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Episode 298 – 10 top tips for a low maintenance and organised home

This week’s podcast was a listener request! She wanted to know our top 10 tips for a low maintenance and organised home, so we are sharing our thoughts.
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Transcript of this podcast episode
00:00
This week's podcast is a listener request. She wanted to know our top 10 tips for a low maintenance and organized home. Well, your wish is our command

00:20
you're listening to the declutter Apple podcast, bringing you tried and tested no nonsense tips and advice from the leading experts in decluttering and organizing your home. Now here are your hosts, Ingrid Jansen, and Lesley Spellman.

00:43
Hello, and welcome, listeners. I'm Ingrid. And I'm Lesley. If you're new to the declutter hub podcast, you're so welcome. What you'll find is that we try and find a fun factor in the serious business of decluttering. And if you've been here for a while, you know exactly what we mean. So thank you so much for listening. If

01:02
you'd like to get involved in conversations related to this podcast, it all takes place in our Facebook group. So come and join our lovely, warm, supportive community. To find the Facebook group go to declutter hub.com forward slash group to find out more, or you can search for the declutter hub community on Facebook.

01:21
Oh, Lesley, I do love a 10 Things podcasts. I mean, thinking about the 10 things cheers me up, chatting about the 10 things cheers me up. And all the feedback from our listeners cheers me up because they send us in list of the things they have or have not have or their thoughts about things. It just I love it.

01:41
I'm seen as a sort of a sense of needing to be cheered up. Ingrid, are you feeling a little bit down today? I mean, to be fair, we are quite. We've got the lurgi both yes, we've got the logo, so we are like, Oh, I'm terrible. You know if I'm ill. I'm a real Mona you know, people talk about mum flu and stuff. I'm like, the female equivalent of mama flu. Like I'm terrible. As a patient. I don't get ill very often. But when I do, I'm like, Oh, I feel terrible. I'm like such a Mona. Honestly, everyone knows to stay well clear. I don't feel that bad. But I do feel a bit bummed up on mp croaky, which I'm sure that people will be hearing.

02:21
I know you do sound a little bit No. 110 Normally, I can't breathe through my nostrils. So never know. What's like, if I sound a bit weird. It's because I can't. I'm just breathing trying to breathe through my mouth. And I can't use my nose at all. I

02:36
know exactly. So so yeah. So it's nice to have I suppose for some Yeah, let's do this listener requests really nice for her to have written in and say, This is what I really want you to talk about Ingrid and Lesley. And first of all, we were like, but we do that all the time. But what it's done is it's forced us to go. We've got hundreds of tips for low maintenance, organized home is the bottom line, like we could keep on going, you know, with 300 podcasts in nearly talking about Top Tips for a low a low maintenance home. So for us to have to condense our thoughts into our top 10 tips is quite the undertaking. So we've been planning we've been thinking we've been discussing, we've not been arguing I don't think we have our top 10 tips. Yeah, it's a nice,

03:20
it's a really good list. So let's get cracking because we know we always get sidetracked in in, in the top two in 10 Things podcasts. So and this is the 10 top tips one. So yeah, a bit of a tongue twister. But nevermind. Let's start cracking with number one. And I came up with this. And I thought, Oh, I know it sounds a bit harsh. But the thing is, if you want a low maintenance organized home, you're gonna have to change your mindset. I think about chores, and housework and things like that. Because let's face it, nobody wants to do housework, some people love it more than others. I don't mind it. But it's not like, Hey, let me open my house. Yeah, your Hey, let me do the ironing. I don't mind it. But I think I just kind of turned the button in my in my head going, I gotta do it. So I have an option, I'm going to either moan about it every week and go, I'm gonna have to do the cleaning. And I'm asked to do the dishwasher. And I'm gonna have to say wipe the sides. And I'm gonna have to do to the mopping and the whole and everything. But I'm like, What is the point? It's just not good for you. And it's takes you into the negative spiral. So I basically went, right, I'm not really love it. It's got to be done. Let's make the most of it. Let's do it efficiently and quickly. And make sure I've got the right stuff and all of that and still if we schedule it in so I can get it out of the way and do the stuff that I want to do. I'm sorry, it sounds like a red.

