Wednesday, August 10, 2016

How to Organize Your Bathroom Products and Makeup

Never underestimate the power of an organized bathroom!  Getting ready in the morning is all about having a system and being able to access the items you need to use in a quick and easy manner. 

We aren’t Kylie Jenner showing off our perfect makeup organization, and our bathroom cabinets aren’t part of a daily home magazine photo shoot that need to look camera ready and picture perfect.  The following 10 tips are practical tips to keep your bathroom clean and perfectly organized. 

Here's my 10 Step Process for de-cluttering and cleaning your bathroom:

1.    Empty out all of your bathroom cabinets. 

2.    Place contents into divided piles. (For example lipsticks into one pile, eye shadow in another, shampoo in another one….(you get the picture)

3.    Get rid of anything you haven't used in the last 3-6 months or anything that's old.  This applies to old bottles of lotion or products that are nearly empty.  Don't keep old products! Their effectiveness diminishes and most of them lose their original scents over time.

4.    Buy plastic bins/containers (like you see in my photos below) to put the items that you're keeping in to.  (See my photos below)   You can always raid your plastic food container stash, and use those little containers if you don’t have time to run to the store right now.  They make great storage bins for lipsticks, eye shadows, etc. You don't need to spend a lot of money to get organized, and little boxes work well too!  I love the acrylic sorters for my lipsticks and mini cosmetics, and they can be found at any Bed, Bath, Beyond for a small amount of money. TJ Maxx's and Marshall's also sells them.

5.    Organize your hair ties, headbands and clips:.

Get rid of old hair ties that are stretched out, broken or have those metal bars around them  Place the good ones into their own, separate container.  Do the same thing for your hair clips and hair pins.  Separating them out allows you to see exactly what you have available to you when getting ready. Put your headbands into a plastic container too. I sort mine out by color and place each color group into their own ziploc bag within that bin.  When I want to wear a headband, I just pull out the bin and go to what color group I'm looking for.

NOTE: I don't keep tons of headbands, so there's not a lot fussing to find the one that I need.  Throw out the ones you haven't worn since high school.  Headbands will create bathroom chaos and clutter by getting caught on everything, and they also have a magnificient way of collecting dust and gross hair.  So, be smart and keep only the ones you’ll wear. 

6. Clean out those drawers.  Literally!

Vacuum out your drawers and cabinets and wipe them down: by now, you've probably noticed all of the hair, makeup and products that have built up in your drawers over time.  Get a small vacuum and take out all of the hair from the cabinets and drawers.  Using the cleaning product of your choice, wipe down and remove all grime and residue.  Cleaning out the cabinets properly sets a clean stage for your entire reorganizing process.  (You can also place liners in your drawers for future protection of the cabinet finishes if you chose to do so).

Wipe down all products that you're keeping.   It's a habit of mine to always wipe down or rinse off all of my bathroom products after using them.  It only takes a fraction of a second, but it helps to keep my drawers, cabinets and shower clean.  Plus, the next time I go to use the item it doesn't get my hands all goopy and gross.


7.  Get rid of all old tweezers, nail clippers, nail files and pumice stones. 

As you prepare to place all of your clean items back into your cabinets, trash any of the old items! It seems like everyone tends to keep those used, gross pumice stones, rusty nail clippers and old nail files.  Throw them out and start fresh! Pumice stones and nail files are a breeding ground for bacteria and dirt.  My favorite pumice stone is the one by "Swedish Clover" because dirt and dead skin can't get trapped into it.  Plus, I can easily soak it in bleach to clean it and it has a lifetime warranty. 

8. Clean Your Makeup Brushes and Hair Brushes

Use this time to clean out all of your brushes and makeup brushes.  This is a good habit to get into, as makeup brushes and hair brushes can build up with product and hair.  There’s nothing worse than seeing a hairbrush that is loaded up with months or years worth of hair.  I remove all of the hair from my brushes first, and then soak them in a hot water with a mild shampoo.  I then place them in a solution of water and vinegar before rinsing them off completely.  I wash my makeup brushes often with a makeup brush cleaning solution from Sephora.  You can use whatever brush cleaning method you prefer.  The important part is that you keep them clean!


9. Sort products on your shelves by category. 

As you put back together your cabinets and drawers, place like products together on shelves.  I separate out my shelves by category.  One shef for hair products, one for lotions and creams, etc.  Then I sort the products in rows by product type.  For example, I place leave-in conditioners together, hairsprays together, face washes together.  (You get the picture).


10. One Last Purge

Before we give you your “Gold Star” for organizing yourself, Skim over the stuff you've kept and see one last time if there's anything else that you can get rid of.  Remember, LESS is more!  Especially when it comes to keeping products and makeup.


10.   Stay Organized by Putting Items Back in Their Place
Now that you're bathroom cabinets are in tip top shape and you feel back in control, make sure to keep organized by taking a few seconds each day to put your things back into the proper place and to also wipe them off before re-storing them.

Products lined up in rows by product type.  Perfumes on bottom shelf

ORGANIZE BY PRODUCT TYPE: (from L to R) hair ties, eye brows, dental floss & whitener, concealers, mascaras, eye pencils

lipsticks and extra eye shadow palettes
s

eye shadows & powders!






Happy Organizing and thanks for stopping by today.

Sunday, August 7, 2016

House chores on a Sunday vs. FUN?

