Organizing Your House!

Be honest, how clean and organized is your house?!  What's your philosophy on keeping up on cleaning and organizing?
A) Life is too short to worry about how clean my house is, a little dirt and piles of clothes never hurt anyone!
B) I like a clean house but I haven't sorted through closets and the rest of the house for a couple years.
C) Clutter and dirt drive me nuts!!  I continuously work at keeping my house clean and organized.

Me, I'm C.  It doesn't mean that I've never left the dishes sit overnight, but it happens like twice a month.  If someone came over unexpectedly, the mirrors may not be wiped down or there might be folded laundry in baskets waiting to go up to kids' rooms, but for the most part, I wouldn't be embarrassed to have people in my house. 

I often just tackle a room and purge what I can, donate, trash it, etc.  My bedroom has NO CLUTTER.  It's my little piece of heaven that is calming and mine (and DH's).  My goal by Dylan's first birthday was that anything baby had to be out; changing pad, diaper caddy, diaper pail, bassinet, baby blankets, kid toys, etc.  And I did it and I wish I would have done that sooner. 

But my Mom, my dear sweet Mom, she was slowly becoming a possible candidate for the show Hoarders.  Her bedroom was stacked with so much stuff you could barely move in there.  Her room is on the small side but still, what was all this stuff???  My mom has always been a shopper, and if you remember a few weeks back from this post about AJ's coat, we have very opposite opinions on shopping.  It makes me cringe when I see her SUV packed with bags from shopping or having her call me from a store while she's out shopping.  I want to put my bossy pants on and tell her to knock it off with the shopping!  Enough is enough. And I've tried having talks with her about the "stuff."  So last week I told her that I'd be willing to come over on Saturday and we'd clear her room out.  You could see her anxiety level rise but it just had to be done, had too.  Our plan was I'd come over at 9am and we would be done by noon and then go see the new Twilight movie.  Well 7 hours later, 10 huge black trash bags in the donation pile, and 3 trash bags out to the garbage, we had cleaned her room.  Now just pause for a moment and imagine 13 massive bags coming out of someones room?!? 13...13!  It still boggles my mind.  And I'm amazed my mom didn't have a break down and say that she has a shopping habit, a REALLY bad shopping habit.  These bags cup up to my belly button, they were HUGE, people!

And you guys, it was just stuff!  Cheap crap!  And crafts, OMG, the crafts.  She has 10 rubbermaid containers of just stuff after we purged as much as she would let go.  We are talking thousands of dollars just shoved in bags and boxes in her room. 

And the dust bunnies, they were huge and all over her really nice furniture which was covered in a thick gray coat of dust.  I even said early on, "Mom, can't you just smell the dust. It's really hard to breathe in here and I'm not even sensitive to dust."  Then I said we should crack the window open to air the room out.  That's when I came upon a window seal covered with mold and ice buildup.  And when I asked if she had an all purpose cleaner so I could clean it up, she didn't have all purpose cleaner of any kind.  Huh???  All this crap you buy and you never thought to buy an all purpose cleaner.  I made do with a vinegar cleaning solution I knew how to make. 

In the end we had a decent day and we never made it to the movie, I was exhausted.  My Mom and Dad even said they think I have a calling in life that maybe I never realized.  I tend to agree.  I really enjoy cleaning spaces (as long as I don't find dead animals like the show Hoarders, gag me!) but it is mentally exhausting trying to get someone to  let go of the THINGS, it's just things.  Really it's just crap, but I used the word things and stuff to be nice:)

So what does my mom ask me to do today, go pick up a huge plastic Step 2 play house for the boys for Christmas from her.  Where the heck is she going to put it???  It's so frustrating.  I've learned when she buys the boys gifts, not to feel obligated to keep them forever.  I purge their toys every 4-6 months and donate them even if it's something she just got them but they really didn't enjoy or have outgrown.  Same with clothes, I can't feel guilty and hold on to stuff forever.  It's just stuff.

If you are thinking of organizing a room, my un-novel ideas are this:

1)  Take everything out of the room including emptying all drawers, closets, shelves that hold stuff.  All that should be left is the furniture that is for sure staying.
2) Clean the room from top to bottom.  Dust, clean floors, windows, strip bedding and wash it, clean light fixtures, everything.  You are not going to bring things back in and set them on something dirty.
3) We brought everything out into the living room and from there, we just started grabbing things and making quick trash, donate, keep piles.  We started with clothes and I wouldn't put anything back in the room until you have your entire keep pile of clothes, and those are organized, folded, and separated in to type (sweaters, tank tops, pants, pajamas, work out clothes, t shirts, long sleeve shirts, etc.).
4)  Once you have all your keep stuff, go back in the room and discuss where everything should go in the room and if you need to add shelving or baskets, etc.  If you do, don't bring the stuff back in the room yet, put the shelves in, get baskets, etc. and then bring the items back in.  Buy clear plastic tubs for storing so you can see into them and only use open baskets or canvas boxes for items you use on a daily basis or almost daily basis, otherwise the items should go in stackable tubs and put away.
5) No items get an "I'm not sure yet what to do with this item."  A decision has to be made.  Even if my mom gets rid of more craft items, which I hope she does, they went in a keep pile, then organized into rubbermaid stacking tubs, labeled on the outside and put away.  She's welcome to take all the tubs out and go through them again but stuffing a bag of fabric in the back of the closet just doesn't work.
6)  Do one room at a time, and don't move on until that room is DONE!!  My mom kept walking into my dad's office asking what he was going to do to clear out his space and I kept having to refocus her to just worry about the bedroom.
7)  Crank up the tunes!  It's sort of hard to be in a really bad mood if you are listening to great music in my opinion!  We listened to Christmas music:)

I know none of these ideas are ground breaking ideas, but hopefully just serve as a little nudge to get you organized before the New Year.  My question to my readers- when family is buying you or your family gifts, do you have issues with them buying gifts that are just unnecessary and take up a lot of room or are expensive? (such as big blow up bouncy things, play houses, huge stuffed animals, things that hang on your walls that you don't WANT on your walls).  How do address it tactfully?