The Intentional Home, Week Six: Monday

For an Introduction and Table of Contents for The Intentional Home, click Here.

Week Six: Monday

By wisdom a house is built, 
and by understanding it is established;
Proverbs 24:3

You are approaching the finish line! This is your last week of “decluttering” your house. Next week, we will be focusing on tools and systems to maintain it and many you are already doing!

This week we will be tackling any area of your home that we haven’t yet. If you have kids still living at home, we will start with their rooms. If not, you may have a guest bedroom to work on instead. If you have both kids’ rooms and a guest room then this task can be spread over as many days as needed.

For kid’s rooms:

If you’re dealing with kids’ rooms, then I’m guessing you’ll be dealing with toys. As a general rule, kids have way too many toys, I know mine do! But, more annoying to me than the toys is the little trinkets or treasures that they accumulate. I’ve found a solution for those little items. Each of my children have a bin or basket for their trinkets. When the bin starts to fill up, I will give them the task of going through it and parting with some of them.

As far as toys go, you need to keep these under control. Thinning them out several times a year is a good idea, especially before Christmas and birthdays. If any toys are broken or in poor condition, just toss them. It is a good idea to involve your kids in this process. My son isn’t a fan of getting rid of his toys as he is only five, but at times we have donated some of his nicer toys to the church. He now plays with them with his friends in his classroom, this has worked out great. Letting a young child give a toy to an even younger child is a nice thing to do as well. Haley blessed a little friend with all of her princess dresses last year. I know Haley felt so good about her gift to that sweet girl.

This is the one area that nice storage will serve you well. But, don’t just assume that you need to buy the toy chest or toy storage bins from the big box store. You can accomplish this with much less costly and more attractive solutions at times.

Here I used a garage sale Ikea television stand for a toddlers room. It was the perfect height for him and these baskets (another garage sale find) worked great. 

I believe the key with keeping toys organized is giving every toy a home. This way when the room gets destroyed it is so much easier to put back together, since you know there is a place for everything. I like using baskets and bins. Harrison has a nice large bookcase in his room and my daughter has a built-in bookcase.

If you haven't already, this would be a good opportunity to get your kids to start making their own beds every morning. Encourage them to be good stewards of what God has given them and begin building these good habits early.

For guest rooms:

Walk into your guest room or extra bedroom. What is the purpose of this room? Do you actually have friends or relatives come visit you? Or, perhaps you would like to have friends visit, but you are embarrassed by the state of this room? Maybe this room just sits unoccupied or used?

If you would like to use this room as a guest room more often, then examine this space. Is it inviting and welcoming for guests? If it is not, then this will be your goal. Think of the things that you would like to have if you are traveling and staying in this room. I’m guessing you would enjoy an uncluttered space at the very least. 

You can pretty much use the same process that we used for our master bedroom for this room. Leave only the things that you find beautiful. Leave space in the closet with empty hangers for guests. Towels on the dresser and a book or magazine on the night stand is a wonderful touch.

After you get your guest room beautified, you need to invite that friend or relative to come visit! No more excuses!

Daily Chores: 

One load of laundry from start to finish

Make your bed

Unload the dishwasher in the morning, load and run it at night

Wipe down the kitchen counters and sink

Monday’s daily chore of vacuuming