Guest Post: Harmonize Your Home for the Holidays in a Hurry

As the holidays draw near, it seems we’re all getting busier by the day and more stressed by the hour.

Still need to rearrange furniture to make room for the tree?

Maybe you’ve worn grooves into the linoleum from pacing around the kitchen in anticipation of that dinner party you’re going to host?

Whatever your situation, you might think it’s too late to get your home into Santa-style shape.

If you have consider traveling for the holidays I recommend visiting G1 Property Holidays.

You would be wrong.

Here are five steps for de-cluttering your home in time for the holiday festivities.

1. Focus on the main rooms. Pick the rooms where your family and visitors are likely to linger, mingle or dine. Get a few Bar Stools and clean up the entire dining table as people who don’t have a seat on the couch can always sit by the dining table as its clean and not miss out on the family fun.  Concentrate on the dining room, living room, main bathroom and coat closet, for example, before you worry about the kids’ bedrooms, the tool shed out back or the canning cellar under the stairs (shout-out to my family back in Appalachia). Remember — you can always go through other rooms once you’ve handled the main ones, but if you’re pressed for time, don’t set unrealistic goals. Concentrate on the important, the reasonable, the achievable. Once you’ve picked your targets, make sure you take on just one room at a time.

2. Out with the old. It helps to organize and arrange what you want to keep by removing the items you don’t. Gather boxes and label them “donate,” “junk,” and “maybe.” Then, start filling the boxes. Use the “maybe” container for the things you know you should toss – like that decorative “glam rock” rudolph statue you thought was a good idea back in December of ’86 – but don’t have the heart to let go. It’ll help get the ball rolling without causing hesitation or regret since you can make those tough decisions later.

3. Think big. Once you’ve cleared out the clutter that has to go, look at the furniture and larger items in the room. Rearrange before you do anything else. For example, if you need to move the couch to fit the tree into its proper corner, or if you have to slide a random floor cabinet from the dining room to clear space for a kid’s table, do that now.

4. Details matter. Now that you’ve handled the big, space-hogging furniture, take a second look at the room. Notice dirt or dust one the floor where the couch used to be? Are there any stray DVDs, books, papers or other eye-sore-type clutter laying around? If so, sweep the dirt and put the movies back where they belong, you can also improve the lighting of the room with the use of antique lighting from Fireside Antiques so it can really improve the looks of any home in the holidays. If they don’t have a proper place, create one. You can always hide a stack of DVDs under an end table with a floor-length table cloth. Get creative and hide any unsightly clutter that you can’t get rid of. Just resist the urge to bury your husband’s full-size Christmas Story leg lamp in the backyard. Remember, the holidays are supposed to be a peaceful time. Avoid inciting World War III.

5. Teach and preach. This is probably the most important step. If you don’t tell your kids or spouse where things go, they won’t know how to put things back. Stay on top of everyone and let them know that clutter and messy rooms won’t be tolerated (until after the holidays, at the very least).

Bonus Tip: Get your family to help. By “get,” of course, I mean force, threaten, bribe or anything else you can do to get them to chip in. Let them know that you are NOT going to do this alone. The more they help, the more likely they’ll be to stay on top of the upkeep afterward.

Once you’ve finished, sit back and soak it all in. After all, the holidays only come once a year (thank God).

 ——

This post was generously was written by Dan Reidmiller, Creative Director for College Hunks Hauling Junk. College Hunks Hauling Junk and College Hunks Moving is a national junk-removal, labor services and moving company, with franchises serving 45 markets in 25 states, including areas such as Central PA, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Northern NJ, Tampa Bay, Washington DC and now Miami.

 

10 Strategies for Organized Gift Wrapping

The wrapping of holiday gifts is often believed to be one of the more tedious tasks of the season. If you have a lot of wrapping to complete this season and are looking for ways to organize and streamline the process, use one of our simple tips.

1) Wrapping Party: Make wrapping fun, by inviting a friend or two to join you. They can bring over their gifts and as a group you can get the task completed while enjoying some quality time with each other.

2) Enlist Help: If you have older children who are capable of wrapping, consider assigning each family member another member’s gifts to wrap. This way each person is only responsible for one set of gifts to wrap. This will help to lessen the burden on you.

3) Gift Bags: We know they aren’t the prettiest of wrapping options, but gift bags are both quick and reusable, thus saving time and money. These are also helpful when little ones want to assist in the wrapping process.

4) Wrapping Services: If you truly do not have time to wrap, get help from a professional. We wrap many of our client’s gifts each year and even offer a discount on holiday service packages. Contact us for details.

5) Sending Gifts: When purchasing gifts that will be shipped to their final destination, attempt to buy online and select the gift wrapping option. Often times, the cost to ship through the online shop is cheaper than if you were to buy locally and ship yourself, leaving you with extra money for the gift wrap option. You may also order gift baskets in Ottawa which look beautiful and often don’t need wrapping at all.

6) Supplies: Before starting a wrapping session, check your supplies and make sure that you have ample amounts of tape, paper, decorative accessories, and a good pair of scissors.

7) Wrapping Paper Tips: Keep the presents organized by assigning each person in the family a specific wrapping paper design. Using this strategy helps to keep clear which packages are for which person and can also save you money on gift tags.

8) Little-by-Little: While some people prefer to get all wrapping done at once, others do not have a large chunk of time to commit. If you fall into this category, commit to wrapping one to two presents per day until the holiday arrives.

9) Keep It Simple: Martha Stewart-esque packages are lovely to give and receive, but that level of decorative creativity is not for everyone. Make wrapping easy by choosing a single type of decorative element for this year’s gifts. For example, this year you could use only ribbon or printed tape or bows, but not all.

