Today is Fun Finds Friday and I have been worrying about it. That is to say I have been concerned, thoughtful, and maybe fretful. My mom was a worry wart. She worried when my older brother didn’t get home from a date when he said he would and she worried about a ton of other things; in fact we bought her a worry stone because she worried so much. I swore I would never worry—Ha famous last words.

Why worry about Friday? I have been getting rid of clutter right and left (clutter I had no idea I had). Deep cleaning every room in our home means I must re-organize stuff too. It has been so much fun getting rid of clutter that I struggled to review a product.

In my sewing room I have pull out drawers that I thought were organized but I went through each and every one of them and found things I had not used forever and I gave them away. Wow! It feels so good. You know clutter doesn’t have to be junk, it can be things we no longer need, use or like.

I do have two products to review—you know how organizing and cleaning go hand in hand? After getting rid of clutter in drawers in my sewing room and bathrooms (one is still being painted—when will it end?) I cleaned. “Lime Away” worked like a miracle to get rid of hard water spots and Costco’s window cleaner doesn’t leave streaks and is fabulous. I only bought this because my son-in-law kept telling me I just had to buy it as it does “everything”. So I did and I am glad I gave in to pressure.

What is your favorite cleaning product? Do you think you should clean first and then get rid of clutter or get rid of clutter and then clean?

Have you ever thought about the amount of time you waste looking for the perfect lipstick to wear with your favorite outfit? That is if your cosmetics are all jumbled. To simplify and streamline your cosmetics follow these simple steps for clutter clearing your makeup:

•Keep make-up and facial products in separate containers. You can use attractive matching containers or containers you have around your home such as mugs, or shallow baskets etc.
•Take a look at all of your cosmetics and only keep what you use. It is a waste of time to have to search through products you don’t use to find the ones you do use. Bacteria can grow on old cosmetics so toss them and don’t feel bad that you spent money on something you aren’t using. You used it at one time and now you can let it go.

Do you have a favorite way to organize your make-up? Do you think the bacteria that can grow on cosmetics is bad if you are the only one who uses it? Share with us your clutter clearing tips!

When you have guests come to your home do you tidy up the bathroom and hope they don’t look in your drawers? (They shouldn’t be snooping, but maybe some do anyway).

The key to clutter control in this bathroom drawer is containers. By having a variety of containers everything has a home and so it is easy to stay on top of clutter control.

This ends my series of Show and Share—a professional organizers virtual guide of several cupboards and places in my home. Please leave a comment if this has been helpful and share with us how you keep clutter under control.

Show ‘N Share Week on how to store medicine:

Are your medicines in the medicine cabinet in the steamy bathroom? The humidity in the bathroom can change the potency of medicines so it is better to store them some other place. That is the latest advice from the research I have done.
It is time to reduce clutter in the medicine cabinet. Above is a photo of how I store my medicines.

Tips on how to reduce clutter in the medicine cabinet:

•Store medicines together in one container.
•Label the container
•Use plastic bags to separate different meds (cough drops, foot creams, nasal drops etc). Label the bags.
•Every 3 to 6 months check for expiration dates and get rid of expired medicines by taking them to your pharmacists for them to recycle. (It is not safe for our ground water for them to be flushed or put in the trash).
•I recommend keeping medicines separated from first aid supplies. Here is how I do it:

I have all the first aid supplies in one container and as you can see I keep the shoe polish in another container on top of this one. These three containers take up one shelf above the towels.

Again, my goal is to have my medicines and first aid supplies easily available and all together in one place. Family members who take prescription medication daily have their pills in another secure place. My goal isn’t to have it look like a page in a magazine—that would take too much work and too much time. For our life style it isn’t practical.

We would love to see your photos on how you store your meds, please email them to me at info@marilynbohn.com and we will put them in a future blog. Or leave a comment telling us how you store your medicines.

WELCOME TO SPRING

We must live through the dreary winter
If we would value the spring;
And the woods must be cold and silent
Before the robins sing.

The flowers must be buried in darkness
Before they can bud and bloom,
And the sweetest, warmest sunshine
Comes after the storm and gloom.
–Anonymous

I love the winter but it is now spring and it is beautiful to see the flowers on the trees and coming out of the ground. The rains bring the smell of fresh air and Easter is the sign of new birth.

Happy, Happy Easter to you and your family.

