24 Ways to get Organized in 2024

 This post from last year has been updated to the proper number of goals (24) for the upcoming year. Good luck!

 If you're like me (and much of the rest of the world), you made some sort of resolution to get organized in 2023. Because I write about organizing and have time off from the middle of December to the middle of January, I've made a lot of progress on my organizing endeavors. 

But still, I focus on what remains to be done, not the least of which is the pile of items made homeless by my recent organizing projects. 

Some days, I look around my house and see a lot of organizing successes. Other days, I'm overwhelmed by all of the clutter that seems to collect and proliferate as soon as I look the other way.

That's when it's time to take small steps. Whether you've exceeded your 2023 organizing goals, or can't even remember what they were, you're sure to find one task in the list of 24 tasks below that can help you jump-start your organizing for 2024. Some are one-and-done tasks (at least for this year), while others may turn out to be starting points for larger projects. Remember that it's okay not to do it all one sitting. The key is to take small steps and to remember one thing.

It's a process.

24 Organizing Projects for 2024

1. Decide what your perfect planner looks like inside and out. Then, splurge on one that comes as close as possible to your ideal.

2. Clean out the junk drawer.

3. Clear off surfaces, clean them well and put things back mindfully, putting back only the things you choose to return.

4. Collect all the homeless items littering surfaces in your home and put them in one container. Put a sticky note with the date on the lid, and put that container in an accessible but out-of-sight location. In a month (or longer if you prefer), donate or toss anything remaining in the container. 

5. Dedicate 15 minutes to decluttering a space that annoys you.

6. Stare down a container that's not working and consider why you are using it. What do you love about it? What do you wish it had that it doesn't? 

7. Sort through the thickest file in your file cabinet and get rid of anything you no longer need to keep.

8. Change the shelf paper in one of your cabinets.

9. Clean out your underwear drawer and get rid of anything you'd be embarrassed to be wearing if you ended up in the emergency room.

10. Stand in the doorway of the room you spend the most time in. What decorative touch or organizing project would make the space a little better?

11. Go through the medicine cabinet and get rid of anything that's expired. Make a list of what you need to replace.

12. Go through your makeup and/or toiletries and get rid of anything that's expired or that you haven't used in a year or more (3 months for eye makeup). Make a list of what you want to replace.

13. Take stock of your towels. Decide how many need replacing and buy one new towel a week until you'd be satisfied offering any of the towels in your closet to an overnight guest.

14. Set aside an hour to take stock of the place in your house that most needs organizing (kids' rooms don't count). Make a plan for tackling it an hour at a time.

15. Take everything out of the cabinet under the kitchen (or bathroom) sink. Clean the area and return only the products you actually use. 

16. Stand in the doorway of your bedroom. What is one thing you could do to make it a more peaceful haven? 

17. Have everyone in the family go through his or her sock drawer. Toss anything that's too small, falls down, has holes, or is too pilly, dingy or faded. Set aside socks without a mate and determine how long to continue the search and/or if any of the singletons can be put together to make an interesting pair.

18. Make sure all the pens in your go-to writing or messages spaces write, and all of the pencils have points and erasers.

19. Take everything off one shelf of one closet. Wipe down the shelf and put back only the things worth keeping.

20. Go through all the purses, tote bags, and backpacks and discard any that are past their prime. 

21. Go through all the purses, tote bags, and backpacks and stock those you regularly use with the essentials: hand sanitizer, tissues, lip balm, a writing implement and small notebook, etc. That way, no matter which one you grab on the way out the door, you'll need to add only your wallet and keys and you'll be good to go. 

22. Work together with each child in the house to organize one space according to their style. 

23. Take everything out of the refrigerator. Toss anything that's expired. Wipe down the interior and put back only the food people actually eat.

24. Stand at the entrance to your home. What is one small touch you could add that would make you smile every time you walk in?

BONUS ITEM: As you put away your holiday gifts, practice one in/out. Got a new sweater? Get rid of an old one -- or another article of clothing, if you prefer. 

Perfectly Imperfect

  When my editor told me they'd decided on Know Thyself: The Imperfectionist's Guide to Sorting Your Stuff as the title of my book, I was less than enthusiastic. I'm terrible at titles, but I know when one grabs me, and this one didn't. It was, after all, quite a mouthful.

But, what the title did do was nail the essence of organizing by STYLE, giving us (writer and reader alike) permission to embrace the imperfection in the process. With an overall goal of keeping our house in order and being able to find what we need when we need it, we can carry out a plan that yields results that align with the mission of tidiness. 

