August FOCUS ent Less Time

1. Use hooks in the kids’ rooms. I just bought 2 sets of over-the-door hooks for a couple of bedrooms that needed a few more spots to hang worn jeans and hoodies. I guess it is now acceptable to wear jeans 4 or 5 times before washing. That’s kind of gross. I like 2 or 3 times as long as they don’t get food spilled on them or otherwise smell. The same goes for other pants, sweatshirts, sweaters, some blouses, and hoodies. Hooks make this possible. It may be difficult to get your kids to re-hang on hangers semi-dirty clothes, but not to plop them onto a hook. If your workout clothes don’t get drenched in sweat, you could do the same with them.

2. Use one towel per person per week. If you are clean when you dry off after your shower, your towel will also be clean. It can be re-used for a week or so as long as it can be properly dried in between. That means that every person needs a place to hang his towel. Sure, kids forget to hang up their towel. When this happens, I make sure they can’t just get another towel. Yes, I want them to use their wet, smelly towel so that they will remember next time to hang it up when they are done. I keep the extra towels and guest towels in a closet far away. If your family all uses a new towel everyday, you are creating for yourself at least one extra load of laundry per day. This is certainly not very green. It costs you money and extra wear on your towels, not to mention your valuable time. Every person in our family has his “own” towel signified by color.

This is Seth who is now 19. He still uses a yellow towel when he's home. (Not the same one!)

3. When your children reach their teens, have them do their own laundry. For my teenage boys, I simply purchased for them their own laundry baskets that sit in their rooms. When this gets full, usually once a week, they carry it down to the laundry room then wash and dry. The folded clothes go from the dryer back into the laundry basket and are carried upstairs and put away. Many teens like to be responsible for their own clothes. This way, no clothes accidentally get given to the wrong person—heaven forbid! For my daughter ( my sons never needed this), I gave her two sorting baskets for her dirty clothes so she could separate darks from lights. When either one got full, she simply washed that load. As a side note, when my teen children participate in sports, they are responsible for keeping their uniform clean and in order. Yes, I am sure that they’ve worn dirty socks and even dirty jerseys for a few games, but it’s worth it since it teaches them this bit of responsibility and frees me of this concern.

At times, they may need reminders!

4. Since there is such a large selection of clothing options available, even for those of us who shop at Thrift stores, it seems unreasonable for anyone to have clothing that needs to be ironed. There is a great selection of iron-free, washable clothes out there. Granted, I do have a few dressy items that need a touch up with an iron, but I wear these once or twice a year. Our everyday items need to be clothes that come out of the dryer looking great! If we leave them in the dryer to cool and they get wrinkled, then we either have to waste a little time by putting them back through the dryer again or by ironing them. What’s the remedy for this that will save us time? Only run the dryer when you know you will be there when it’s finished and have a place to hang up your clothes when they are done. I’ve put a hanging clothes rack in my laundry room. To save sorting out the hanging clothes, I’ve also put dividers for everyone’s clothes on the rack-like you might see in a clothing store. Instead of S, M,L, I have my children’s names.

Part of my husband's wrinkle-free wardrobe hanging on the rod in my newly painted laundry room. (It used to have a cute, country cat border--enough said.) It's a Kirkland (Costco) brand shirt.

5. When trying to follow the method above by hanging up the clothes when they come out of the dryer, have you ever had to run around looking for hangers? This wastes your time. Have a set place for hangers in your laundry room and have plenty of hangers. You will need more hangers than you have hanging clothes. You also need to tell your family members that when they wear something that was on a hanger to put that empty hanger in the dirty clothes basket with the dirty clothes. Or if you have a chute, to send the hangers down the chute. This way the hangers will end up back into the laundry room ready to be used again.

6. Bib your kid. They have some great catch-all bibs for those really messy eaters. Even the simple cotton bib can save you from having to change an entire outfit. Sure, you may have to launder the bib, but this is better and less time consuming than treating stains and pre-washing, etc. Bib for adults? Sort of, but not for eating. It’s called an apron. It may be a bit old-fashioned, but if you are baking or frying, it will also save your outfit. I especially use one when I am up to my elbows in flour or I am wearing a nice dress and cooking for the kids before an evening out or entertaining company.

( Work wonders in you Wonder Woman Apron)

7. Have a soak bucket ready. This comes in handy if you have athletes, mechanics, and boys! Mine is a small plastic garbage can that sits in my laundry room sink. You can certainly use a soak bucket without a sink. If something gets stained or dirty beyond a simple squirt of Spray-n-wash, I put it in the soak bucket, fill it with warm water, put in a ½ cup of Tide (or Oxy-clean or your favorite cleaner) and let it soak for a day or two. Dump this whole batch into your washing machine and spin dry. If it was really cruddy, you may need to rinse and repeat. Otherwise, if it looks pretty good, just wash as normal. I’m thinking this may save time scrubbing out stains or repeated washings. This works great for socks or items that have mildew.