04:56
Do you know what it is? I think it's absolutely perfect. And I think it's the most Important thing, you know, as you say, is it kind of a tough love scenario, we're saying to you moan all you like it's still sitting there waiting for you. And if you tackle it with a more positive mindset, which is well, not positive, but just more accepting, don't try and fight it. Just accept that is part of what you have to do every week, boring as it might seem, and just get on with it. I think that's what you've got to do. And as soon as you have the acceptance, rather than that fight all the time, people fight it, this is the problem and go, you know, it's almost as if it's like a completely separate thing that's over there. You know, do I prefer to do my housework, then go out with my friends and have a glass of wine. And of course, I prefer to go out, my friends have a glass of wine. But I think I just accept that that's something that just needs to be done. And once you get yourself into that place, then that's half the battle done, isn't it? Ingrid?

05:51
Yeah. I mean, it's a bit like after dinner, you just do the washing up? Yeah, you really do do the washing up, you wipe your hope, or your stove or your cooker, or whatever you call it, you give those this decides in the kitchen, a bit of a clean, you throw out some of the bits of rubbish, it turned up, put the stuff back in the cupboards. And it just makes a massive difference. You know,

06:15
it's interesting. So I was listening to a podcast, actually. And I said that in the last one was listening, because I listened to podcasts all time, by the way, but yeah, it was with, it was actually all about, it was a kind of health positive, that kind of vibe. And it was with Greg Wallace, right from Master Chef, you know, Master Chef. Oh, yeah. And I don't really watch master chef that often. It's a UK program, but I think he's in the Master Chef Australia as well, actually. Right. So I feel like he is an internationally known person, maybe not in the States and Canada, but I feel Australia and the UK is. But he was very kind of disparaging about where you just got to get on and do it. It was about nutrition, and you know, and all that kind of stuff. But I think the difference between what we're saying now and what he was saying he was like, Well, you know, he was definitely over everybody's got the same 24 hours in a day. And yes, everybody does have 24 hours in a day. But people have more pulls on their time than others. And so it's not quite as simple as going everything's the same, and everything's equal, because it isn't. But you still have to get yourself in a place where if you want to have a healthy body and move, you've got to eat the right things. And you need to get yourself into that mindset might take a while, it might be more difficult for some than others, saying we're doing chores, you've got to just start to sort of tread that path of working stuff out. That's the thing, but you've got to want it, you've got to want the low maintenance Organized Home, in order to get yourself shifted into that place of I just got to do it. It's just you got to do it boring. But you got to do it. But yeah, but I did turn off the talk going back to Greg Wallace. I didn't like his is, is what he was saying. Because there seemed to be no empathy in the way that he was understanding other people, you know, so we, you know, we're, we are very empathetic about all the polls and struggles that people have to get to this point. But nevertheless, regardless of the struggles, if you want low maintenance and organized term, ultimately, you have to find a way to do it, though. Yeah. And it is with that positive reframe in your mindset. So a good one, Ingrid, it wasn't on my list, but it was up there on your so yeah, you're number one.

08:29
Thank you. Thank you. So let's go down to number two. And that is delegate, if you can, if there are other human beings walking around in your house, delegate some stuff. You're not in a hotel, where you are the one who has to do everything. If you have a partner, husband, wife, children, people helping living in visiting all the time, I mean, even with like very regular visitors, you know, some people have very regular visitors and chip in, you know, you can ask them nicely, you can kind of nudge them you can be say, give me a hand, you don't have to go can you please, with the kids? You can I think you give them chores, and you're like that's your job, but delegate some stuff and if there's nobody to delegate things to outsource some stuff,

