Designer Emily Henderson's Smart Tips For Keeping Your Home Organized

For many people, home organization is a concern and even a problem. If your kitchen table has piles of books, school paperwork, and stacks of bills, you're not alone. According to a survey from Uncluttered Simplicity, an estimated 43% of people feel their home lacks organization. Whether it's piles of magazines, clothing on the stairs, or the always-lost library book, there are many ways to get things organized so you feel refreshed and ready to start your day without a panic about a missing shoe.

Many people want to live a more organized life, but finding the time and proper methods for decluttering isn't easy to do, especially when you don't have a lot of room to be flexible. In a recent article on organization, designer Emily Henderson shares some tips on how to get organized. Here are five tips from the designer to help you get on track no matter what's causing your chaos.

Do you often find yourself digging through the pantry to find the perfect combination of items for the kids' lunches or a snack after school? According to Closet & Storage Concepts, the pantry is one of the biggest areas of organizing frustration in the kitchen.

Emily Henderson recommends moving to clear storage containers for many of the items in your pantry. Decanting food, which is the process of organizing items out of their packaging, can be a practical solution in many pantries, and it's an eye-pleasing experience. It helps create kitchens that are cleaner and more in order because it's easier to see where everything is within that space. Put kids' snacks in drawers that are closer to their eye level, making it easier for them to grab. Don't forget to include a few lazy susans for a simple way to see options in the pantry as well.

Do you have a drawer in your kitchen dedicated to sandwich, freezer, and gallon-size plastic bags? According to Noissue, Americans use 100 billion plastic sandwich bags per year. Perhaps you want to do better by reducing your use of plastic bags like this but lack any way of organizing what you have on hand.

You can purchase a few easy solutions to help you with this in your kitchen. Emily Henderson recommends the use of a kitchen drawer organizer designed specifically for sandwich and other plastic bags. They are helpful because they create a very simple way for you to open the drawer, grab the bag you want, and head on your way to pack that lunch. Trying to shove a bunch of boxes into this drawer, all of which are different sizes, tends to be much more complicated and less organized overall. Organizers make it easy and neat.

There's nothing quite as frustrating as remembering at 5:30 that your kids have to be at soccer practice at 6, and you haven't even thought about dinner yet. Kids are busy these days. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 44% of boys and 35% of girls play a sport, and 29% of girls and 24% of boys are involved in other types of clubs and lessons in 2020. That's a lot to remember.

To keep it all organized and you on track, Emily Henderson recommends creating calendars hung up on the wall to help you to visualize your schedule. Do the same thing for chore charts that involve all members of the family working together. Be sure to have cleaning supplies all in one place so kids can easily find them to participate in the cleanup and organization of the home. Use stickers to help keep everyone motivated, too.

It may be time to think about the organization of specific tasks in a different way. Did you know that having an organized home can contribute to mental health and well-being? According to Intermountain Healthcare, organizing helps to reduce stress, improves relationships, and helps to minimize anxiety and depression. While overall home organization is important, there is often the need to have certain types of items together to create more of a functional system to increase productivity.

Emily Henderson recommends creating systems to organize various groups of items based on what you need and use them for on a daily (or less often) basis. For example, use a utility cart to help organize all of your crafting supplies in one area. Use another one for school supplies to make homework time more efficient. You can do the same for just about anything that you need to use for various tasks throughout the home.

How many shoes do you have? Next, count how many shoes the kids and other members of the family have. It's no wonder that you are struggling to find a way to avoid tripping over them as you walk into the home. According to a study reported by Reuters, the average American has 19 pairs of shoes. Even if you don't have nearly that many, maintaining order is a must.

Emily Henderson offers a few solutions for this, including the use of various shoe racks or a shoe bin to keep everything contained. You could even use a lidded basket or container, so you don't have to have the visual of clutter throughout your home. Find the right type of storage for the amount of space you have to dedicate to it. It's always a good idea to work on decluttering your home, and that may mean getting rid of those extra shoes in the process.