If you are like me, thinking about becoming more organized brings to mind aesthetically pleasing storage containers, a family calendar on the wall, a weekly meal plan, maybe a successfully executed household budget, probably a label maker thrown in there somewhere. And all those things are great. One day I hope I can all achieve my Pinterest worthy organized bliss. But for now, I am just a reluctant grownup over here trying to keep their part of the world spinning and all their pieces in place. 

Do I have it all together? No. Do I always know where I left my sunglasses or my phone charger? Also no. Where is my passport or my kid’s vaccination record? No idea. I am not here to tell you that I’ve figured it all out. I am here to talk about how I am learning to navigate life each day and how some days are better than others. 

Matters of the wallet.

This is not advice on how to manage money or prioritize spending. That’s way out of my lane. This is just how I keep my lights on without feeling like I am always thinking about bills or money. Before I began this system 10 years ago, I felt like I spent so much time and energy just managing money, and that’s really it.

The best way I have found to organize my day-to-day finances, and as a result better manage my budget, is by having multiple accounts for different purposes. I have a single income, but I have two accounts at my local credit union. My check is deposited to account #1, then I look at what bills I have coming up and transfer that amount to account #2. I label each transfer “Mortgage” or “Electric” or whatever it is intended for. I do this for each individual expense, even if I am transferring multiple times in the same day. This means when I look at either my outgoing transactions in account #1, or my incoming transactions in account #2, I see each expense labeled and accounted for at a glance. Now, I know that what remains in account #1 is left to distribute or spend as I please, and the money dedicated to bills is out of sight. Then, I either manually pay or have previously set up auto draft for some recurring bills to come out of account #2. When possible, I round up a couple dollars on each transfer so there is usually a little left over in that account in case I forgot to transfer for something, or I want to pay a little extra towards an expense. I only must really budget or manage my money twice a month like this. 

If I purchase something like an add-on subscription or sign up for a trial to a streaming service for example, I use my spending account #1. This helps me keep all those little things in check, and helps me catch anything I forgot to cancel, or maybe just don’t use enough to justify. I’ve known people that use the envelope stuffing method, which is the same concept, just for those that prefer cash.

The Same 24 Hours: Multitasking VS Efficiency 

For most of my adult life, it feels like being a self-proclaimed multitasker, or just being busy in general was expected, even treated like a badge of honor, like something everyone should aspire to. I was no exception. I read books and listened to podcasts about how I could fit even more into my “same hours in a day” as historically successful people are running the world with, reminding me that I still wasn’t busy enough. I strived to be busy and gauged my success on how many tasks I could manage at the same time. 

I think a lot of us started to slow down the last couple of years and realized that aspiring to be great at being busy may not be what we all want.  It’s wonderful if you thrive always being on the go. I know people who do it so effortlessly and it suits them. I personally recognized that a few changes improved my quality of life and my mental health. Realistically though, our reality still means we are pretty busy even if we are embracing a slower pace. 

I have managed this by organizing my day with a strict 30-minute increment schedule and day planner accounting for every waking minute… 

JUST KIDDING!! I wish I could have seen the look on the faces of anyone that knows me when they read that. 

I have, however, started trying to find a healthier balance in my day. There is still plenty of multitasking going on. But I try to make a conscious decision to identify what tasks truly can and should be going on at once and still be done efficiently. This isn’t an easy habit to overcome when you have existed in a constant state of rush for 20+ years. There are still days where I just can’t keep up. Then there are other days where I feel like I coast right through and never lose my peace. 

Technology is a huge part of organizing my busy modern lifestyle. I have never been successful when I try to keep a physical day planner. But I always have my phone with me. I also utilize my Alexa devices and have one in most rooms of my home now that they have become so affordable. My typical morning consists of my Alexa announcing the weather to me, so I know what to wear today, listing off my schedule and meetings or reminders, and giving me a news brief so I feel informed for the day. I have older teenage children who have tasks they are responsible for daily, but even they need reminders. I use the text scheduling feature on my phone to send them reminders in the form of texts from me for things like chores. I have a running shopping list that everyone just calls out to an Alexa device and adds to throughout the day as we run out of something. My shopping list is always with me on my phone this way. 

