It’s time for another mom tip! I am so thankful for all of my friends and my family who have given me wisdom and advice over the years. Some wisdom and/or advice has become a staple in our home, and other advice has not. It didn’t make the advice wrong necessarily. The advice usually just didn’t work for myself or for our family. So, this blog is geared towards giving you something that works for me, and if it works for your family then that is great too!
I read a book a couple of years ago that changed my life and how I keep my house. It is called The House That Cleans Itself by Mindy Starns Clark. I loved the book so much that I wanted to buy it as a Christmas gift for all the women in my life, but I wondered if they would take offense to getting a house cleaning book as a gift. Perhaps they would take it to mean I thought they needed to have a cleaner house. I would not have meant it that way, but when you find something that helps you so much, it is hard not to want to share it with others. I did give it to two of my girlfriends for Christmas that year, though.
One of the ideas I loved in the book was the Launch Pad. The Launch Pad is an organizational area that is used for items that are on their way out of the house. It can be a basket by the door, an office file folder system, or a wall hanging mail organizer. You can make it as plain or as pretty as you want it to be, but it needs to be located in an area you see when you are getting ready to head out the door. Examples of items that would be put in your Launch Pad area are as follows:
*Movie rentals to be returned
*Outgoing mail
*School permission slips
*Store returns
*Sunglasses that need to go back in the car
*Birthday party directions, liability waivers, or gifts
*A book that needs to be returned to a friend
*Maps or directions for a trip or social gathering
Stuff is influxing into my home on almost a daily basis, but what to do with the stuff that is going out? Where do I put the movie that needs to be returned tomorrow by midnight? Where do I put the signed permission slip for the birthday party that is not for another week?
When I looked around for a Launch Pad, I wanted something pretty that would match my home decor. I bought a wrought iron mail organizer that you hang on the wall through Lillian Vernon. It hangs next to the closet where we grab all of our coats, backpacks, purse, etc. before we head out the door. We grab all of our outgoing stuff, and we are ready to launch.
I can almost guarantee that this will not be the last time I reference The House That Cleans Itself book. There are just so many great ideas. Some of the ideas from the book might be a little too anal for me, but there were tons of ideas that I love. One of the main premises of the book was to organize your house in such a way so that you know where everything is, and you save yourself time looking for stuff. More time in my day means more time for family, God, friends, kids, and even myself, and I like that!