Recently I bought a new entertainment “table” and the old one which was bulky had to be carried out of the basement. As the men were maneuvering it up the stairs the wall was scratched. They were concerned, but I was just grateful they were doing what they were doing. Because of a few organizing tips my friend Heather had shared with me it was no problem to quickly touch up the scratch on the wall.

“This is my sanity. I have a small Rubbermaid sample of all the paints that I have in the house. Even a small tub of spackle. Sometimes I just wander through the house and look for all of my touch-ups. No one would do touch-up if they had to dig their big gallon can of paint out of the basement to haul it from room to room
I sometimes take it with me when I do my cleaning so that the instant I find a touch-up, I can do it right then and not have to remember where it was when I came back to it”.

I love this organizing tip. Often places don’t get touched up because I had to drag out the can and by the time I get the lid off and on a few times the paint has dried out. And it is such a pain to not only get the can out but to get the key or screwdriver to open it and then the hammer to close the lid tight.

What simple organizing tips do you use around your home to make it easier to keep up with the “little things”?

I love winning things. I mean, who doesn’t love FREE stuff?! Especially when it is quality and not junk.

You could be a lucky winner! I did a product review January 27 on wickless candles and she is having an awesome give-away of a Scentsy warmer and a Scentsy bar on her website.
Warm the Heart, Enliven the Senses and Inspire the Soul with these beautiful fragrances. Good luck on winning this wonderful product.

One of my favorite things is getting packages in the mail. How about you?

I have a follow up to a blog I did last week. One of my organizing tips was about the wonderful Scentsy wickless candles. I received my plug in ones I had ordered. I just have to tell you them came so fast I was amazed. I have them in two rooms and we love them!

I have a friend who associates clean with organizing and they do go hand in hand. When things look good—when everything has a place and things are organized the bonus of a wonderful smelling room makes it feel better and look better too.

What do you think? Do you think smell has anything to do with the way you feel about your home and getting organized? We’s love to hear your organizing tips.

I am always on the lookout for organizing ideas to share with my readers and I am excited about this. It is called Scentsy. This is a fabulous way to have your home smell good and be safe at the same time.

Several months ago my daughter gave me a Scentsy “un-candle” (that is what I call it) and I love it. These are the reasons I love it and recommend it:

1. My home smells good when I use it. (Which is every day)
2. It is safe! It is safe to leave on all day, it is safe around children. My grandson stuck his finger in the wax and he pulled back quickly and looked at his finger when he felt the warm wax, it did not burn and he did not cry.
3. They come in wonderful styles to fit every room. This is the one I use in my family room. They just added plug in ones which I have on order. They also have ones for the car.

4. When ordering on line S/H is very reasonable—it is just 10% of the entire order. I really like that.
5. They are reasonably priced and the refills are cheap.
6. They fit into any decor and in any room.
7. It is easy to order on line at: www.scentsy.com/jschofield

We would love to hear what you think of this product.

This week Fall softly came to our city with the sound of rain drops on my window. I was happy with the thought that cooler weather was here with the hope it was here to stay. Then I watched the weather forecast and she said we would be back to summer temperatures by the end of the week. Softly summer is creeping back to keep us hot for awhile longer.

Isn’t this just how it is with clutter in our homes? It softly creeps up on us until one day we say “Where on earth did all of this clutter come from”? Here are some tips on how to avoid the clutter creep:

In the kitchen:
•Keep the dishwasher unloaded. This way when something needs to be loaded it can be.
•After using a utensil, bowl, or pan load it in the dishwasher right then. This saves you time later on having to come back and loading. It also keeps the kitchen cleaner looking as dishes don’t pile up in the sink.

In the bedroom:
•Hang up clothes as soon as you take them off, or put them in the laundry.
•Make your bed every morning.

In the bathroom:
•Toss (recycle) bottles when they are empty, don’t hold on to them to clutter your space.
•Get rid of soap slivers. Decorative soaps can also be clutter if they are never used and just take up space and become dusty.

In the office:
•Get rid of pens you don’t like or don’t use. You do not have to keep every pen that comes into your life. Keep all pencils sharp so when you need them you can use them.
•Create a working filing system so paper doesn’t scatter all over your desk.

It is the little things that add up to big things to make our homes unorganized. Doing the little things in every room every day will help us be organized and stay organized.

What tricks do you use to stay organized?