09:23
if you can, again, nobody can. Nobody can pay for help. But if you can, don't close that door to yourself, you know, it might be you know, I prefer doing this, I'm better at this. I'll feel more positive. In my mindset. If I outsource the cleaning, for example, every week, you know, just knowing that is a huge way of people showed us the amount of people that we work with, who love a cleaner but the clutter is stopping the clutter is the thing that's stopping them from getting the cleaner. It's not the financial ability to pay. It's a little bit of shame, a little bit of embarrassment, a bit of like it's just throwing good money after bad or That kind of thing. And so, you know, think about delegating all work towards that, you know, outsourcing is different to outsourcing. You know, if you want a cleaner, for example, to do a good job, then you need to kind of do the decluttering first otherwise, they're just going to struggle, delegation, you know, just jumping back to Ingrid's failure point of earlier point about mindset, you really have to get into the mindset of it being non negotiable for other people. So you have to force them to have a similar mindset as you like, you know, kids, you know, I might have done things for you for the past five years. But things are changing around here now. And so now, even though it's really hard, and we spoke about it before, because sometimes you like, it's just easier for me to do it myself, you have to get into that mindset of No, I need to train them, I need to nag them, I mean, I need to keep reinforcing the idea that this is something that they have to do over and over and over and over, which is basically what has to happen. So that you can then long term, change everybody in the homes mindset, and make everybody accountable for what's going in, in the home. So really, really important. But again, it takes a while to change your mindset to change their mindset. So, but I think that's really important.

11:14
Yeah, for sure. Because I think you're if you want a low maintenance and organized home to last, everybody needs to be on board. It can't just be you who's responsible? Because that's impossible if you've got several people living in your house. Well, let's go to number three, then this was also on my on my on my hit list, Lesley. I think it's really important to have good equipment in your house. Now, you might wonder what does she mean? I can have a good low maintenance and organized home because the equipment that I have at home works. And with equipment, I mean, I have a Hoover that works properly that Hoover's properly, how often do we come into homes where the Hoover is not working properly, or the bag is full up, or the filters have never been changed, or whatever there's a blockage has not been resolved. Good Hoover, super important

12:08
and maintained and maintained Hoover, you know, how to change your filters and all that kind of stuff as well.

12:14
Yeah, with good equipment, I mean, you know, having a good mop and bucket and not something that's falling apart or that so it has been used for so long that it's falling apart. Because the reason is, all these jobs are annoying, but if you didn't have to use equipment that's faulty or not really functioning properly, it the job is even harder and you then procrastinate longer to actually do is same with an ironing board, you know, when was the last time you change the cover ironing is it's really a can be really a chore for some people, I don't mind it that much. But I make sure I when my ironing board cover is getting a bit like brown and yucky looking at like, oh, this job totally becomes too big. Let me get it, you know, let me get a new one. Of course when it's broke or not, when it's in good condition. Obviously, I don't just willy nilly replace ironing board covers all the time. But you need to make sure that what you have in your home works good. Same with maintenance on your washing machine maintenance on your dishwasher. If you want these machines to do a good job for you, you have to maintain and keep them in good condition. So they can do a better job for you and make your life easier.

13:30
I think I think toggle just jumping back to the equipment side of things, I think what they create is barriers. And so you can get all equipment is not equal. So people you know, we get this is something that happens all the time, which we we fight against very vocally if we can, you know, when a t shirt is become old and people go, Oh, that'd be useful for a dish cloth or a tea towel. It's not designed to be a dish cloth or a tea towel. It's designed to be a t shirt. And so whilst it might be useful to mop up some oil, it's not gonna be great to wipe your sides in the kitchen. And I mean, but that you probably need a more substantial cloth or a microfiber cloth or something like that. If you've got a mark from a kind of a low costs sharp, it might be very, very heavy. It might start rusting, you know, and these things, you know, if you've got a really heavy mop or one that doesn't go into the wringer properly, or the Ringu thing is broken, and it snaps and all these things are barriers, which psychologically stop you from getting those things out and using them. Same with it. You know, if your Hoover is not picking up properly, you go what's the point and so may as well just leave it, you know. So it's about investing the time into impatience. You know, it's investing wisely into getting good solid equipment which ultimately, you probably if you invest once and invest well, it will last you as opposed to some of the cheaper things that are out there where you've probably got to continue to replace them. So I think things is like that we definitely will go down the route of, if you can, of course, you know, try to invest more wisely in these things and keep them maintained, you know, a lot of times, you know, I go to client's houses, and then the Hoover bags of fall or one of the nozzles has gone missing, or they can't find it, or in all of those things that

