The ultimate guide to decluttering routines that you can use to keep your home clutter free each and every day. Stay tidy all year round with these 4 easy routines to add to your cleaning / home maintenance schedules – and get sorted once and for all!
Decluttering your home once is all well and good – and usually much needed – but what about KEEPING it decluttering and tidy from day to day?
The decluttering process gets easier the more often you do it, but unfortunately it never ends!
I’ve written posts about keeping clutter from entering your home, habits that you can use to stay tidy, and how to stop clutter returning for good – but I haven’t as yet tackled the nitty gritty of creating decluttering routines.
So here we go!
Decluttering routine #1 – Year round boxes
One of the simplest routines to start is to set up a couple of boxes in your home as a permanant fixture: –
- Things to go to charity
- Things that you’ve got to give back to somewhere or someone (i.e. borrowed items, library books etc…)
The boxes need to be put in an accessible place so that they are easy to add things to, but out of the way enough not to become clutter in themselves (oh, the irony!). I would suggest your garage, or a hallway cupboard (if large enough).
Get into the habit of adding items to these (and only these) places when you find things at any point of the day/week/month.
Then – set up a routine whereby once a season, once a month, once a week – or however often is needed – you take the boxes and deliver everything to where it needs to go.
It would be a great addition to your Spring cleaning checklist for sure!
One trip out of the house will get it all done – and you’ll feel great afterwards when you walk back into your more clutter free home!
Decluttering routine #2 – Monthly deep dive
A great decluttering method to use is to start by writing all the rooms in your home out (including outside spaces, loft and garage), and split them roughly into 12 equal areas.
Each month, add to your chores that you will do a real deep dive into one of these areas – purely for decluttering purposes.
This means that you look at EVERYTHING in that space – inside cupboards, on shelves, on walls, in drawers etc…. – and really determine what you need and what you don’t.
Make it easy on yourself by picking the outside areas in a warm month, and harder-to-declutter areas in months where you know you have more time.
Because you know that you will tackle the entire house each year, you can feel happier that everything will stay clutter free.
Decluttering routine #3 – Weekly sweep
On a weekly basis – alongside your cleaning schedule – why not add a decluttering sweep to each room as well?
You more than likely look at obvious rubbish during your cleaning, but you could take it further and do a quick scan for obvious other clutter.
One way of doing this quickly and easily is using the bin bag challenges I’ve talked about previously. You could do one challenge a week over a month, and then start again the next month.
Making this a routine will help keep the whole house looking great!
{ Worth a Read: 13 Common Clutter Hotspots & How to Fix Them }
Decluttering routine #4 – Daily tidy up
I love to go round my house each day just to check on each room so that I know everything is being looked at regularly.
This daily routine is pretty quick to do on a daily basis and really helps me feel at ease at home without feeling overwhelmed by how much there is to do at any one time.
Whether you choose to declutter as part of your routine to put your home to bed each night, or as part of your daily tidy up routine – the choice is yours – but my advice would be to get the whole family involved so you start the new day afresh.
Just walk into each room and so a scan to see if anything is out of place. If it is – then tidy it up. Simple!
After all – clutter is simply that which is not in it’s correct home….
It really does make a huge difference – and is quick and easy to do.
and that’s it! – 4 decluttering routines that really will help to stay clutter free all year.
With yearly routines, monthly routines, weekly routines, AND daily routines, you won’t let your home have time to build up clutter at all!
The benefits of decluttering as part of your cleaning/home maintenance routines are that you will make things so much easier over time.
Cleaning and general tidying will become quicker, and you’ll know that every room is being looked at on a regular basis, so you’ll have peace of mind – and what could be better than that!
So – get your schedule out now, and make sure decluttering is part of it from today onwards, you’ll thank yourself, I promise!
