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 😂

A butter crock solves the butter problem. The butter is upside down with the top in water. This means the butter is always spreadable but doesn't go rancid. Mine holds about half a block butter and is fab

Or just buy spreadable?

It's not butter though.

This is the best post ever on MN. I have just finished putting baby pics in album (my DS is 21), my hob stickers are already here, and my Amazon order of cupboard lazy Susan's, magic wipes and cling film boxes is on its way.

Thank you OP!

Oooh @MrsClausMaybe do you have a link or anything for these? been on the hunt for decent serving spoons for ages. Preferably plain as we have patterned cutlery.

Butter and spreadable butter are not the same.

Something I find useful is a teaspoon with a long handle.
Stellar Rochester Latte/Sundae Spoon Set | Stellar Cookware
(other retailers stock similar ones)

When clearing out the house of my late parents, we found a canteen of silver-plated cutlery. We thought about doing what they had done - saving it for “special occasions”. But we quickly agreed that life was too short - so now we eat our beans on toast at lunchtime (and indeed all our meals) using the posh stuff.

If you’re storing something like this away - that rainy day is now.

Love this!

You can buy stick on led lights which are battery operated, and which push to light up. We have those in an under stairs cupboard, two for different shelves.

If you can justify the initial expense, a heat pump dryer is similar to a condenser because it doesn’t have an outside pipe. However it is much cheaper to run. Probably not worth it if you have a good tumble dryer but definitely worth considering if replacing. We did a lot of research and bought AEG.

These pan lid holders - I have two inside the front of the pan drawer, and two inside the cupboard under the sink, and no longer have to rearrange things and fight with random lids to get things in and out of the pan drawer. They hold the lids snugly enough that they don’t rattle and crash when you open the drawer. I did have to cut them in half to make them the right size for bigger lids and I added a very short screw to hold each one firmly, but the faff of installing them was totally worth it. https://www.robertdyas.co.uk/joseph-joseph-duo-3pc-pan-lid-holders-grey Also decluttering the pan drawer so everything left in it has a specific place to live.

I cut a hole in the back of my chest of drawers big enough to fit a plug through, and now my hairdryer lives inside the top drawer, permanently plugged in to the socket behind the chest, and I can’t see the cable at all when the drawer is shut.

No link sorry, I bought them a few years ago now. I did get them from Amazon, they’re intended for catering so you could use that as a keyword!

Thank you, I will investigate!

It's partly butter and tastes ok. It's also about half the price of butter. I use butter for toast or things where the feel and taste are really important, but the spreadable is fine for sandwiches etc. (I'm not talking about spreads which are not butter. I mean spreadable Lurpak, Norpak etc.)

Sure.

But the suggestion was about butter. Not about something that isn't butter and that you think is acceptable instead.

When I bought new wardrobes I chose ones with x 2 hanging rails instead of just one rail! What a difference it makes. Can see my clothes handing up so more easily instead of all being cramped in.

My point was that that it is butter. It's just got oil added to it.

I think the pp is trying to say that a butter crock or just taking out small pats of butter is a solution to the hard butter problem.

Using margarine/spread or a spreadable blend with partial butter content isn't a solution to the butter problem since very many people would never eat those as they are ultra processed and really bad for your body. As such they're not a solution to the problem.

It's a bit like saying my mayo doesn't last long and a solution being "dip your chips in ketchup instead". They're just different things.

Use lifeless Tupperware boxes in a slim cupboard in the bathroom for new toothpaste tubes razors..new toothbrush heads hair elastics etc.
I'm another one who loves the slim velvet covered coathanger.
Group all my white tops together followed by colours in groups.
Decant soap powder from a big box into a smaller plastic tub with a lid

The spreadable butter I mentioned is mostly butter with rapeseed oil. It's not UPF.

🤣 Yes! Just in case... That's why I'm drowning in shit!!

We've got this... Hopefully!

Yours,
All lid, no container.

That's got to be a future username 🤣

Great thread.

About hairdryers.... would anyone know if there are such things as hairdryers with curly wires (similar to the hotel hairdryers on the wall, or the old landline telephones!) I'm sick and tired of the straight wires curling up and having to uncurl them nearly every time I use mine. Yes I haven't much patience!

I did a search (cursory TBH) and all that came up were the wall mounted hotel types.

My tip for the day is, I am partial to Nescafe Gold coffee (philistine!). I buy the big jars when on offer, but I only have two large cups a day. I find that when I open the jar, the contents lose flavour very quickly. I now decant into small clip lock containers to keep fresh and it works. I think it's the constant opening of the jar letting air in that deteriorates it, or maybe it's just shit coffee lol!

@persephoneee this?

Thanks, but I keep saying that is what I want to get rid of.