15:19
are taped up with like, you know, the, the strong tape put keeping it all together, and it's like, what's wrong? Oh, yeah, that's a massive tear in the, in the, in the hose of the Hoover. So I've put tape around it, I'm like, Okay, we, we work with what we've got. But long term, it just always makes these chores harder, doesn't it? And

15:42
they'll just think about back in the day, you know, think about back about, like, my grandma and granddad, you know, in the way that they had to do their washing, you know, like, if it was some kind of a machine. But it's having said, you know, there was no dryers there was no, you know, if you wanted to polish things or to do it and your hands and knees to do the floor and your hands and knees, all these things are new, and how lucky are we to be able to have access to these equipment that speed up the process. But ultimately, we need to have the right stuff. So I'm, I am firmly behind your number three, Ingrid, you've put a light into this 10 things.

16:13
I know, I know, I kind of this is my bag, I kind of I kind of really got a cut, cut, cut delighted by this by this one. So number four, Lesley, ah, the good old donation station. We love a donation station. Very important. For a low maintenance Organized Home.

16:33
Definitely, let's explain what that is to anybody who's not familiar with the term donation station. So basically, a donation statement. So a donation station is put in place once you have done the bulk of your decluttering. So if you are going through a big decluttering journey, and you're taking out four or five bin bags of stuff a day, that's not the time for you to use your donation station. A donation station comes later when your house is more or less done. And it is designed for you to have an easy place for you to put things as you find them while you are working on probably the chores in your house. And you find something to think Oh, actually, that dish cloth is a little bit rubbish, I'm just going to get rid of him probably that's not something that we could go into rags, right. So you could put that into your donation station. If you find a sock with holes in that can go into a donation station. If you find something that you want to send to the charity shop, it can go into your donation station. And then at some point, you've got enough to take a bag down to the charity shop or the thrift shop is really handy because although if if that's if you don't have something like that a designated spot for the things that you want to donate, what means that you don't gather things to donate. And so therefore, this clutter that's hanging around that you could be taking from one place and putting it in your donation station as a temporary measure, of course, always is a temporary measure is still sitting around your house rather than going to it's kind of action spots or donations at station is almost getting it to the point of action. So it might not go out. You know, we you know that we're big advocates, when you're doing a big declutter to offload the stuff that you've decluttered on the day, if at all possible. But once you start, you know, like our house in my house, Ingrid's house, you know, we don't need to because the charity shop every day or every week, you know, we might only go every once every two months or three months. And we're gathering the stuff in the donation station in the interim period. All it needs to be is a little box, a little basket, something down the side of your sink something in your laundry room, if you've got one and utility room, underneath the bed, whatever it can be anything it can be anywhere, but just an easy box or bag for you to put something in that you can take things to a charity shop from. Absolutely,

18:43
we love a donation station essential for me. So a great number for now let's go to number five. Oh, yeah, I liked this or this, you came up with this from Lesley Dunn is better than perfect.

18:58
Absolutely Ingrid. It is better to have things done and have them perfect. People in the chores in the low maintenance Organized Home, the cleaning, all of those things procrastinate terribly. And sometimes it's because there's perfectionism coming into play. Now we've talked about having good equipment, which you could argue is more perfectionist to be fair, but that's just for us. That's just a basic requirement to get things done. But then once you go through them, just try and get through the tube through the way through your chores, every chore that you do is not going to be absolutely perfect week on week. But you can tackle it again next week and give it a little bit more of a go. So Don is always better than perfect. We're not looking for perfectionism here. We're looking for the jobs to get done and the chores to get ticked off your list. Yeah,

