I now longer need to measure a “teaspoon of this, a tablespoon of that” when following a recipe - I just add the requisite number of spoons of the mix (which I post-it note to the top of each recipe). Cuts cooking times massively and makes recipes with lots of ingredients suddenly manageable enough for a weeknight. The big jars don’t fit in the drawer, but I can live with that!

oooh, I love threads like this! A few things I’ve done include:

• sorting out my tights drawer. I got some plastic dividers, so instead of having one massive tangled tights drawer, I have half a drawer for black (other half bras) and half a drawer for all other colours (and socks). Tights are all tied in knots so don’t get tangled and black and navy kept apart.
• kallax unit in utility room. Box for random bits of washing (socks, t towels etc), boxes for the dogs’ towels, box for various vacuum and cleaner attachments.
• mini drawers in cupboard for shoe cleaning stuff, various mop-head cleaners, magic sponges etc.
• small plastic boxes for bedside table. Compartments for lip balms, hand creams, medication, bobbles, nail bits.
• baskets in every room for dog toys
• baskets in every room for throws
• sorted all my spices wrote down what we had duplicates of. Keep list tucked in spice rack and check every time something is used up that we don’t already have masses of the stuff somewhere. A pain at the time but is actually freeing up space as we use stuff!
• organising wardrobe into t shirts, long t shirts, skirts, trousers etc. so much easier to find things when in a hurry.
• retractable multi chargers. No wires trailing
• sorting random wires/chargers/plugs for abroad into their own boxes and putting into labelled boxes.

I could go on…organising helps calm my mind!

I have at least 3 of these in different places in my kitchen, they are so useful

I like this. I do use a lot of pyrex but the tatty metal ones are still there. What do you use for baking and pizzas?

The own box per person is brilliant, I’m going to do this.
thank you

I’m sure I have seen a tip where you paint the rim with clear nail varnish to achieve the same result, it protects the metal rim from getting rusty when wet

For everyone asking about steam mops. I've got the Karcher sc3 which is brilliant, but expensive.

It solves a lot of gripes that the cheaper ones don't, ime, so worth it.

Got rid of my fugly Pyrex as well! We don’t bake and eat pizza rarely and that can go on directly on the oven shelf/tray thing.

Lots of great life hacks here, but to take it back to household snags: consider whether your fridge door is hung the optimal way round for where it is sited -- they can easily be changed over.

This year I plan to make 2 boxes to store under the bed

a Winter Box that will contain
Hot water bottles
Hats, gloves, scarves
ice overshoes
fluffy socks

a Summer Box that will contain
In date sun cream
sunglasses
Cooling sprays
hand fans

There are probably more things I can add to each box

Lidl have decent tupperware type products in the middle at the moment for a good price.

I regularly clear out oven trays and replace so they fit nicely in my drawer and are decent not rusty or scratched etc. As life changes (kids move out) I find we cook and use the kitchen differently so I have had a clear out of mugs beakers waterbottles and the like

I regularly do the same for clothes and bedding and towels

@RB68my husband has banned me from buying any more TW as our huge drawer is full and a bit out of control already. I’m a bit sad I’ll have to miss out.

I’m loving all the ides on this thread I’m filling my Amazon basket and making lists.. I need new roasters and baking trays and I’m emptying a cupboard taking the shelf out and putting a small table top sized freezer in there. I’ve ordered storage boxes for dc and will fill with gloves hats and scarves from primark for each of them I’m also thinking of getting a storage box for the car boot with dummies nappies wipes spare bottle for dd

I do this too. Several different styles of tupperware but each type nests and can fit several types in one box.
I have two large storage boxes that sit side by side and make better use of a corner cupboard.
We're planning to refit the kitchen and I want more pan drawers than cupboards and some of the metal shelving that clicks out when you open the door.

I also use baskets and large RUB type boxes in my food cupboards - stops spills in cupboards and when I need to sort I can pull out and do one by one. I did it originally when I had a bad back so I could reach everything

Maybe, if you dry mop it first, use a dustpan and brush to gather it then mop. Or leave it a few days then sweep the edges (not that that’s what I’m doing, honest!)

OMG there are coverless duvets???

I also bought a shark hydrovac for downstairs as it’s all tiled it’s fab for every day use I shall still do the flooring once a week on my hands and knees so the edges and skirting boards get done

I store the aerosol can upside down if they have a flat lid.
Or use a plastic lid from Pringles or coffee tin lid (azerra coffee has orange ones).