5 little hacks to get your crap together

I don’t know about you guys, but my car is a mess. My house is a mess. My hair is often a mess, and if I wore make up, it would probably be a mess by the end of the day. It seems like lately, everything has been SO overwhelming. Kids, work, housework, relationships, self-care, never ending to-do lists……it seems like everything is piling up all around me. I hate feeling out of control and stressed out all the time. It makes me irritable and snippy with my husband and kids, and it tends to build on itself.

I get overwhelmed with our budget every time I open it, so I stop opening it. Since I stop opening it, I get farther and farther behind, which makes it more overwhelming the next time I open it. I’m feeling disconnected from my husband, so I stay up late to spend time with him. We’re both exhausted, so we just sit there and watch tv. We’re up too late, we didn’t really talk about anything, so I still feel disconnected from him only now, I’m also annoyed because I’m tired and I feel like we just wasted an evening. I spend my day off doing laundry, dishes, and trying to catch up on projects that have been sitting around the house in various stages of completion but then that night, realize that I barely spent any time with my kids. They were demanding and loud and fought all day, so I snapped at them when really, they were just trying to get my attention and I was ignoring them to focus on the physical mess around me.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how our physical environments can majorly affect our mental state. When my bedroom is clean and clutter-free, I really enjoy being in there. When my kid’s room is picked up, I can sit in there and actually play with them instead of being distracted by the toys and books strewn about. A clean kitchen means dinner might actually be on the table by dinner time, and so on. But spending all of my free time decluttering and cleaning just isn’t enough of a priority for it to happen. Spending time with my family, doing something creative, taking a day trip somewhere new…..these are the things I want to do on my days off. I’ve been toying with a few things to help keep the clutter and cleaning under control. Here are 5 that have been working for us!

Cleaning wipes in the bathroom. It took me years to “splurge” on a canister of Lysol wipes, but once I did, I was HOOKED. Having a canister in the bathroom has helped keep our bathroom from looking like something you would find at a campsite, because it literally takes under three minutes to wipe down the sink/counter, the outside and under the seat of the toilet, and the heater along the floor. I do it while the kids are taking a bath or right after we brush our teeth, and it’s made a noticeable difference. I’m not nearly as stressed about the deep cleaning that I know my bathroom needs when I just gave it a wipe down with disinfectant wipes the day before.

Every time you get out of the car, take something with you. I have a typical mom car. It’s an SUV, and it’s full of crap. Toys, books, food wrappers, unopened snacks that were dropped under the seat and then forgotten about, more water bottles than I care to count, and just straight up trash. As crazy as it made me to be driving what essentially amounted to a garbage truck, it never occurred to me that I could clean it out WITHOUT devoting an afternoon to the task. This might be common sense for you, but to me, it was a major lightbulb moment. As embarrassing as that may be to admit. So now, every time I get out of the car, at least one thing that doesn’t belong in there is coming out with me. It only takes a second to gather up the tissue, granola bar wrapper, and empty fast food bag from the front seat and toss it in the outside trash can on the way past, but it makes a big difference! I’ve gotten the kids in on it as well, having them grab a toy that doesn’t belong in the car or their nasty booger-filled tissue on the way out of the car, and it’s ALMOST becoming a habit. We’ll get there. One day.

Get the kids involved in your daily chores. Like I mentioned above, I have days where I spend so much time worrying about the state of my house that I basically ignore my kids. #HorribleMomConfession. I hate that I do it, but it’s just a fact. So last week, I tossed the clean laundry into a basket and brought it upstairs to the boy’s room, where they were playing. I sat on the floor and started folding. And guess what happened: they came over and helped! Okay, they “helped”, but still. It made folding laundry significantly more entertaining (because a four year old matching up socks and a two year old having to fish them back out of the hamper because he mis-understood his brother’s instructions to put them away is adorable), I was spending time with my kids (and since boys bond through shared activities, it was a double win!), and the laundry still got folded and put away. My four-year-old can help put things away when I unload the dishwasher, and both of them can help bring the small trash cans out of the bedrooms on trash day or pull up a chair and “help” with dinner. It might take a few extra minutes, but in my experience, it’s been worth it every time. The chores still get done, my kids are learning to be helpful members of the family, and we’re bonding over a task instead of them hanging off my leg crying to fruit snacks.

If it takes under a minute, just do it. This one I learned from Gretchen Rubin in The Happiness Project. (Side note, if you haven’t read that book, go get it at the library. Like, now.) This hack is exactly what it sounds like. Instead of putting that stack of envelopes on the stairs so you grab them next time you go up (and is that actually going to happen? Doubtful.), just bring them up to the office and put them away now. Wipe off the kitchen table after dinner. Sweep up that gross corner of the kitchen where dust seems to congregate instead of waiting until you have time to clean off the counters and sweep the whole kitchen. Wipe out the microwave when pasta sauce bubbles up and leaves residue on the side, even if you don’t have time to take out the rack and the spinning plate and give it a thorough clean. When you take care of little messes or inconveniences as they happen, they don’t have the chance to become big issues. Cut those suckers off at the knees!

Make time for mascara. This one isn’t really a cleaning/clutter attacking tip, but I feel like it helps with the general feeling of overwhelm in my life. Those of you that know me, know that I don’t wear make-up. Never have. But lately I’ve noticed a little sass in my step when I take the time to put on a pair of earrings and a couple swipes of mascara. When I take the 5 minutes to look pulled together, it shows in the way I handle the rest of my day. I’m a little more confident, I’m more willing to take on a tough email or phone call I’ve been putting off, and I’m more cheerful and energetic in general. When you feel good about yourself, it changes how you interact with the people around you. I’m willing to bet that this would be true for you, too. It might not be mascara and earrings, but if you think about it for a second, what is that one little thing that makes you feel pulled together? Maybe it’s curling your hair. Maybe it’s adding a splash of fancy creamer to your coffee and drinking it before the kids get up (or while you hide in the pantry). Maybe it’s a pair of butt-kicker boots that make you feel invincible. Maybe you have a newborn and brushing your teeth AND your hair makes you feel like Marilyn freaking Monroe (#beenthere). Whatever it is, make time for your mascara!

And that’s all I’ve got for you today! What about you? Are there any tips that you would add to the list, or any that you’re excited to try out? Comment below, or shoot me an email. I’d love to hear from you!