8. Summer is for sandals and Crocs and no socks! I pretty much ban sock-wearing in the summer, except for sports (and church—but we re-wear the church socks by storing them inside of the church shoes.) Once school begins, if you have boys around the same age, get them all the same socks for their everyday use. My boys like the no-show ankle socks. I have found some stretchy ones that seem to fit a variety of foot sizes. This has reduced a lot of sorting and lost socks

9. Catch up on a novel. Learn a language. Become an expert on something. Listen to the books your teens are reading. Pray the Rosary with others. This can all be done while you are in your laundry room by having a Cd player in there and a library card. (Most libraries have great books on CDs) And trust me, this will make your time in the laundry room just zip by. It will feel like you are spending less time in there.

This is not an ad--it won't click you anywhere, but you can find these CD's and others online.

10. Lastly, remodel your laundry room. This doesn’t have to cost a lot. Re-organize. Simplify. Get a few new baskets or shelves. Get a fresh coat of paint. This will make your tasks go more smoothly and quickly. Everything should be easily accessible. No extra clutter to work around. Keep your washer and dryer clean on the outside. A wet sock out of the washer does this easily. Just rewash the sock. And like listening to a CD, being in that lovely space will feel like less time is being spent there.

Unfortunately none of these are my laundry room, but what inspiring pictures 

July Focus: Cleaning Tile

When the Sun is Hot--Get Down on the Cool Tile!

I saw an ad for an offer to clean tile in my junk mail. It showed the before and after shot. Pretty impressive. I decided to try and tackle my own tile. I even researched some heavy duty grout cleaners on the internet. The one that seemed most promising was expensive and had to be ordered. I settled for a less expensive one that I bought at Home Depot. It looked very promising, but proved to be dissapointing--then I remembered: Baking Soda. In the long run, it worked just as well as the harsh cleaner from Home Depot, was less expensive, and most importantly, it's not going to ruin my tile or little bare feet that go in my bathroom. This is cleaning you can get excited about! No harmful fumes. Maybe even good for your skin. (OK, that's a stretch--but I do know you can brush your teeth with it!) Look at this super-sized box I got from my grocery store.

I recommend with your money saved on the cleaner, that you purchase a grout brush to use--it stood up much better than the old toothbrush. Plus this grout brush is a must to clean around your sink faucets and toilet hinges--in that order, of course. Used with a little spray cleaner, it can really dig out the grime.

To clean your tile grout, I put some Baking Soda in a cup and added water to make a paste. I slapped this paste on a square foot area and scrubbed all the grout. When I got the whole bathroom done, I went over it several times with a wet mop, rinsing and ringing it out in the tub. Here you can see where I've scrubbed some of the grout. It actually is white again!

Was this tedious scrubbing all of those lines? Yes! Here are a couple of lessons for us to keep in mind for the future. When picking tile: 1) Use brown/gray grout and 2) Use bigger tile, like 12x12. When I had to replace the tile in my other bathroom, I followed both of these principles, and it still remains lovely with just simple mopping. Another problem that can help grout from turning black with mildew is to have a good fan in your bathroom. Keeping the air flowing keeps that mildew from growing on your caulking, as well. "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of Baking Soda. . ."

June 2011

The1/4 Challenge

What am I up to now? This is a very simple challenge for all of you for the summer or year or however long you want/need to do this. I am simply going to try to get rid of 1/4 of everything that is in my house. Yes, 1/4. I originally wanted to go with half of the stuff in my house like a true minimalist, but reality set in, and I decided that 1/4 would be difficult enough, but doable. So I have begun. And really, keeping 3/4 isn't so bad. Isn't 3/4 of an apple pie plenty? And how about 3/4 of a pizza?

Like I said, I am beginning this summer, but it will probably spill over into the fall and the rest of the year. I can see myself always looking at a shelf or cupboard in the future and saying, "Yep, 3/4 of this stuff is enough. Some things will have to go." As you can see in the picture, I need to do this at my desk. I've got an action bin with far too much stuff in it. I'll get to that tomorrow. . .