19:48
I think it's the same. We see it both in chores in tidying and decluttering. If I can't do the whole room, I can't find the time to do the whole room and I'm like, but don't do Do the whole room then do one side cupboards, do one drawer, do one shelf, do one, wardrobe, whatever it is. Because if you're going to wait for the perfect time, it will never come, you're better off to get started and doing something a little bit every day, then to wait for all the stars to align. Same with cleaning, a lot of people don't really like cleaning their bathroom, for example. And then they leave it and leave it and leave it and leave it and then it becomes this three hour job. Because then they have to get the toothbrushes out and add the you know what I mean? And just get the home from the cleaning and the clothes and the whole thing and all the strong equipment and old. What if you would have just wiped your sink, you know, every couple of days and gotten the toothpaste out, you know, you would have really saved yourself a big job there. So don't try to do everything. Don't wait for everything, all the all that everything around it to be perfect. Do a little bit at a time. And the more you get on top of both decluttering tidying and cleaning, the easier it will be to have that low maintenance and organized home it that's a process you have to go through. Absolutely. Well, let's go for a break, because we've got another five to go after the break. Hi, everyone. Welcome back, we're giving you 10 Top Tips for low maintenance and organized home before the break, we already had the first five done. So it's time for number six, ha a place for everything and everything in its place. But it's true. Everything in your home needs to have a place where it lives. Because if it doesn't have a home, it's out somewhere on the floor on the side on a flat surface. And then it just kind of disappears in the vortex because then a you don't have that visibility anymore. So you can't find it again, unless you have like almost like a photographic memory of where you put everything down. And then things get put on top of other things and then things completely disappear. So having a place for everything is is crucial. No, absolutely.

22:11
Because you just can't put things away if they've now got a designated home. And that's when things start, we started to have these kind of flutter hotspots and junk drawers and you know, like dishes in the kitchen where everything kind of gets thrown in or little piles on the end of the kitchen work surface? That's because things have not got a designated place. Yeah, it could be because so there's two parts of that, quote, a place for everything and everything in its place. You have to start with a place for everything first, because only then can you then put everything back in its place. So where is it falling down? Is it falling down at the creation of the place for everything about the thinking about the logic, the accessibility, the visibility, the decluttering, having the right amount of stuff that's all sort of together in a place for everything. And then everything in its place. It's all about the tidying the routines, the resets, and all that kind of stuff. It just makes things so easy. You know, Ingrid, and I spend very little time in a week tidying up. Because it's just, there's all the things that have become out of place. Let's put them let's move them, let's carry them upstairs and let's put them straight away. There's no soul searching, there's no oh, well, I put it there. And that doesn't look tidy. Everything goes away. Everything's got a place it fits where it goes. And it belongs where it goes. And that's the key to all of a decluttering and organizing journey. But it can be difficult to get to that place. And so, you know, the listener who asked for this question said the top tip for low maintenance and, and organized home. And we're giving them to you, we're talking very much about chores. But before you get to that point, you've got a whole load of work to do on the decluttering categorizing and organizing your home to be able to facilitate the opportunity for you to do chores to make this task low maintenance and to keep your home org organized. So whilst the all these tips are designed for towards the end of your journey, once all of the kind of foundation stones are in place. And so it's not as simple as a top 10 tips really, if we're honest, but we are moving towards the end of that process. And so once everything is put in place, these are things that you need to do to kind of, you know, to really fine tune it and make it amazing.

