How to Take Action and Organize Your Space in No Time at All

Organize your space

Organizing the place you call home is an action-packed self-improvement project that yields great personal satisfaction.

I challenge you to organize your space in the next 30 days! Organizing the place you call home is an action-packed self-improvement project that yields great personal satisfaction. But how do you move past the feeling of overwhelm and what feels like an insurmountable undertaking? In order to organize your space, you actually need to first organize a plan. For without a plan, you won’t reach that personally satisfying state of accomplishment called “organized.”

Organize Your Space in Less Than an Hour a Day

Say what? Organize your space in less than 60 minutes a day? Uh huh. And when you take the time to put your plan into action every day for less than 60 minutes every day, you’ll be organized in less than a month, too. “How,” you ask? With this 30-day or 30-step plan.

Organize Your Space in 30 Days: the First 14 Days

Day 1. Just Begin

Eat the frog first. Start with whatever it is that annoys or stresses you most. Tackle that paper pile in your office, no matter where it landed. Get rid of or put away the pile of clothes on your bedroom floor. And all that “stuff” on your counter in the kitchen? Pick up just one item, and put it in its place. Then, move to the next item. It’s amazing how simply starting on what feels so overwhelming will set you in motion on a path to completion.

Day 2. Create a Give Away Box

Put everything you want to move out of the house in a “give away” box. And set it by the door. As you come across items you wouldn’t miss “if you lost it in a fire,” put them in that box. Once it’s full, donate everything in that box to a friend or places like Goodwill and Salvation Army Adult Rehabilitation Center here in Brooklyn.

Day 3. Make Holidays Happy

You might have decorations for every holiday. After you decorate for the next holiday, donate anything you didn’t decorate with, and separate the rest of your decorations by holiday. Then, sort the decorations for each holiday in their own clear, stackable box. When it’s time to decorate for the next holiday, you won’t waste time or energy digging through your 4th of July decorations to find your Halloween decorations. Plus, your decorations won’t get tattered, dinked, crumpled, or worn as quickly either.

Day 4. Take Command of Your Entryway

Set up a “command center” at the door your family uses to come and go. Add hooks for coats, bins for shoes, and a mail sorter. Without hooks, bins, or a place to sort everyone’s mail, everything will “land” on the nearest flat spot available. Oh, and don’t forget to save a spot for your give away box.

Day 5. Put Your Pet’s Things in Convenient Places

It makes sense to put leashes, sweaters, water bottle/bowl, doggie waste bags, and other outside activity items in a bin conveniently near the front door. It also makes sense to put your pet’s dishes, treats, and food in their own convenient spot in the room where you feed them.

Organize Your Space in the Kitchen

Organize your space in the kitchen

Day 6. Organize the Spice Rack

Choose to arrange your herbs and spices in one of three ways: alphabetically, by cuisine, or by brand. Whatever works best for you or makes the best sense to you while you’re baking or cooking determines the arranging.

Day 7. Eliminate Unused or Unnecessary Utensils

The longer you’re married or on your own, the more utensils a body seems to acquire. Some are god-sends, and you use them all a lot But do you really need to create space for four of them?! I can’t imagine using fewer than two spatulas or sets of measuring spoons, but four can openers? If you can pare down your kitchen utensils to one or two of each, do. Then organize what’s left with drawer dividers.

Day 8. Organize Your Pots, Pans, and Lids

I speak from experience on this one. Digging around in a pile for the right lid is annoying, inefficient, and very noisy, especially when they fall. If you have pots or pans that you hardly ever or almost never use, donate them. Purchase and install cupboard organizers, like these for lids, to manage the rest.

Day 9. Check Expiration Dates

How often do you use figs or dates? Once a year? What about anchovy paste? Check the expiration dates on whatever is sitting in your refrigerator, freezer, or in your pantry. If it’s expired, pitch it. And when you need it for that annual dish you prepare, buy just enough to use for the recipe and throw the rest away.

Day 10. Sort and Stack Your Staples

Your pantry would be put to better use with airtight, stackable containers. Sort your flour, sugar, pasta, oatmeal, dry beans, rice, noodles, and other staple dry goods. Then put them in containers that are stackable. They’ll be much easier to retrieve when needed, and you’ll be pleased with the added space you now have.

Day 11. Get Rid of Unnecessary Kitchen Gadgets

Yes, that spiralizer. I have one, and I never use it. Maybe if I enjoyed eating zucchini noodles … I’m going to give mine to someone else who needs to discover why they don’t need one either.

Organize your space in the coffee mug cupboardDay 12. Just Say No to Another Coffee Mug

I have a coffee mug fetish. I collect them, on purpose. You can only use so many mugs at a time, right? Like how many times do you entertain coffee or tea drinkers 30 at a time? Keep one or two mugs per coffee or tea drinker in your family, and either donate or pack the rest. I like to change them out once a year.

Day 13. Pair Food Storage Containers with Lids

If you’ve got a container that has no lid, toss it. And if you have any lids that have no container to use with them, toss them, too.

Day 14. Organize Your Junk Drawer

Junk drawers are a necessary evil, and they exist in more than the kitchen. But wherever it is, why not organize it? How? Dump all of its contents onto a sheet in the floor. Then sort everything into piles. Add some drawer dividers to the drawer and place each pile in its own spot in the drawer.

Now that you’ve reached day 14, take time to think on what you accomplished. Wow! And there are only 16 days left to completely organize your space! Don’t let what you’ve done “go to pot,” as some say. If you use it, put it away. You are creating a place for everything, so put whatever you use back in its place. Space in your brownstone or studio apartment is a precious commodity. Make the most of it. Purge, sort, organize your space and keep it that way.

Organize your space and help potential buyers fall in love with your place. If you’re ready to enter the real estate market and list your home, contact Charles D’Alessandroyour Brooklyn Real Estate Agent with Fillmore Real Estate. Call (718) 253-9600 ext.206 or email [email protected] today.


Brooklyn Real Estate Agent

 Charles D’Alessandro

Your Brooklyn Real Estate Agent

718-253-9600 ext. 206

[email protected]

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