I've actually started in my walk-in closet a couple of weeks ago. I went through all of my hanging up pants (my dress pants) and got rid of the ones I knew I didn't want. I am also turning all of the hangers around on my dress pants so that they are hung up backwards. (After I wear the pants, I turn the hanger around and hang them normally to signal that these pants have been worn.) If I haven't worn the pants by Christmas, no matter what, they've got to go. (I don't wear a lot of dress pants in the summer, so I really won't start wearing them until fall.) I'd like to see this rack get about 1/4 less by Christmas. I've already done my t-shirts. Yes, I still have a lot, but they are the staple of my wardrobe, my "work uniform."

I have been doing 1 or 2 spots a day--remember, "a journey of a thousand miles begins with one step." If this is too much for you to do each day, dedicate some time on the weekends to this task.

Since I like the look of less furniture and less knick-knacks, I decided to apply the purging 1/4 to all of the areas of my house, not just the shelves or drawers. This is a small example: my fireplace. It may not look that much better, but the room as a whole feels lighter with 1/4 less stuff in it, plus my son who has to dust this room will surely appreciate how much easier it will be to dust the hearth--one swoosh with the broom!

I just finished my vitamins/medicine cabinet in the kitchen--this used to be packed full. Now that I know all of the vitamins and medicine that I have, I will be more conscientious next time I want to purchase more. (Those plastic step orgainizers for kitchen shelves work great for vitamins and your spices.)

A task like this one or like cleaning out your utensil drawer takes less than 10 minutes!

A couple 1/4 clean-outs like this a day and your house will begin to feel so much lighter.

Less is More! Simple is Sweet! Uncluttered is unequaled!

March 2011 

Since March is National Frozen Food Month, I thought we would focus our efforts this month on organizing, cleaning, uncluttering and simplifying our frozen foods. Since most of the nation is like a deep freeze right now, (yes, we are even cold here in South Carolina) it seems like a good time to contemplate our frozen food dilemas.

If you haven't cleaned out your deep freezer or chest freezer, or even your freezer in your refrigerator for awhile, February is a good month to do it because you can simply unload all of your frozen items in a box and put them on the porch. Since I am too lazy to haul them the whole way out there, I just unload them all into a cooler and work quickly.

(If you've got the kind of freezer that needs to have all of the built up ice and frost melted out, you might want to put the food in coolers and put it outside in the cold, unplug the plug, and wait a day for the freezer to defrost. Or if you don't want to wait, you can try a blow dryer--although I've read that it is not recommended, I've done it many times and it works great. I've also heard of putting in pots of very hot water and closing the door for awhile and repeating until it is all defrosted.)

After you've wiped it out with a warm washcloth, you are now ready for the unclutter and organize steps. By unclutter, I mean get rid of the frozen food that you know you will not be eating. These are those half-opened popsickles that were stuck to the bottom or some mystery stew that it totally frosty--although, I'd probably stick it in a pot of hot water and see what kind of soup it could turn into.

For the most part, I can keep my freezer part of the refrigerator simply organized. I put meats on one shelf, frozen fruit on another, desserts on another, etc. My deep freezer doesn't organize as easily. What I've tried to do is keep all of the other frozen food such as frozen meals (either bought or leftovers), bags of veggies, ice cream, and other meats in this freezer.

To keep track of what is in there, I use a dry erase board that I keep on my refrigerator. In theory, everything that is in the deep freezer is written on that board. If you've just emptied out your deep freezer, now would be a good time to start this list. If you don't have a dry erase board, just use a piece of paper for now. Everytime I buy new food that goes in the freezer, or even freeze some leftovers, I write that on my dry erase board. When I get something out of the freezer, I simply wipe it off.

Another way I use this board is for meal planning. I look at the board before planning my meals for the next week. If something has been on the board for awhile, I try to incorporate that into next week's menu.

A warning! Don't put this board where little children can reach it. They will erase it. Also, don't stress out if you get completely off track with your board. It is hard to get all family members to remember to mark off the frozen pizza they ate when they got home from school the other day. Just like so many other things in our life, we have to keep up with it, and when we get really behind, we just start over. It isn't unusual for me to wipe off the board completely and get one of my older kids to do a "freezer inventory" for me as one of his chores.

I find it very handy to have certain staples always available in my freezer as well as emergency meals. To have these all written on the board saves me a lot of guessing. It can also save me a lot of money by stocking up on hamburger or mozzarella cheese or whatever when it is on sale. When I plan my menu, I can keep in mind which staples I have stored away that I got at bargain prices and use these. When inventory gets low, I can look for sale opportunities to restock. Also, if you've bought whole cows or pigs, using this list on your board is a good way to keep track of this meat as well.

By having emergency meals,( I mean frozen complete dinners that can just be thrown in the oven or a pot--we have chilli like this a lot) I can resist the temptation to go out for fast food or spend too much money at a restaurant when I just "don't feel like cooking."