Making peace with chaos and clutter - Page 2

[phatchristy]

Originally Posted by NotAFairytale 

So I've been watching a lot of videos on you tube of really messy houses and that definitely makes any normal clutter instantly look cleaner! Might want to check those out :)

Or...check out the hoarders show.  I will admit that sometimes I watch that one myself, I always find myself cleaning a lot during it LOL.  

The kid mess...well, I have four and am expecting another.  Though we've gotten rid of a lot, especially as my older girls aren't really into playing other than building legos and such.  We still have cars, little action heroes, abc tiles and letters and little pet shop toys.  It's amazing how quickly then can turn into a mess.  I keep them on shelves up high, when DS asks for them I give him the amount (generally every category fits into a shoe box).  He can only do so much damage that way LOL.  

I find that getting rid of stuff, every year, really helps immensely.  Because people still give us gifts, etc. for the kids we still wind up with more stuff.  So as the new comes in we need to bless someone else with what we're no longer using.

But, I remember back when our home was so free from anything, just furniture.  Nothing ever on the floor or anything.  I remember those days.  I'm certain eventually it will get back to that.  It would be great to sort of 'section off' an area.  However, we have that open floor plan and rooms sort of flow into another and some don't really have much of a border so things drift over easily it seems!

[Oliver's Mama]

I have a 2 year old and an almost 5 year old.  I've given up on cleaning and picking up during the day, but then right before betime, we crank up some dance music and run around crazy cleaning up for 5 minutes.  Then after they're in bed, I finish things up, and it makes a HUGE difference to wake up to a clean slate in the morning, for my mental health. then we start all over again.

At 2, you can certainly teach your kiddo to help clean up, and even do things like clear off their dishes and put them in the sink after meals, as well as put away their clean laundry in their closet, and dirties in the basket.  I  take a few montessori cues for setting up our house so that practical things are at the kids' level; my son can even grab a rag and clean up a mess after himself. Those little things save me a few seconds of cleaning here and there, and it's great learning and sense of pride for the kids.

[jes h]

We are extremely minimalist when it comes to stuff;  DH and I keep very little things; clothes, trinkets, decor, whatever.  If something hasn't been used for over a year, it is generally donated.  My mom is a hoarder, and I find I tend this way unless I am actively aware of it and discarding things.  We went to open shelving through out the house, the only covered closets are at the end of the hall where I child-proof my craft supplies, DH and my closet, and the bottom cupboards in the kitchen where food is kept.  The rest (bookshelves, kids closets, kitchen pots/pans, bathroom, etc.) is open.   I think the clutter is disguised in the look, but I am sure other people probably think our house looks like a constant disaster.

Many things that are given to DS just go right to someone else (i.e., the big wheels SIL gave him when he was 2 to 'grow into')  However, we do foster care, and kids come with their own stuff, and their own ideas of toys, and the state gives them LOTS of toys that we wouldn't normally get for holidays.  The pair we have now came from another foster home that attempted to compensate for their crappy lives by buying them LOTS of plasticy-flashy-blinky things we would generally not have in our house.  This is the junk that drives me really crazy. 

We're doing a yard sale this month to raise some funds for a ministry thing.  I am going to try to sell the idea to them to sell some toys for their own money - and then 'help' them spend that money... ;-)
 

[MrsBone]

I tell myself when clutter begins to make me a little bit crazy, that this chaos is so completely normal having a house with a preschooler and a toddler, and that one day, I will miss it. I know I will! every parent I've ever talked to with grown kids says the same thing..."it was hard, messy, crazy sometimes, but I miss it." So that helps a lot. The suggestion of putting a hamper where your DH leaves his clothes is a good one, but until I let DH know just how amazingly stressed it makes me when I'm picking up after kids all day and the house still isnt clean, and then have to pick up after a fully capable adult, he didn't start trying harder. And for him, it was definitely difficult. He's very ADD and doesn't take his meds unless he's at work. Oy. But after a few weeks of constant reminding, his clothes are in the hamper 90% of the time, and if they're not, they dont get washed! Plain and simple. Also, as your kiddo gets older you may find that your DH will try to be a better example so his kids arent just laying their clothes anywhere or leaving dishes out. DH has gotten on to DS about the same things he's guilty of, and that has improved his habits.

[Mama Florentyne]

Tips for clutter with small children:

Obviously, eliminating some of the toys will shave some time off the clean-up process, but if you love them and want to keep them find a way to work with all your toys.

For toys, bins seemed to be the only way to store in our tiny house, so when my first child was around 2 and entered the dumping stage, I switched to bins with snap-tight lids. Then he would come to me and ask me to open it - and I could choose where we dumped them out, i.e. not in front of the dishwasher.

