I did all the normal cleaning tasks today and had about five minutes left over. I decided to do a quick repair that has been bugging me. You know what I mean – that screw missing from an outlet cover or the hole that needs patching from when you took the hook out of the ceiling. Just a little, easy thing, but you never seem to find the time to fix it. I decided to try to make a dent in the list of tiny tasks and was surprised at how many of them I got done in those few …read more

Have you ever picked up a pot by the handle, only to discover the handle was so loose that the pot could spin around when you lifted it? I did. Luckily, the pot was empty instead of filled with some boiling hot food. I also have gone to pull open drawers, only to stand there staring at the closed drawer with the handle in my hand. So, for this Tidy Tuesday’s task, I went on a knob and handle tightening expedition.

I was surprised at how many kitchen cupboards and drawers had loose knobs and I found some loose …read more

We’re well into September, which means I’m thinking about holiday baking. Before I get caught up in the holiday rush, I like to inventory all my baking supplies, including pans and measuring cups. (How do cookie sheets just vanish like that from one year to the next?)
I start with the pans. Do I have cupcake pans, pie tins, cookie sheets, etc. in the cupboards? Many times, I realize that someone still has one of the pans from when there was a potluck dinner and I make a quick phone call to ask if they still have it. (The answer is …read more

School has already started for many families and is about to start for many others. As they rush around getting ready to see children off on buses, meet the carpool mom of the day and head off to work, the last thing busy moms and dads want to hear is, “I don’t know what to wear,” or “Has anyone seen my shoes?”
To make things go smoothly each morning, why not spend a Saturday or two a month organizing your children’s clothes? I always decide on a week’s worth of clothes for myself before the new work week and it saves …read more

Do you have five or six DS games you don’t play anymore? A whole selection of Disney movies gathering dust? Then, this week’s Tidy Tuesday is for you. Go through those crammed shelves in your entertainment center and weed out all the movies you don’t want to watch any more. You may discover a lot of empty cases. If so, you’ll need to make a pile of cases and DVDs to match up. (This can be a great activity for kids, especially if they like matching games.)
Once you have a group of unwanted movies and games, you can try trading …read more

You can usually tell when children live in a house. The yard looks…well, it looks lived in, too. There’s a ball over there by the hedge, a frisbee on the roof and a few random toys scattered around on the ground. Half the time, the toys actually belong to a neighbor, which brings me to my organizing plan for today’s Tidy Tuesday.
Put a bin labeled “found toys” in an easily accessible location and toss everything that doesn’t belong to your kids in it. (Except that bicycle. It is way too big to fit. How do kids not notice they left …read more

Today, we didn’t just change our little critters’ cages and aquariums. We made it our Tidy Tuesday task and really cleaned, rearranged and decorated. The cost was minimal – a fancy new bag of gravel here and a cute hamster house there. However, the return on the investment was priceless.
Normally, it seems like I either clean cages or the pet’s owner does the job as  quickly as possible and the pet gets the bare minimum of attention from its loving, but busy, little owner. Spending time arranging their pets’ living quarters and seeing how they liked their new digs gave …read more

It never fails. You get a call inviting everyone to a pool party or a day at the beach and…you can’t find your sun screen or a favorite bathing suit. After a few fifteen minute search and find missions, I decided to set up a summer fun corner. I have a metal baker’s rack and a hamper in the mud room area by the back door that I designated for the job.
I put plastic crates (the kind with small holes for air circulation) on the bottom shelf of the baker’s rack and labeled one for each kid. In the crates …read more

Okay, it might not be a counter. Maybe it is a table or a chair. But somewhere in your house is a spot everyone seems to pile stuff. Mine is a counter and this morning it was covered with:

a hairbrush
a 2.0 beanie baby
2 malt balls in a bulk food bag
a box of pasta
a craft project
a lunch bag
a half drunk bottle of water
a phone
a container of Ovaltine
a ruler

Now, this is something I clean off every single morning. Every morning. And by evening, it looks exactly the same. Maybe there’s a banana instead of a bottle of water, but the pile is …read more

The air vent on our one bathroom wall seems to be a mini lint trap. A few times a month, I like to clean the front of the vent and remove the lint buildup. It is pretty easy. I just grab a cotton swab and run it from one side to the other in each little opening. The lint all bunches up at the far end and I can just pull it out and toss it in the trash.
Heat vents on the floor are another story. I have a kitten that thinks it is just hysterical to stick little things …read more