In thinking about organization in this holy season, it occurs to me that there's an interesting parallel here. Jesus's arrival was perfectly imperfect; perfect, in the sense that it occurred exactly according to God's plan, and imperfect in many ways obvious to mere mortals. An immaculate conception. A pregnant woman whose husband was not the biological father of her child. Birth in a stable, followed by a run for their lives. 

Yet, none of this stopped Jesus from carrying out the plan the Father had in mind for Him. His mission to save us from death was unhindered by the imperfection of the world around him and he remained true to his mission despite myriad obstacles placed in his path. 

Makes keeping our houses tidy sound like pretty small potatoes.  

My point here is not to equate an organized life with the life of our Lord but rather, to point out that we, too, are here as a part of God's plan. Like our Savior, we have been given missions that sometimes align with
the world and sometimes run at cross-purposes to it. Some days, we count as successes and other days, our efforts seem to make very little difference. 

But it's the big picture that matters. 

Day by day, Jesus walked with his family and his disciples. He told stories, he healed the sick, and he made sacrifices beyond what we can comprehend. He traveled paths we can only imagine, recognizing the power of each moment even in times that yielded despair.

Christmas is a bittersweet season for many of us, but it's filled with opportunities to find magic amid the chaos and to appreciate that imperfect settings and situations contribute to the big picture of life. Like life, organizing is a process made up of small moments of success alongside setbacks, conflicts, and things that don't make much sense to us mere mortals. Some days, it can be a bit like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle with no lid and a few pieces missing but, if we persist, the end product might be a thing of beauty.

Even if it's imperfect.

This season, cherish each piece, remembering that it's only one part of a much larger whole.

Need a gift? Making a New Year's Resolution to read more or get organized? 

To order, contact me at L2Hess@comcast.net with "$5 paperback" in the subject line.

 (*Shipping and handling additional; prices in effect while supplies last).

Organizing for the Holidays

 If organizing is about balancing what comes in with what goes out, the holiday season can make us feel doomed from the start. No sooner have we finished giving thanks for all that we have than we start to acquire more. Gifts. Decorations. Food for future feasts.

If you have more storage space than you need, congratulations - this is probably not an issue for you. But if you, like me, feel maxed out when it comes to places to put things on a regular, run-of-the-mill weekday, all of these Christmas acquisitions can feel overwhelming.

At our house, the Christmas decorations are stored in the crawlspace off the master bedroom. This means that as I begin to pull out Christmas decorations and all the trimmings and trappings, they inevitably invade the space in my house that should, arguably, be the most tranquil. I wish I could tell you that I have a wonderful solution for coping with these interloping, festive, baubles but the truth is that it comes down to the same thing it does during the rest of the year: making sure our styles lead the way.

Take small steps. In order to minimize the amount of space that all these Christmas goodies take up in our bedroom, I take decorations out a few at a time. I have a red basket that I use to store the decorations I like to start with each year and that’s the first thing that I take out. Once I put up the decorations in that basket, I can use it to store anything that I’ve replaced during the decorating process (which also makes putting things away easier when I “un-decorate” in January). When I put the basket back in the crawlspace after putting out those first few things, I can take out a few more decorations. Decorating the house slowly makes it a little more festive each day.

Store presents according to your style. I need to see it or I know I put it somewhere organizational style? Don’t put everything in plain brown boxes! That’s a sure recipe for digging through the same container over and over again. Instead, consider the type of storage that works best for you during the rest of the year. If you’re trying to keep things covert, maybe do stick to the plain brown cartons that the gifts arrive in, but put a brightly colored sticky note on the outside of each one to signify whose presents are in which box. No need for covert operations? Use clear storage bins so you can see what you have. Cram and jam organizational style? Stick to one large container for storage, but consider subdividing it so you don't have a pile-up inside.

One in- one out. Opportunities abound to practice this! As you buy new decorations (or put them away), replace anything that’s become tired and worn (or a safety hazard). In addition, anything that doesn't make the cut this year probably won't next year either. Toss it, donate it, or recycle it now to create space. Cool stuff under the tree? Consider what you can do without now that you have all those fun, new things. 

The Christmas season brings wonder, joy, and stuff. We can't control all the stuff but, if we keep our styles in mind, we can keep some of it neatly under wraps.

qimono via Pixabay