How My Organizing is Going- Starting with Cleaning

It is going, really. I am getting organized. My first plan was to get my blogging on a schedule and organized but then I thought I'd like to have my physical, real life more organized first. My life is why I blog; not the other way around.

This is linked up with Hearts for Home Blog Hop

To start with, I wanted to get my cleaning schedule in order because our house, although not filthy, is beyond 'lived in', if you know what I mean. I would not really want someone to happen by with the way the cobwebs are hanging in the corners of the ceiling. Um yeah...

But I need a simple schedule or I won't follow through. Plain and simple. 

You'd think {okay I would think} that it's easy to just sit down and come up with a cleaning routine. I know what needs cleaned and I know that it should be done every so often. Or do I? Apparently not because I can't recall the last time I cleaned the baseboards {and they are looking pretty sad} or a lot of other commonsense places in our house. 

I sound lame to myself for telling this but I had to do some research of just what I should clean- and when. I used to have a cheat sheet for helping me know when/what to clean. It's been years since it's been seen. It was in a binder and last I looked, it was one of the only pages missing. Of course.

I looked online for some help. Here is where I started: Pinterest. Here are the top sites I went to and saved printables to help me get organized with my cleaning:

• Upside Down Homeschooling- Cleanup Blitz Cards
• At the End of the Drive- Cleaning Box
• Joyful Mothering- Cleaning Schedule Daily, Weekly, Monthly
• Money Saving Mom- Free Customizable Cleaning Lists {it's the third on the page}
• The Time-Warp Wife- Housekeeping Schedule
• Freebie Finding Mom- All Inclusive Spring Cleaning Checklist by Room

After all of those, and many more I don't have linked, I decided to go with the very simple customizable Monthly/Semi-Annual Cleaning List from Money Saving Mom {fourth on the page}. They are half sheets, customizable to specific cleaning schedules. I really like the simplicity of them. 

I started my cleaning 'routine' on Thursday and have accomplished much. Since I've got a few days under my belt I feel confident I can move on to another aspect of organizing. Over at Organized Home, there are printables for a Household Notebook.  I might not use very many of the printables because I'm sure I can use plain lined paper for many of the sections. I probably won't have as much as they have listed either. 

That's my next project.

High or Low -Where Should It Go?

Many houses in this day and age have air conditioning, whether central air or other means, and so the temperature of the kitchen is fairly regulated. We do not have air conditioning in our home which requires that I focus a bit on where items are stored in the kitchen.

Heat rises and therefore the higher cupboards of the kitchen will be hotter, and for longer, than those lower cupboards and drawers. Heat affects the quality of our food. In regards to foods that spoil, such as oils in containers that have been opened and nuts, I do not keep them in the cupboards. So what foods are best kept low, and which are safe in the upper cupboards? Here is how we do it in our kitchen, year round:

Upper cupboards: 

• Teas
• Instant coffee
• Salt
• Boxed noodles
• Dried beans

Middle cupboards:

• Cereals (cold, with no fruits, such as Cheerios)
• Hot cereal (oatmeal, grits, barley, etc)
• Flour
• Baking powder, soda, and other such products
• Sugar
• Coffee beans or ground
• Hot cocoa, apple cider mixes

Lower cupboards:

• Cereals (cold, with added fruit, and granola- if not refrigerated)
• Baking chips (unless it is summer, they go in the freezer then)
• Cans (meats, vegetables)
• Oil (before being opened)
• Peanut butter (before being opened)
• Mayonnaise (before being opened)
• Salad dressings (before being opened)
• Water (especially when in plastic containers)

I know I've not touched on everything that is in our cupboards. I use the mentality that if it can spoil, then it needs to be kept cooler, and lower. If it is fairly 'dry' then it can go up high. If it's a can, it goes low, so that it won't explode! It does get fairly hot in our house during the summer.

There are some things that we leave on the counter because I don't want them in a cupboard where they cannot be seen yet do not require refrigeration. Those are things such as bananas, apples, occasionally a loaf of bread, and some vegetables, such as my garden tomatoes and zucchini. When it is really hot during the summer, I do put these in the fridge. And if in doubt, I put it in the fridge.

All above images are public domain, source: http://www.pdclipart.org

I’m linking this post up with Making a Home at Linda’s Lunacy, where we can share posts about homemaking ideas, recipes, crafts, decorating, cleaning tips, basically anything that has to do with caring for a home and family.

Organization...what's that?!

What do you use to keep yourself organized? I'm to the point that I think I might just go through my entire house and alphabetize everything. Okay, that might be a  bit extreme... But am I the only one that starts the year (and by 'year' that can be the beginning of whenever I feel that "now is when I get organized!") with everything in its place and by oh, I don't know, a few months later, its all in shambles?

I'm a list maker, but not a list follower. I'm a perfectionist, but also a procrastinator. I'm also a pack-rat. There is no counter for that one- it is what it is! I'm thrifty but buy a lot of 'inexpensive' things. I buy many things after careful deliberation but then fail to use them. And of course, that goes back to the pack-rat bit. Do you see the pattern here?

I have been putting together my creative writing lesson plans for co-op and I know I already have tons of great resources. I know I do. I have to- after all I have a page with websites that is organized by subject (and some are even referenced by grade/ages). I even have a few spots on a few bookshelves that are dedicated to writing books and such. But wouldn't you know, when I went looking for these resources, I often cannot find them or I find something else that I think is so great (but come to find out later I already have it). Something that is absolutely amusing to me is when I have a document or website open in front of me and it has what I need, right there, but I go looking somewhere else and forget about what I already have.

Organization is obviously not my best character trait (yea, I won't be putting that down on my resume). I would love to have a program on my computer (since I pretty much am always on it) that catalogs all my magazines, DVDs, CDs, files, documents, books, resources, etc. into a database that will allow me to search by subject or topic, or simply random words to find where it can be found in my already owned items. Do they make such a thing?

And of course, I understand that in order to have all those things cataloged I would have to input the information first. Did I mention I am a list maker? Another thing I love to do is fill out forms and input data into fields. Lol it's using the information afterward that I have such a problem with.

So, what do you use to keep yourself organized?