198 | 3 Things I Do Every Evening to Maintain a Clutter Free Home

Waking up to a picked up in orderly home is my favorite way to start every morning. It sets the tone for the day there are three thing is that only take me a couple of minutes every evening and it makes it possible for my mornings to start off clutter-free i will be sharing those with you on this episode Have you ever heard the phrase? Never miss a Monday. Some of the fitness accounts that I follow on social, see thing is like, Monday is the most important or your Monday workout, especially if you had the weekend off or you really slacked over the weekend, then Monday sets the tone for the week. The Monday workout. Sets the tone of what you’re going to do and the physical activity that you do, the workouts that you do the rest of the week. That is why I’m bringing that up today. It came to mind when I was thinking about this [00:02:00] episode and what we would discuss over here for today’s episode, because our home is. What we wake up to each day that sets the tone for the rest of the day. And of course, that can carry you through to the rest of the week, because it’s a day after day after day. I know if I woke up in the morning and I came out to a mess, whether it is just in one room or it’s all over the place on every surface dishes piled on the counters, a sink with a bunch of stuff in it, waiting for me to do chores that needed to be done. Piles of laundry, to fold baskets of laundry over full, because they needed to be put in the washer and actually washed. All of that stuff, including the clutter everywhere. That would be discouraging. Discouraging might even be a nice word. It would not be a great way to start the day. And it would have set the tone of a really a negative atmosphere in a way. It sets that tone to be annoyed and to be grumpy and just in a bad mood, because you have all of this stuff right in your face, knowing that you need to tackle it, you might not get to it.

And the thing is aren’t going to get better unless you put in a lot of work. No, of course. I talk about decluttering all the time. I talk about organizing and making sure that you have routines set up that are serving your home and your family. And the routines that we have are what makes it possible for that situation of waking up to a messy cluttered home. Those routines are what is going to prevent that from happening in the future. I have done to the decluttering in my house. I have put in all of the work to remove the excess and to declutter anything that is extra. I do have systems in place. And I have routines that I set up intentionally to prevent clutter from accumulating in my home. And also those routines making it possible for things to happen in a natural way [00:04:00] because they’re habits now. So we put things back or we put things away after we are done using them. Everything has a home because the organization is in place.

So it’s easy to get something out, find what we’re looking for, use it for what we need, and then it’s easy to put it away. Again, it is not a big deal. We have these systems and routines in place. Everything in the home has a place to go when it’s not being used. So all of those things are working together. Now the intentional routines that keep everything going and that maintain the organization. Those are in check and yes, it took time, but I know how to do this and I’ve helped enough people. With setting the systems up and the decluttering and the organizing and combining the routines to maintain this longterm. And that’s why I have courses like this simplified whole masterclass and programs. That you can follow. So the, you could have success with this kind of stuff, too. Now if all of those things are working in my house, we also have to remember that we make millions of decisions every single day. Making those decisions are one thing that adds to the stress and the overwhelm. I would be making millions of decisions every single day, but because I have established those routines. it brings that down. It makes it less, you don’t have to think about as many things in my evening routine. There are three things that I do. There are a few steps that I take every single evening, or some of them are only a few evenings a week, but there are routines at my home that make it possible. To a week up to a house that is free of clutter or a clutter-free home. And that means that I start the day without adding unnecessary stress or projects. To my to-do list to have busy day already, these things are already done. They’re already taken care of, and I can start my day on the right foot, or I can start my day with going back to the earlier [00:06:00] reference of never miss a Monday. I can start my day on the right tone or setting the right tone for the day and the week.

I make sure to load the dishes in the dishwasher. And empty the SIG. That means that any dishware or dishes. That are in the sink or on the counter. Those are put in the dishwasher. And if the dishwasher is full, I start the dishwasher. So that cycle can run and be something that is completed the next morning. When I wake up. The sink is empty. When I go to bed, there are not dirty dishes out around the house, on the tables, anywhere like that. The sink is cleaned and it is going to be empty. When I wake up in the morning. One thing that keeps this practice to only a few minutes is because we do the dishes as we go throughout the day. Everyone knows because the age of my family, if you have a baby, this is not possible, but as your kids get older, two or three years old, it is possible for them to take their cup or take their plate to this, the sink, and set it on the counter next to your kitchen sink so that your not. Checking all of these dishes down all of the time. Get your family in the practice of putting thing is at least at the kitchen seek if not renting the dishes that they use and putting them in the dishwasher. If you have some type of chore set up for your kids, this can be if it’s age appropriate, this can be something that the kids help with too. You do what works for your family and what makes it so that your home functions for your family. So you have to take into account the individual needs and the ages of everyone and who lives in your home. But emptying the sink is one thing that makes it so that my kitchen is less cluttered and it is a good, a place to go to in the morning where I don’t have a sink full of dirty dishes, [00:08:00] screaming at me that they need to be done.

