Clean House, Clean Mind?

Do you find that when your house is messy, your mind feels messy? I seem to feel disorganzied & just plain "off" when the boys have destroyed the house. The gritty snacks I step on, the lack of clean spoons, etc etc. The only remedy I have found is to deep clean!

With spring approaching, my mind has turned to spring cleaning, & with that comes home organization! I love to organize things. Like, to an obsessive, crazy extent. One project I crazily took on? Organizing the boys` Legos by size & color. I gave up after a week, LOL. They are, however, still organizd by "category", bricks, flat pieces, people, windows/doors, car pieces. Haha. Makes a person wonder about my state of mind somedays!

Anyway. The warm-ish weather yesterday & today has had me thinking of spring, & with that cleaning lists. I had found a great website to help me create a Household Binder (www.organizedhome.com). The site has a lot of amazing printables, & many, many articles with hints & i deas.

The nice thing about a Home Binder is that you can completely customize it to suit your family`s needs. You can use the pages they have, or use it as a guide to create pages that you need. My binder is fairly thick.

- I have a calendar in the front, with everyone`s activities on it (practice, birthdays, appointments, etc). I have color coded the calendar as well, making it easy to see who needs to be where & when with 1 quick glance.

- Then the 4 of us each have a section. Because of allergies & asthma, each person has a list of their allergies & medicines listed, as well as their doctor`s number/info. Then I include a class list, school calendar, & sports calendar. I also have a list of important phone numbers (coaches, teachers, friends).

- My recipe section helps with my meal planning. I have meals listed that the family loves, & what we need when we have that. When I plan my menu, I go through the lists & pick out what we will eat & make the grocery list. I also have a page protector to put new recipe ideas in (printed, or torn from magazines). I use this section along with my recipe binder (more on that to come later!).

- Another section is house ideas, since our home is a work in progress. This I have divided by room. At the top, I have listed the paint color(s) used, and then listed are all the projects that need to be done (changing out light fixtures, flooring ideas, etc).

The last subject I have is my Cleaning Schedule! Yes, I have a schedule, & I really, REALLY need to get back on it! I have a list of daily chores (vaccuming, laundry, beds, wiping down the bathrooms before bed, etc). Then I have set a room to each day to focus on.

Monday - Toy room & entrance/office
Tuesday - Kitchen
Wednesday - Living Room
Thursday - Upstairs
Friday - Bathrooms
Weekend - Catch up

When I do keep up with my schedule, it makes Spring Cleaning SO much easier! I don`t have to deep clean as deep, & then it`s just a matter of switching out linens, putting away winter gear, & taking inventory of what the boys need for summer.

I am hoping to get my Home Binder up to date, & to implement my cleaning schedule again. It will be nice to have a clean, tidy house again! And, to have a coherent head, LOL. Well, one can hope anyway ;)

Once I get my binder together, I will share photos. Are you going to create a home binder for your household? What will put in it?