Everyday Decluttering

I want you readers to know that I’m not a neat freak all the time. And I suppose these pictures will still seem neat to some. It is a busy day where I need to be driving kids multiple places, including during the school day. So my time feels more limited than a normal school day. I did get my gym workout in though!

After getting ready for the day, I saw this on the table and the kitchen counter. Yes, clutter, generally from the days activities. The Sunday newspaper is still on the table. I just don’t always get it read and it doesn't seem to leave my table and until I determine we are done with it!

Since I had a little time before leaving the house for those errands, I decided to tidy up and put the clutter or evidence away. Have you heard of that term about erasing the evidence? Or ETE. I think it is a Fly Lady term. Correct me if I’m wrong. Erase the evidence means to make it look like you were never there. 

I quickly pulled everything off the kitchen table and moved it to the cluttered counter. I wiped down the table of crumbs and shook out those place mats. I only put back some papers of my daughter’s and today newspaper! Much better.

After the table I started stacking the papers that remained. They don’t all need to be in separate piles, although it does help my brain at times to see what I’m working on. Today, that was not necessary. That part was easy since I wasn’t sorting through the papers. I took my vitamins so I could put the containers back in their basket and out of the way. I then put away the clean dishes that had been hand washed, as well as all the clean dishes in the dishwasher. Those dishes took less than 5 minutes to put away. And putting the dirty dishes into the washer took less than 2 minutes. Clearly, this is something that we have to do everyday in our house. I’m just not good at getting it done before I leave for the gym. I knew with today’s schedule I needed to get it done before leaving since I didn't want to come home to dirty breakfast dishes right at the time I needed to be making dinner.

It feel so much better to just tidy things up a bit. Do you have a routine for keeping your dishes clean? Do you prefer to tidy everyday, or just when it gets really bad?

Guess what? I wrote this post yesterday with the intention of getting it posted late in the day. That didn't happen. Guess what happened in the meantime. Dishes have piled up again and the counter and table have things on them again. Just part of living really. But it does help to keep up with that type of decluttering daily. I will do this routine all over again this morning before I leave the house. Luckily it doesn't take too long!