And the big thing that. Makes that only take a couple of minutes is the fact that we put our dishes in the dishwasher when we are done using them throughout the day, or at least in the sink. If the dishwasher is full or if it’s something that needs to soak, at least they are ready to go into the dishwasher as soon as possible. The second thing that I do. Is a long with the sink. I clean the counters and the table. When the last person is done in the kitchen, the table is wiped down. The counters are clean. I wipe off the counters after I cleaned the kitchen sink and I get everything back to that baseline that I prefer, the counters are nice. And clutter-free because we put everything back and because I dialed in the organization, That means that everything has a home. So if there are things like yesterday, we went to the farmer’s market. I purchased a few things that don’t belong in the kitchen. Those were in a bag on my kitchen counter. I sat them there when I got home quickly because I was off to the next thing We also had company in town for a few days. And so there were some extra things out that are normally not On the kitchen counter. I was able to grab those and in less than a minute, Walk to the room where they go open the drawer and put them back, open the cabinet and put that away. When you have. Organization where every single thing in your home has a home. It is very simple to grab the things that are out of place and make a couple of laps around your house, returning things to your home. It takes minutes. It is. Uh, something that is not a big deal, you can return these things to your home. So that’s an example of our routines and the organization make it possible. They work together and they make it possible to maintain this clutter-free or less cluttered environment. the first two work together, the loading of the [00:10:00] dishwasher, making sure the dishes. The dishes are done, the sink is empty and then cleaning off the table and the counter. So that those are also clutter-free and they heard clean. When I come out in the morning, my. Kitchen is not cluttered whatsoever. It is a place where I can start the day, cook breakfast, do whatever I need to do and not feel burdened by the mess that is there from the night before and the days before. The third thing I do. I kind of hinted at this with the last one, but I do a quick walk through of the house picking up and putting anything away that is still out of place. We. Sometimes take our shoes off at the door. When we walk through the house and some of those shoes have a designated spot by the back door where they stay. Some of them do not. If I am wearing a fiancee or a pair of shoes or something that I don’t normally wear because of what the day schedule called for those I’ve took off.

When I walked in the door and I’ll just grab those at that time and then take them to my closet quickly, put them away, things like that. If we had friends over or activities, Or extra things. If I was doing some type of a crafty creative projects and maybe I left one or two things out and didn’t put all of them away when I finished up. At that time, I will do a Walker on the house and put things away that are out of place. This is something that adults can do and kids can also do If you have a cleanup time at the end of the day, it makes sense to have your kids involved, where they’re picking up the things that they got out and picking up the toys, especially if that is all over a main room in the house. Get those. Picked up and put away at that time and you should not have the burden of all of that. Let everyone partake in these things. When this becomes a routine and the habit is to put your items away when you’re done using them, then you have significantly less to put away at the end of the day. Something sometimes I don’t have [00:12:00] anything to pick up like this. There isn’t anything that is out of place. I might fix the pillows on the couch or refill the blanket or straighten a blanket or something like that, or because I have the extra time maybe dust off a table or pick up the dog toys or things that might not necessarily be something that I would normally pick up just because there isn’t anything available because we are in the habit of putting the things away when we are finished using them.

So those are the three things. Again, I will say, load the dishwasher and make sure that you wash. All the dishes and empty out the sink to clean the kitchen counters and wipe off the table. And then three do a quick walkthrough of the house, putting everything back, just picking up everything as you go, and then going to each room and putting everything away where it goes. If there are things that have been left out now, each one of those tasks, it does not take me much time.

And that is because of the routines that we have implemented through the course of the day and the habits that we have, like putting the dishes away. Into the dishwasher instead of leaving them out or waiting until one a time to do all of the dishes, when you’re into that routine, it saves you time in the moment and it saves you time later because you’re getting this done when it needs to be done, rather than adding to the work. We don’t let the dishes pile up.

We resulting in that big project of having to spend, you know, 30 minutes or so doing the dishes at one time. It’s also nice to have these systems in place when you have a good routines. That means I’m not spending 30 or 45 minutes at the end of the day, washing dishes when I’m already tired. And all I want to do is go to bed anyway. The decluttering and the organizing and the routines have to work together. That’s what simplifies everything in your home. That is what makes everything easier. Those are three things that I do that. Most homes should be doing to get back to the baseline. That feels good. [00:14:00] it assures you to wake up the next day to a clutter-free environment. If you have a lot of clutter, if you’re in a space right now where you have a lot of clutter in your home, and there are a lot of extras on the counters, there’s maybe a cluttered table or more stuff than you would like to have out these tasks that only take me a few minutes. That can seem like a lot right now for you because you haven’t done the decluttering yet. And that is again why you have to do the decluttering. Make sure you have the organizing in place. And put the routines together. Those three work hand in hand, if you want to see how this works, sign up for the simple home habits five week challenge, because it’s kind of like a crash course at seeing how these things all work together. Because what we do in that is we take one area where it has clutter.

You declutter that one specific area and it, it teaches you how to do that. And then you’re going to implement a routine to keep up with the decluttering. that is the first week. And then the second week you are going to repeat the same process by decluttering another area. And these are just small de-cluttering projects. It’s nothing big, but you’re still going to see the results. And as long as you implement the routine, you have success with this.

we keep going each week repeating that process. But by the end of the time, you have five areas, decluttered and five little bitty chunks. That are part of a bigger routine that make it possible for you to keep the areas that you’ve removed the clutter from a clutter-free. Everything in that simple home habits, viably challenged. It is designed to take a few minutes. It’s not going to be hours and hours of projects. So these are quick wins. They’re not huge projects, but you’re getting them done. by doing the purging and then making sure you have that system or that routine in place to prevent the clutter from coming back, that is essential to have success with a truly [00:16:00] simplified home, with the big picture, the link for the simple home habits, five week challenge that is in the podcast description.

You can click that and sign up and then you get direct access to that challenge. And you can follow along for five weeks. It’s really easy to sign up. you can start this week or start next week. get this routine going where you’re doing a thing, is that a simplifier home, you’re trying to make things easier and let’s get the clutter out of there. Let’s get going on the decluttering and let’s finally get your home organized set up these routines so that you could have the simplify at home that you are really looking for. Thank you for listening. And today I will meet you back here next week for the next episode of the intentional edit podcast.