Spring Cleaning and Organizing All Year Long

It’s spring and everywhere we see advertisements and information about Spring Cleaning. Growing up, pill spring cleaning always meant days of reorganizing.  My mom had a wonderful way of putting a fresh look on our house in the spring. Now as a work-at-home, homeschooling mom, I always get a bit anxious when I start to see my friends talking about their spring cleaning plans. I can balance the load of work and homeschool, but the pressure to reorganize my house and make a few new spring decorations is overwhelming. I’ve recently discovered a couple of things to help me with this. I’m surprised at how much I’ve been able to accomplish, all while having fun!

Pinterest

Pinterest is a virtual pinboard. Here you can easily find ideas for home organization, recipes, fashion and much more. You create your own boards and name them so it makes sense and works for you. You can get ideas from others. You can also follow those who have a similar taste and style.

I’ve found virtually all of the decorating ideas for my daughter’s High School graduation on Pinterest. All of these ideas are pinned on a board called Graduation Ideas. As we make final decisions, I remove ideas we won’t use and keep the ones we will. All the ideas and instructions for making items are online meaning I don’t have another extra file of papers lying around the house.

You can find out more information about Pinterest and sign up for a free account here.

 

 

Evernote

Evernote is a free app for your smartphone and computer. Here you can store everything from recipes to airline tickets. You can also store articles, manuals for all the appliances and gadgets in your home and make to do lists to help keep you on track of important tasks.

I use Evernote for almost anything I need to gather, note, and file. I especially love creating notebooks in Evernote for events.
We’re hosting Easter at our house this year. All of my menu plans along with the recipes are stored in that notebook. I’ve been able to plan our menu as I’ve found recipes I want to use. I’ve made an ingredient list as I’ve added recipes, so grocery shopping a few days before Easter will be quick and easy.

I’ve made notebooks for the past few holidays. This means I won’t have to recreate our plans and forms. Next year I’ll be able to see the menus for each holiday. For Christmas I’ll have our budget list as well including notes about every gift we purchased. Having these notebooks on hand will make our holidays for 2012 even easier to plan.

Using Pinterest and Evernote I’ve been able to host the past 3 family events stress free. I’ve not only planned our daughter’s High School graduation but I’ve planned for improvements and changes we’re making to the outside of our home. I no longer fear the term “Spring Cleaning” because I have a great new system in place that helps me stay organized all year long!