24:27
Yep, definitely. Let's move on to number seven, Lesley little and often. And that's really true. I we were we were making this lesson I said, I'm tidying up all the time, but because I do it all the time. When something is out of place. I don't leave it I pick it up and I put it where it belongs. And I do this all the time automatically without even thinking about it. Little jobs, but all the time often because that will save you that pile I have stuff that then takes forever and ever to short out of an evening or over the weekend. So I already tried to kind of do this. You know what, when I come in when I, when I'm at home, when I walk from upstairs to downstairs, I'll take something with me, you know, if there's, I don't know, a toilet roll to be recycled in the bathroom, and it's on the put on the side, the next time I've been in the bathroom, and I see that, I grab it and up and I'm on the way down, and I put it into recycling bin. And it's, I don't even think about that as a chore or as tidy. It's just so in my psyche that I ultimately do it. But it saves me so much time later or over the weekend, to make sure that my house that everything I know where everything is. So the key really is little but often not these gigantic whole weekends we need to now block to get everything sorted here. Build on the on the little and often principle. And

25:56
I think again, you know, like we were talking about was a place for everything and everything, its place, you know, little and often is going to come later. So people like probably go and like the idea of little don't like the idea of often that much. But before you get to that place, you do have to do these, we don't have we you know big habits are good at doing whole weekend's but if you feel able to do that, then it's going to get you to the final place a little bit Quicker, quicker. But I think that you've got to know that you've got to put the groundwork and then you can work towards this little and often principle, you know, are you as a kind of disorganized, generally disorganized people, people who are listening to this are probably a little bit more chaotic, a little bit disorganized, these things don't come naturally, we need to be honest, these things, you know, Ingrid, and I professional organizers. These things come very naturally to us. And so they happen as a matter of course, as we're going about our daily business. And some people need to work harder towards that. But we have seen colossal changes in people putting these strategies in place to a point where they had a very chaotic life. And now they're at the stage Ingrid and IRA, which is where we see something, it's all about seeing it. So you've got an almost like a radar, you know, England's got a radar to see that empty toilet roll in the bathroom to bring it down. You know, I've got a radar now, which means that I can walk into this room at the end of the day, if I walk out and I'll see there's a glass here, and there's a cup of tea. And so I might walk out because I might get distracted by something or whatever. But as soon as I come in, I'll see that and then I'll take it straight out because I don't want to because it'll be like a sort of reset, or a refresh. But we see these things and it's getting to that stage. But it's very difficult to see these things before you've allocated a place for everything. And before you put everything in its place, isn't it Ingrid? It's all? It's so interlinked, which is why at the beginning this podcast when somebody said what are your top 10 tips? It's like, that's a really hard question. Because there are hundreds, if not 1000s of components to get in this right. And, you know, we make no secret the fact that, you know, the all of the things that we teach, teach things from the ground up. But it's not easy. There's no quick fixes in the declutter hub non like there's no quick fixes when you want to put the groundwork in, you've got to do the work, you've got to learn about the emotions habit, you've got to take things one step at a time, you've got to find the right place for something that makes sense, from a size perspective, from a storage perspective, then you've got to put your resets and routines in place, you got to work out your non negotiables. And then ultimately, you'll get to a stage where you are not a slave to your home, which is where we want you all to get, you know, we want you all to get the same place to England, now we've still got water, we've still got we're not like we're not perfect terms far from it. I'm going to do some stuff this weekend. You know, I've got plans in place, I'm gonna start fine tuning things. But it won't be that bad. You know, because it's mostly okay. We're always gonna be decluttering. But it's about understanding it so you can get you know, that should be everybody's goal is to get to a stage where I see little bits of clutter as I'm going about my daily business. And I deal with it as a matter of course, without even thinking that it's a chore to get to a stage where you think you don't even think that something's a chore is where we want to get to write. Yeah,

29:12
absolutely. Absolutely. And I think as well, that's what you wind up with what we see in the membership as well as intellectually, I think people come in, they listen to the podcast, and maybe come into the Facebook group. But then they realize, wow, you know, getting decluttered and organized, I need more I need more information. I need more help. I need more support, I need more accountability, I need more knowledge. And that's exactly what people come into for the membership. And we give that to them. And then some and everybody was lost. So many of our members have said, Oh my gosh, there's so much more in your membership than I ever thought was possible. You really explain it from the ground up as you said before the need to know the basics before you can't run if you can't walk right You need to kind of go right? How am I going to figure this out here. And by doing by scheduling a weekend and doing a massive decluttering in one room and being completely overwhelmed, completely counterproductive of what what we're teaching and what we what we're all about. So this is really agree I agree with you. Let's see, these top tips are all about for the later stage, but super fun to talk about anyway, because this is what we where we want people to go, right? Yeah, and not

