Wednesday, June 17, 2009

WFMW Stop sweating the small stuff around the house.



This WFMW tip is going to sound odd, but it's liberating. It's about what not to do.
Before I had kids, I had an infinitely organized house. I miss that A LOT. The linen closet was labeled, everything was stored in it's own tote, etc, etc. After I had my son, it became harder to keep up with all the organizational tasks, but I persevered.
Then I had my daughter. And things haven't been the same around here.
It's a mess! The kids keep me so busy cleaning up spills and other real messes that I haven't got time to organize as much. It's been driving me nuts, but my husband made a suggestion a while back that made me re think things.
I was complaining that L kept taking dozens of VHS movies out of the case, which meant I had to find all the cases and sort them all out over and over again. And my husband asked why I didn't just throw away the cases. Gee that NEVER occurred to me. Seriously, it blew me away. So I've been throwing away movies cases, and it's one less organizational task around here.
Here's another example:
L trashes his room every day. He has way too many toys, and no matter how much begging, fussing, and reorganizing I do, he still drags out basically everything he can reach every day. For a while I was going in there at least twice a day and doing a major cleanup, only to have him immediately do it again. And to be honest, it was really getting on my nerves. (He helps * a little* with clean up, but not much.) And then I decided that it's not imperative that his room always be spotless. We're just talking about toys after all, not food and icky laundry. So now I clean up every every day or two, and it's less housework for me, and his room is about as messy as it was anyway.
I'd still prefer for everything to be super organized, but at this stage of my life, it's just not possible. So now I'm looking for small ways to let things go, so I have more time and energy to do the stuff that's really important.
Stop sweating the small stuff when it comes to housework. It's working for me.
Go check out www.wearethatfamily.com for tons more WFMW tips.

3 comments:

  1. Awesome tip! I totally agree, and I always need the reminder, as I am the same way about being organized. Thanks for helping me remember not to sweat it! ~Holly

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  2. Absolutely wonderful advice. I have had to let go of some perfectionist tendencies too!

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  3. Thanks for visiting my blog. I've had to let go of a lot too...I also throw away movie cases, I now store all DVDs in a CD case. I have four children now, so choosing your battles is imperative and not sweating the small stuff (and it's really all small stuff) has allowed me to enjoy them (it goes way too fast).

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