40 bags in 40 days Decluttering Challenge!

I feel like the first step to being organised in your home, is to get rid of all the junk! The less junk you have, the less mess you have! If you know me well, you know that I HATE junk! Now junk is going to be different for every person. What I consider as junk, may be a prized possession for someone else and vice versa.

So as tomorrow is the start of a new week and a new month (not to mention the 1^st full week of the kids being back at school), I’m going to be starting the “40 bags in 40 days challenge” and would love it if you joined in with me. You try to fill at least a shopping bag each day with "junk" from the days area. The challenge can be found at "Inspired by Familia". Either copy and paste in a word document the challenge from bellow or follow the Link above to print the challenge out.

Mari suggests that you ponder these things as you declutter and purge! 

• Do you need it?
• Do you use it? 
• Have you used it more than a few times in the past year?
• Do you like it?
• Does it work?

Hope you will join in with me. Let's get rid of that junk.

Kylie xx

Getting Life Organised Part 2!

I LOVE projects!! My problem (which drives my husband crazy) is that I’m not great at just sticking with one project at a time. I start something and then before finishing,  start something else and then something else...well you get the picture. Basically I have numerous projects going at the same time, that I never seem to finish. At the moment this is what our playroom floor looks like.

It is almost finished. We had made a financial decision to do the floor bit by bit, but we could have it finished by now, however we have not. We have lost my floor mojo lol. Hoping to get it back soon.

We also decided to fix up our blinds. We have vertical blinds that are an ugly grey/blue and have creases in them but other than that there is nothing wrong with them. Seeing as we didn’t want to spend $1-$2K on new blinds, I decided to straighten and paint them. A frugal mumma gets unbelievably excited when you can spend $20, instead of a few thousand! I have straightened & painted the 1^st coat of the blinds on one window. They look fantastic, but it’s a time consuming process and with sick kiddies for the last few weeks, I haven’t gotten back to doing them. Here is a comparison...left side is straightened & painted beige....right side is creased & gross! Sorry about the bad pic. It doesn't show the colour change well.

We have also painted a good portion of the house. Walls in most rooms are finished but we are only part way through painting the skirting's & architraves. Or take the back of our front door for example, it’s had one coat. We will finish it one day!

The problem is life gets busy and it may take months before I have time to finish them. When I do finally get time to finish them, I’m not sure where to start cause I have too many things that I want to get finished!

So as part of my “Getting Life organised” challenge, I have decided to only concentrate on one project at a time (I can hear my husband screaming with joy already!).  My aim is actually going to be to get one big project done a month. If I finish a project and have time to go onto another than I will. But I’m starting small. 

So here’s my project goals for the next few months:

June – Finish the floor (and if extra time, continue on with painting)

July- Finish painting the back of the front door and all the architraves and skirtings that we have started.

August – Straighten & paint blinds

Let’s hope I stay organised and start getting these half done projects finished!

Kylie xx

Getting Life Organised Part 1!

Hello! 

Well today Monday, it is the 1st day of June and for us here in Australia, it is also the 1st day of Winter brrrr!! And yes, it is cold today!! So what better day to start a get organised challenge!

With Winter upon us, I have to admit that I find it really hard to get out of bed in the morning. In fact, I would say that bed is my most favourite place during winter. So firstly, I want to get organised with my morning duties so that we can have stress free mornings......and maybe an extra 20 mins of zzzzzzzzzz's!!

Here's what I plan to do......

Get organised with lunches

Whether you make lunches for yourself or someone else, for work or for school, your morning will run much smoother if they are prepared in advance. This is something that I have done at different times, but I have never made it a routine. So my 1st challenge is to get more organised with lunches. On a Sunday I will make all the sandwiches for my kids for the school week. Once made, I wrap them in glad wrap and put them in the freezer. 

 Along with this, I will start packing the rest of the lunch boxes each night. I will put the made up drink bottles in the fridge. In the morning, I will just grab out the drink bottle, sandwich and any other fridge items that need to go in the lunch boxes. 

If you are working, then making your lunch at the start of the week, or at least the night before, will give you less stress in the morning or may keep you from wasting money buying your lunch each day. If I get really organised, I might even start making my hubby's lunch!! But i'm not committing to that yet lol! 

Get clothes organised the night before

On the weekends our kids seem to be able to find their own clothes and get dressed quickly. During the week however, they have absolutely no motivation to get ready. In light of how long it takes them (particularly miss 7) to find her school clothes, I've decided to lay them out on the couch the night before. If you are someone that takes too long in the morning to choose what you are going to wear, then you would probably save time by doing this too. This won't only save us much arguing and whinging in the morning, but it will also eliminate those moments where you realise (in the morning) that your child has no uniform to wear, as it's still in the laundry. If you have never done this before, then you are way way way more organised than me...I have done it too many times to remember!

Bags Packed and ready to go for the next day

Any homework, readers, news, spare clothes e.t.c for the following day, get packed in the school bags, which hang at the front door. I hate trying to run around like a mad women trying to find homework in the morning. This is something that I have done for a while, but I would like to be more organised with my own bag too. So I'm going to start packing the baby bag at night with anything I need in it for the next day.

I have done the majority of this stuff before but never kept up with it. Such small things the night before, make for a super organised morning. It also means that if you sleep in, it's no problem. Everything is ready to go!

Kylie xx