In having a school-aged child, life naturally gives you three solid opportunities to reset your family calendar each year: January (who doesn’t like an annual reset?), May (school ends, childcare shifts, etc), and September (fall back to school energy). With “school” starting right after Labor Day, we are taking a step back to reflect on our personal and family commitments.
temporary school work stations
As I’ve mentioned before, my goal in life is for things to be simple and easy. With school starting soon (or perhaps it already kicked off), I recommend taking 30 to 45 minutes to set up a temporary school work station for your kid(s). Designing a system for all things related to school will:
provide clear boundaries for the start and end of the school day
provide a clear location where all things related to school “live”
Earlier this summer, I offered a free virtual organizing workshop to support you in setting up a temporary workstation for your kid(s). This workshop will help you whether you have a dedicated space for school, such as a desk in your kid’s room, or a temporary space, such as your kitchen counter, where you want your kid(s) to pack up their school stuff everyday.
systems to make the return to school easier
I really like simple. I also like easy. Simple makes life easy. To make life easy, I thrive on simple home systems that improve the flow of our routines.
Our son’s school starts just after Labor Day. While school is going to be virtual this fall, we are planning to provide similar routines to what we were doing last school year. The start of fall semester is a great opportunity to reset and refine your home systems and routines. If something wasn’t working great for you last year, change it now!
the dream
As my 35th birthday approached last October, I found myself analyzing my life - ok, those close to me might say I freaked out a bit. I had gone through more life transitions in the previous five years than I was likely equipped to handle (finished grad school, had a baby, became a working mom, became a stay at home mom, sold our home, moved into the smallest apartment with a toddler, two dogs, and a cat, built a home, and went back to work).
I’m pretty proud of my little family and where we are in life. We are busy - the good kind of busy where your days fly by and you live and learn and grow. We hardly get a moment to sit down (ok, that part is exhausting), but I really wouldn’t trade it for anything. This season of life is short.
As I reflected on my career and as a mom of a very active little one, I found that I was looking for more control of my time, my projects, and my work flow. While I love my current jobs, I want the flexibility to prioritize what is most important in my life (my family, friends, and passion) and spend my time doing what I love. I crave variety and I want to own my success through building something bigger than myself.
So, I reopened my home organizing company. I have always loved playing life’s greatest game of Tetris. I love helping others identify what is important and consequently removing everything else. Life is too short to spend critical time searching for your keys (or your wallet or your purse or your kid’s shoes) or spending time doing what you don’t want to (or need to) be doing.
In addition to organizing physical spaces, I love designing systems that work for families. Systems provide the foundation to allow you to be spontaneous and flexible with your time. Systems allow for you to get the laundry done before you need the laundry basket again for the next load. Systems allow you to do one trip to the grocery store a week with a full grocery list - on a budget. Systems give you time back in your life.
I firmly believe that you need to curate your own life. You are the person who identifies what is important to you. Start taking back your home. Start taking back your time.
My goal is to share a few of my best practices that enable my home to by tidy enough for anyone to stop by at any moment, yet incredibly lived in (yes, there are still toys on the floor and yes, there is probably a dish or two in the sink - I am human) and my calendar to be full, yet directly represent my priorities.
There will be some good freebies along the way with the hope of making your home life just a bit simpler.
xoxo - heather