A friend had a rule when her boys were a little older (4-6 yrs), only 3 different things out at once. That way they could extend their creative play (the dinosaurs could crash into the lego buildings) without making clean-up a sorting nightmare.

This same friend taught me to lay out a fleece lap blanket before dumping out a box of toys with tiny parts, that way the blanket could be lifted up by the corners and all the pieces easily poured back into their bin. Voila!

Another friend's method for dealing with clutter went like this: "I just kick it all out of the way until 5 o'clock." Ignore it all day and then do one concerted effort to put it away, once a day, at a regular time, like just before dinner.

For your state of mind, I do think it helps to watch a show like Hoarders and then look around at the relative sanity of your own house! You might also try looking at some of those glossy architectural magazines with sleek, minimalist interiors and feel sorry for the person who has to live in such a sterile environment. (Or, if this is what you long for, remind yourself that in the future, there will be time to live this way, but then you'll miss the pitter-patter of little feet.) Then look around at your own home, bursting with the joy, vibrancy and life of small children, and revel in the "lived-in look!"

[gitanamama]

Originally Posted by Mama Florentyne 

 Then look around at your own home, bursting with the joy, vibrancy and life of small children, and revel in the "lived-in look!"

That's what I've been focusing on--and I've found it really helps to change my mindset and make me feel less stressed. 

Lots of great tips from everyone--I've made some small changes around the house and I think they'll help keep the clutter more controlled. Lots of toys are being put away and will be rotated back out as needed, and I'm off to get some bins with tops--great idea Mama Florentyne! I think the toy sets we have with tons of small pieces will be on a shelf out of reach and only come down as needed. And I'm getting rid of some toys that don't get used much and aren't great quality. 

I do play the clean up game with my son and the kids that I care for, but I've started really emphasizing it at the end of every activity. My son is at the stage where he loves to help with everything and imitate what I do, so I'm hoping he'll get in the habit of picking up toys with me.  He does get a rag from the kitchen to clean up anytime he spills something and he helps me put away the kiddie plates in the kitchen, so I think we're making some progress!

And DH and I had another talk about him putting his clothes in the hamper and his dishes in the sink. You made a great point MrsBone that we need to set a good example for our kids. It's almost humorous to me that my DH will toss his dirty work clothes a foot from the hamper, but not actually in it. Grrr! But he promised to work on it. 

[nd_deadhead]

Our house is cluttered (and I have 2 teenagers). I try not to fret about it - DH and I work full-time, and we prefer hanging out with our kids to tidying things up. When I start feeling overwhelmed, I attack one area (my desk, the kitchen) and I feel SO much better!

I used to compare our house to our neighbors - it was always spotless and tidy. But I finally figured out that it isn't a contest, and it doesn't matter if we are not as tidy as our neighbors or friends. Once in a while I'll visit a friend who's home is worse than ours, and I feel pretty good!

OP, I think getting your DH to help with little things will help you a LOT. I can imagine feeling really frustrated if I had to pick up after the kids AND DH.

My twin sons go off to college in the fall - I'm anxious to see if DH and I keep the house any neater when they're gone (I doubt it).

[tittipeitto]

Oh I love this post, and I love all the advice like:  "Remind myself that death is very orderly, life is chaotic and crazy. Embrace life."

Now here are few tips that have made my life easier. I designed my new home originally with a play room next to kitchen, which was for a while a good thing because a toddler wants to be near mommy. When my younger one was 2.5 I realized that they played at the other end of the house more anyways, and moved the playroom out of sight. Now from the kitchen, a place always in some stage of chaos, I can move my eyes to the organized family room. NOT that it always is, but that room is my priority. It feels amazing to have an empty coffee table to look at when ever I need it.

Don't know if you allow any tv, we do, but never before both bedroom and playroom have been cleaned, tv is a great motivator! My older one lived without this rule for many, many years, and still, it never occures to him to complain. In fact they get pretty much nothing without cleaning up their mess. No ice cream before, no play date before, no night time story before etc...

I teached my kids since very little not to dump toy baskets for the hell of it. I had a friends big kid to show me an example of how arrogant it can be of a child, dump a game with little peaces, then another, play neither, and assume you can just walk away. Not saying that of your little one, but never too early to learn it's not fair to mama!

[ElsieLC]

I find it helps me to distinguish among different types of disorder:

     clutter - either too many items to easily put away, or objects that don't have a home

     dirty - grime on surfaces, garbage to be thrown away

     untidy - objects are out of place but they do have homes and are easy to put away

The last one is easiest for me to bear, because kids can help with it ("Let's tidy up before we go to the park."). They can help (in very limited ways) with clutter and cleanliness more as they mature.

I had a friend in college whose apartment was tidy but grungy. My apartment was clean but untidy (stacks of books and papers everywhere). Each of us thought the other was a slob!