10) Odd-Shaped Items: When you’ve got something with an unusual shape, don’t worry about attempting to wrap it. Simply get an oversized bow and hide the item until the present opening session begins.

For more wrapping tips and other holiday organization strategies, check out our printable ebook, Holiday Planner: A Comprehensive Organizing Guide for the Holiday Season on Lulu.com.

TWOW

Best Holiday Shopping Apps 2012

Finding the perfect gift for each person on your list, and within your budget, can be a challenge. Luckily, we’ve got some ideas for managing the process and helping to keep costs down.

Online Shopping: 

  • When shopping online, visit coupon websites, such as retailmenot.com for discount codes and free shipping offers.
  • Google Shopping is a simple way to aggregate all online prices for a particular item, including shipping, into one page. Simply search for what you’re looking for and Google Shopper will list all online availability with pricing totals.
  • Slice App enables you to track and organize all of your online shopping, including receipts, shipping and arrival tracking, and order details.

In-Store Shopping:

  • When shopping in store, use RedLaser to scan the bar code and ensure that you’re getting the best available price on the market.
  • The Coupons App is an excellent tool for locating coupons for nearby brick and mortar stores.
  • SnapTell let’s shoppers compare items on store shelves with Amazon.com prices. If you’re planning on shipping the gift anyways, you may as well buy it online and save the hassel.

Other Great Tools: 

  • Gift Plan is the perfect app for anyone who wants to keep an organized gift list on-the-go. It even syncs with your calendar for future birthday and holiday reminders.

We hope these apps will help keep your organized and within budget this holiday season.

TWOW

Getting Ready for the Holidays: Gift Wrap

It is officially the first week in November, which means that the holidays are just around the corner. Each Friday until Christmas we will be posting ideas for how you can get organized for the upcoming festivities. Additionally, we are very excited to announce that The Well-Organized Woman will be releasing it’s first eBook on Organized Holiday Planning next week. Please check back then to download your very own copy.

The first item on our holiday to-do list is to review our gift wrap supplies. The act of looking through your supplies and determining what you have and what you need is important for two reasons. First, it ensures that you do not buy duplicates of things that you already have. Second, it should serve as inspiration for how you choose to wrap presents this year. If you have a lot of ribbons or bows you could make those the focal point of all wrapping this year. In other words, try to use as much of the supplies you currently have before purchasing anything new. Below are a few additional tips and ideas for maintaining organization of your wrapping supplies this holiday season.

  • Keep wrapping supplies organized in a portable carrier, such as the Gift Wrap Work Station from Container Store or the over-the-door option pictured below from Better Homes & Gardens.
  • Purge anything that is torn, ripped, or in other ways poor quality.
  • Sort decorative supplies by category. For example, keep all ribbons together, tissue paper together, and bows together, etc. Then sort wrapping paper by occasion, such as all Christmas paper together, all baby shower paper together, etc. This way you know exactly what you have for each potential gift-giving event.
  • Store gift bags inside of one large gift bag.
  • After wrapping gifts, make sure the supplies are returned to their rightful homes.
  • Donate any gift wrap you no longer want but is in good condition to Goodwill – another shopper might love something you no longer use!

 

Get Organized for Halloween

Halloween may not be one of the most important holidays, but for families with children the day can require much preparation. In order to avoid last minute scrambling, we’ve put together a list of things to get organized ahead of time.

1) Costumes: By shopping for costumes earlier in the month of October you’ll not only have a better selection, but you may also get a better price. Costume stores typically offer coupons in early October, so keep a look out in your coupon mailers or check online sites like retailmenot.com for discount codes for online shopping. For optimum organization, you should aim to have all costumes purchased by the second week in October.

2) Decorations: Halloween decorations can help to get your family and neighborhood in the holiday spirit. Plan on decorating your home and yard by the weekend of October 20th. If you’re carving pumpkins, ideal timing is the weekend before (27th) Halloween to ensure they stay fresh. Keep in mind when you are decorating that the weather changes quickly this time of year, so if you have delicate ghosts or spider webs, be sure to bring them in before any rain hits.

3) Candy: Stores like CVS, Costco, and Target have deals on large bags of candy early in the month, so now is the time to stock up on the sweets you’ll need for trick-or-treaters.

4) School Activities: Schools often plan Halloween activities, such as costume parades and trick-or-treating. Find out the dates of these events now and mark your calendars to ensure your child will be prepared. In addition to the activity dates, also add deadlines for costume and accessory (candy pails) purchases.

5) Trick-o-Treating Plans: Plan on setting up your trick-or-treat plans two weeks ahead of time. If you are coordinating with other families, set a meeting time, location, and plans for child supervision and safety. It’s also a good idea to assign each child a ‘buddy’ to stay with for the evening to ensure no one is left alone.

6) Party Plans: If you plan on throwing a Halloween party, you’ll want to send out invitations the first week of October. During the second week, you can start to plan decorations, food, theme, music, and other party needs. The third week is the time to firm up these plans and finishing buying necessary non-perishable items, such as decorations, I always make sure to place antique clocks during this time; however, this year we will need to get a Repair for one of them . The last week leading up to the party is the time to decorate your space and complete the grocery shopping. On the day-of, you’ll prepare the food and drinks, set up last minute items, don your costume, and get ready to have a spooky evening with friends.

7) Holiday Food: Although Halloween is best known for candy, some people have traditions that include certain Halloween foods. Ensure you’ll be able to make these for friends and family by making a list of foods and necessary ingredients two weeks before the holiday. When making the list, keep in mind the little items, such as spices for pumpkin seed roasting and drinks such as apple cider.

We hope that by getting a head start on your Halloween plans this year you’ll have more time to enjoy the festivities on the day of.

TWOW

Another Pretty Cool Site by:


Copyright 2011-2017 - The Well Organized Woman