House chores on a Sunday vs. FUN?

After four kids, let me give you some good advice: on a Sunday when you have time to spend with your family, DO IT!  Forget about the stupid laundry and the endless house chores.  Go and relax with your family instead!  It's good for your mental health, and will make you a much better parent in both the short and long run.  Trust me....I wish I knew better sooner, and stopped myself from focusing on stuff that doesn't bring happiness to me or my family.  Quite honestly, this might be the best parenting advice you'll ever get.

It's no secret that I'm OCD, and freak out at even the slightest hint of household disarray.  So, I'm not an advocate for just letting your house go to complete and utter shambles for the sake of quality parenting.  What I am advocating for is YOU, and I want you to take back your life.   I've been a mom for almost 17 years now, and I've spent more hours than I'd ever openly admit cleaning and fixing up the house instead of enjoying my life.  I know exactly where I learned this type of behavior: my mom.  My mom has spent the majority of her life cleaning the house and obsessing over the house.  I yell at my mom all of the time, insisting that she stop obsessing over that stupid house and to get out and enjoy her life.  Nobody cares how clean her darn house is. (Note: we both have cleaning help that comes each week to our homes, but we clean before the help comes so that they don't think we're not clean).  Do your kids a favor and teach them that life has to more offer than a clean house, or you'll turn them into people who obsess over a clean home.  Hopefully, I'm not teaching my kids the same obsessive traits that I learned from my mom, but I'm sure they're getting a fair does of it.

I've begun to ask myself this question when I start to obsesses over the house: "If I knew that today was my last day on earth, would I spend it cleaning?"  (I think we all can unanimously agree on this one......heck NO!).  If you say yes to this, call me and I'll teach you how to have some fun on your last day!

There's just no need to be an over achiever in areas that don't count or matter.  Read that statement again slowly. Nobody is ever going to remember how clean or not clean your house is.  If someone is judging you on that criteria, they need to get a life and get out of your home.  Get rid of them and find dirtier friends.  If it's a family member doing the judging, throw them a mop and dust cloth and then go outside and sit in the sun, or go get your nails done while they tidy up.

Let's do a little exercise this Sunday, ok? Put down the vacuum and duster right now, and go outside and play with your kids.  Go and do something with your significant other, or for yourself that makes you feel good about you and your family.  After all, you're amazing and don't you think you've earned it?  You're family will thank you for putting them and yourself first over the house.

The house and the chores will be there when you get back.  Pinky promise they will.

Happy Sunday,
D

Monday, August 1, 2016

What Does Your Folded Laundry Say About You?

What does your folded laundry say about you? 

Well, if you're anything like me, you obsess over the way every single item of your clothing is folded. Countless loads of my family's clothing washed and folded perfectly by me.  Perfectly. Every single load.  Every single piece.  Every single time. Every single day.

What does that say about me? Well, it says that I'm insane.  That's what I am, I'm insane. There, I said it. Only a crazy person micromanages and controls a laundry room the way that I do. My laundry says that I flew over the cuckoos nest and that I'm never coming back.

Why do I freak out over something so stupid as the way my laundry gets folded is the real, burning question that I need your help with? I have this part of me, this little voice that tells me to let it go, and to stop obsessing.  That it doesn't matter how the laundry gets folded, as long as the laundry gets done, right? WRONG!

I take the time to fold every single article of clothing like my house is the GAP.  The jeans have to have the perfect fold with no showing of denim coming up or out of the side of the fold.  (Come on, you know what I mean by the perfect jean fold?  Don't play coy with me!)  The t-shirts folded like they were done on a folding board.  (I've thought about buying one of those things, but stop myself because I think my hand folding is pretty on par.  Just sayin')  Underwear......folded up like origami.  Wait, maybe I should become an "origami-ist"?  I have some mad folding skills in my humble opinion.

Here's a scenario that might make me a seriously horrible, bad, awful, terrible person: My mother-in-law is sweet enough to do my laundry for me.  She's a great woman, and I'm lucky to have her in my life.  But here's the thing........I want to kill her when I see that she's washed and folded my laundry! When I see it all stacked up on the counter in my kitchen in those uneven, non-color sorted piles, I have to tie my arms down to my sides so that I don't throw it on the floor in front of her, smack her in the head, and then refold it all while cursing up a storm and screaming obscenities in front of her and the kids and yelling, "WHO THE HELL FOLDS CLOTHES LIKE THIS???  YOU SHOULD BE SENT TO JAIL FOR THINKING THAT THIS TYPE OF PITIFUL FOLDING IS ACCEPTABLE!!!  WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU"



(At this point, I remind myself to breathe deeply to avoid passing out, and I thank her profusely for folding my laundry and for her help, which I sincerely mean.)  

Confession: Sorry, Mamma, if you're reading this.  I'm crazy, but you already know that and thanks for loving me anyhow. Once she leaves the room, I secretly throw it all on the floor and refold every piece.  After my mini-meltdown is over and I've refolded the mess,  I stand back to look at all of my perfectly folded laundry piles sorted exactly the way that I like them.   I applaud my good work in my head, and quietly take a bow.  Then I remind myself that I almost just died a thousand deaths and this is why I need a glass of wine even though its only 4:38pm.

I can breathe again.

Anyone else out there suffering from my laundry disease?  The first step its acceptance, my lovelies.

xo,
D