It helps to visit other families' homes that look like mine! But if you are running a school from your house, you probably don't have many opportunities to do that, and do you possibly feel that your visitors are forming an opinion of your skills based on the way your house looks?
 

[*bejeweled*]

We've given DD (9 yo and very artsy and cluttery) a space in just about each room. In the living room we put down a blanket and she keeps all of her beads, art supplies, journals, etc. only on that blanket. It helps immensely. The whole living room is usually clean and then her stuff is in one spot. In the office she has the bottom shelf of the bookcase. In the kitchen she has a corner with her easel and supplies under it. In the bathroom she has a bin with her stuff in it. And then she has her room which is filled with baskets to contain it all.

The blanket helps a lot because she never has to clean up a project if she's in the middle of it.

[gitanamama]

Originally Posted by ElsieLC 

It helps to visit other families' homes that look like mine! But if you are running a school from your house, you probably don't have many opportunities to do that, and do you possibly feel that your visitors are forming an opinion of your skills based on the way your house looks?
 

Yes-exactly! I think a lot of my stress comes from feeling like I need to keep the house looking nice, since it also serves as a school and parents come and go. I'm really hoping to create a separate space for the playschool when we move to a larger house this fall. And I love how you outlined the different types of disorder ElsieLC! I think part of the problem is that I'm battling all three. We have more toys than we probably should for this size house, but I feel like I need to keep a wide variety since the kiddos I care for have different interests. And I find that I spend so much time tidying that the real cleaning rarely gets done. My DH did a major house cleaning while DS and I were out of town last week and it helped enormously in how I feel about the house. I realized that there was so much grime before that even with all the toys put away, things still felt gross to me. We're going to try to stay on top of the grime and tackle one project a day (cleaning the bathroom or mopping the floor, for example) so things don't get out of hand.

Tittipeitto--I think I may try to keep our dining room table totally free. Like you said, even just having one clutter-free space to rest my eyes helps me feel more relaxed. My son doesn't watch TV yet but we do let him watch toddler music videos on YouTube, so I may try using that as incentive. I find that he actually does help if I make a game out of it, but he still makes faaaar more messes than I can generally stay on top of. 

bejeweled--I love the blanket idea! We have a small area rug in our living room that may become the designated toy area. It would probably take awhile for my DS to understand the concept of keeping his toys confined to one space, but it never hurts to start the process!

[Heymamawolf]

I try to keep at least my counters clean and clutter free. It really does help to see once space that doesn't have anything on it. I also try to clean at least one small thing a day, like do one load of laundry or vacuum one area of the house.

[SweetSilver]

I just noticed today that the blanket idea works in reverse.  We have a green rug, and the girls almost always keep it clean for doing their cartwheels and general jumping around and rough-housing.  

Very nice.

[newmama2011]

Thank god I have a small house and a little one year old baby girl and a helpful husband so I kinda keep things clean and going... My problem is when I have guests (which happens alot) and mostly from my husband's family who stay for several days all things get mixed up. My baby becomes out of control!!! She doesn't like playing with  toys.. sometimes I just wish she would spend 10 minutes interested in a toy she has.. She just runs around the house pulling anything she can reach to the floor.. table cloth, pillows, books, paper tissues,,,,anything... It just drives me crazy trying to keep up with her mess and the guest needs.. I have seen alot of babies in my life but non like her..she is extremely energetic and knows how to tease me on purpose.. she runs to the bedroom, opens the drawes, and in less than two minutes they are empty.. I'm afraid of her getting hurt and I have tried everything to keep her interest in her toys or some harmless things she can play with but nothing seems to work.. not even TV which she doesn't have any interest in whatsoever..so the clutter and mess Im fighting with is not just toys,, its the concept of rearranging the whole house and carrying out my hostice duties beside my full time job...... any suggestions?????

[mkksmom]

My second child is very energetic and likes to pull things out too. I made our family room as child-proof as possible, and just try to contain her mess to a smaller area. Maybe you could ask one of the house guests to entertain her while you get caught up. Hopefully, as she gets older, she'll be interested in helping you. Mine likes to take a washcloth and wipe down the counters when I am cleaning the kitchen. She'll become more interested in toys as she gets older too. It gets easier, but I had to accept some level of insanity in my home when seh was little. She still pulls things out and takes them to the wrong rooms. It's tough sometimes.

[newmama2011]

thank you for your kind reply...it actually gives some relief to know this will become easier someday... some hope and patience is all I need...i think... well just let me tell you her latest discoveries in the area of wrecking my nerves: jumping...and I don't mean sweet innocent jumping...she now climbs onto my bed or the sofa...counts to 3...then jump (if not commit suicide!!!) It's crazy!!! Im putting cushions all over the floor so she wouldn't hurt herself while Im "not looking"....and boooy is she good at using these times....