30:27
all of these things are the goal is a little bit of like, you got to do a few little things to put the groundwork in place. But the goal is to have a low maintenance organized home. Yeah, takes time and effort to get there. If you have a place of chaos, which a lot of people are in our world. Yeah,

30:42
yeah. And I think number eight is kind of very linked to number seven, the little and often. And that is number eight, don't put it down, put it away when you've been cooking, but the chopping boards and the knives away in the dishwasher, if the need washing, put the packet of sauce that you've used in there, maybe two packets in one thing, put the other one back in the cupboards. When you have come in from I don't know grocery shopping, and you've put all of your food away in your fridge in your freezer, any of your pantry, put the bags either back in the car or in the cupboard where the bags live. Finish the job. If you put it down and walk off and go somewhere else, you forget about it. You get distracted and later you have to come back and go oh yeah. And then it takes you more time by doing something straight away. You know, when you come in, take your coat off and hang it up to on the coat rack immediately. Go. No,

31:48
it's on the back of a chair. Not on a banister. Yes, they hold family doors. If there's like loads of options, I'm like, that sort of things drives me insane. Yeah,

32:00
yeah. But it's, it's with everything, isn't it? Lesley is really to have that habit of, I'm going to do it here. And now. If a job I think that once somebody said if a job takes less than two minutes, do it there. And then because if you put it down and walk off, it's going to take you longer. And I think that's really that's something that I do a lot as well of this lesson how I stay on top of stuff at my house.

32:23
So let me ask you a question. Are you a controlled cook? Are you constantly putting things away as you cook? Yeah, I say I'm erratic. Of course, as you might imagine, I've always put it away once I'm done. But I'll bring everything out. I bring everything out. So you know, some people might, oh, I want a pinch of paprika or whatever, bring the thing from the thing, put the puppet and some people would put it straight away. Whereas I'll bring all of the things, then I'll cook and then once there's a bit of cooking, then I'll start to pull things away. Yeah, I'll definitely put it all away once I'm done. But I think I'm, I mean, Nathan is like, on a sweat when he cooks. And this is madness, my youngest son, and he's a great cook. But honestly, what I see the kitchen, and it's really hard, isn't it when they learn and be so enthusiastic. And I just think it's such a fantastic thing as a 21 year old lad to be able to cook these beautiful meals that he does, to kind of let it go. So I'm not as erratic as him because he would have everything out everything. And I'm like, okay, the cleanup is quite big and nurse, but I've got to kind of go through it. It's like the same things we were talking about with the delegate delegation. You have to allow learning from other people, don't you as well. You know, the minister, it's the same thing. Yeah. Do you save? I want to put some things away? No. I mean, yeah. Every single herb and spice that we own out at the same time, but anyway, so yeah, don't put it down, put it away. So I think you're probably really good. I'm probably by most people's standards, quite good. Nathan's probably not too bad, because he would tidy up after he had done it. But then some people would just give up because it looks so so kind of hideous when it's all out and if it's time has elapsed and things like that. Yeah,

34:07
for sure. For sure. So I think that's, I think, a very important one in the list of the 10 top tips. Let's go to number nine, Lesley non negotiables. Yes, they're back. We talked about non negotiables on a very regular basis on this podcast. But for us, they are crucial to keep your house tidy and organized and clean. And non negotiables are different for every person. For example, a couple of my non negotiables are loading the dishwasher every day, unloading the dishwasher every day, bringing the recycling out to the recycling bins, emptying the bins wiping the kitchen sites, all of those kinds of we do those daily, and there's no man overboard if one day it certainly doesn't happen because but it's so ingrained habits. It's really something Really crazy must have happened for the non negotiables not to happen, right? It's just something that we do, we tidy up after breakfast after lunch after dinner, the sides get wiped. So the next thing can happen. And, you know, those help, I think incredible,