Embracing technology has been a big help to keep both my work and personal life organized. I know not everyone cares to be so reliant on smart devices or technology, but just my smartphone alone made a huge difference before I even started adding in other systems. 

Creating systems and routines that work for you

If you give me a structured schedule for a weekly household maintenance task, I almost guarantee you that I will fail. But there is a show I like to watch every Saturday, so I walk around the living room watering my plants during the intro song and recap every week.  I have kept my ferns alive for almost a year and I’m proud of myself!

I work remotely and am in and out of my car and on the road a lot of the day, so it gets messy on both the inside and outside very quickly. I have a weekly phone meeting every Thursday at 9:00 am that mostly just requires I listen in and pay attention. Most weeks I drive through the automated car wash during that meeting, then park near the vacuums until it’s complete, maybe gather up any water bottles or trash from my car from the week and, if there is time, I’ll give it a quick vacuum once the meeting is over before I get back to work. 

I organize my closet by color. Like many of us, I have a ton of things to downsize, and I am working on it, but in the meantime, I want to be able to find my stuff. I put similar items like tops together, then sort them roughly by color. If  I see I have a huge chunk of space taken up by harvest yellow (my least flattering color), I know I should weed out a few pieces. I keep a small hamper in the closet where I drop things to be donated as I encounter them.  If I purchase something and get it home only to find out it doesn’t fit, I immediately put it and the receipt back in the bag and put it with my keys. It may not actually get returned the following day, but if I can just get it to my car, I’ll have it with me the next time I’m near that store. 

I buy all the same color linens and towels for whichever room it is intended for. My personal bathroom has white floor mats and white bath towels, washcloths, and hand towels. I know exactly where they go. I know how to launder them and don’t worry about sorting colors. If I need to replace something, I can just buy one piece in that color. 

I keep a basket hanging on my stairs for little random things that accumulate around the house and need to go upstairs. In a perfect world it would be emptied daily. It’s not. But it’s all at least easily found. 

A place for everything and everything in its place.

I am always striving to do better and adopt better habits, both in my home and in my life. “Don’t put it down, put it away” has become a common chant I say to myself as I make my way around my home.  I have also started to keep items stored in a practical place based on where I use it. 

I don’t like a lot of things out on my counters, so I try to keep the small appliances in the lower cabinet below the outlet where I use them. I don’t use toilet paper in the storage closet. I use it in the bathroom. So, I immediately distribute the new packages around the house to each bathroom to store as soon as I bring it home.

I have a 2-level home and hate lugging a vacuum or mop or broom up and down the stairs or even room to room. So, I am slowly adding these items to each zone in the house. Having a small inexpensive floor cleaner just for my bathroom saves me time and makes me more likely to run the cleaner across the floor in between big cleans.

My teenage children are much less concerned with where things are stored but we are working on it. They mean well. To them, just putting the dish away is enough. My guess is their brain hasn’t developed enough to really grasp how much easier life is if that item is always where you can find it on the first try. After enough reteaching and reminding and frustration, I just used a label maker and started placing labels that say exactly what goes in that spot. I’d love to say that this solved everything. It has not. I still find the blender blades and cutting board under the label that says “6 white dinner plates” and the peanut butter jar on the shelf with the drinking glasses. But it’s getting better. At least now I have a hill to die on when I try to make them fix it and they try to swear this is the first time they were ever told the crock pot doesn’t go under the bathroom sink.

Does every part of our lives need to be color coded?

I suggest asking yourself if your organizational goal is truly something that will improve your day to day life. If you long for an alphabetized spice cabinet, that’s great. This may make kitchen tasks more peaceful for you, but for me finding my spices doesn’t really take up too much of my time as long as they are at least in the correct cabinet.  I feel like I would spend more time organizing and maintaining that space than it will impact my routine. 

The biggest organizing tip I have for anyone is to identify the things in your life that feel like they take up the most of your time or energy. Then find a solution that works for you.

I am not trying to be perfect over here, I am just trying to organize the chaos…and find my keys.