35:16
I think in terms of non negotiables. And so, you know, we talk about these in a kind of, you know, a general way. But I think if this is something that you've never really thought about, it's important to put the groundwork and to really think about them, so, and to time them and to write them down. And to use a list in the first instance. So we have non negotiables, checklists, and things like that in our membership, because it takes time to build habit, and you need to remind yourself, so you might think, Oh, well, these are the non negotiables that I want in my kitchen every morning, you know, why the work surface, but the dishwasher on whatever that might be, you know, clean the dump bowl, or whatever. So you've got to work that out is also important for you to think about how long that is likely to take you so that you know that the plans that you're putting in place are achievable, and realistic, really, really important. But use those take less until it starts to become habit. So I mean, we don't need to think about these things, because they've been our non negotiables for so long, that we don't need to think about it anymore. But if this is a habit that you're trying to change, write these things down, tap time them go, you know, the load in the dishwasher, because I just think that we mistakenly we underestimate or overestimate often how long these things are going to take. So these things become this huge chore, when they're not at all, how many times have we put something off and then go, I've been putting that off for so long. And actually, it just took me 10 minutes was fine. So really, really important to give yourself a chance to analyze and evaluate your non negotiables. And really think them through Yeah, think about other people in the house, look at the non negotiables list and go okay, if I've got a six year old and a four year old, which of these non negotiables can they help me with might be a pain might be awkward, might take 10 minutes, you might have to kind of, we all know what that looks like with kids right after dinner and stuff, you might be too tired to do it, but get it into their non negotiables. So they know as soon as they step up from that dinner table, they've got to bring their plate up and put it in a certain place, or they've got to empty the bins or whatever it is that you're asking them to do load the dishwasher, if they're a little bit older. You know, think about all those things. So give yourself an opportunity to change those habits by writing down those non negotiables on a tick list. Yeah,

37:29
absolutely, absolutely crucial, crucial to stay organized. Well, Lesley, we've had nine of our 10 Top tips. So let's go to number 10. And I know it sounds maybe a bit obvious, but it really is so true. Have less stuff. And it's a game changer. Less stuff really equals, you know, less stress, more time, more space, more energy, more time to do stuff with the things people that you want to hang out with. Having less stuff is the game changer. You know, it's it's yes, you need to have a place for everything. But still, if your cupboards are over a fool. And you know, things fall out, when you open the doors and you still have too much stuff. It really is incredibly important if you want to have a low maintenance and organized home to get a grip of that control of that stock that you have, and that you have less stuff coming in and make sure that the exit plan keeps going with the donation station.

38:41
So important is the crux of everything that we've spoken about, you know, to mean, the less stuff you've got, the less stuff you've got to clean, you know. So it's just really basic, but really obvious and very kind of life changing. So having less than that, the effect that that has is colossal on all areas of your home, like you say you can find places to put everything and your storage is now overflowing, which saves you time. It's not as stressful, there's less stuff for you to do, don't put it down, put it away because it might not need to get put down because you haven't got it. So just have less. And so it all starts with the decluttering process.

39:22
Yeah. And I think what we've really realized by doing this, this list of these 10 things, it's just really important. It's never you know, we know Lesley it's never about the stuff and the nice containers. It's all about that mindset shift and those habits that you put into place when you're decluttering and organizing your home. Like you said, all these things come after you've decluttered categorized organized and put it away. They can put all of the steps one and one in place. It will all fall into place. But But if your house is bursting at the seams with stuff, these 10 things might sound very, very difficult to do. And you're probably would be right this is this is feasible, if there's less stuff. So I'm not, we're not advocating a minimalist mind lifestyle whatsoever at all, we have things in our houses as well. But I think it's really important to realize that we don't need so much. And that if we have less stuff, we really get more time and more energy, more money, more space, more everything.

40:34
Now, I've quite enjoyed that, I think, you know, it's, it's reset our thoughts. And so the more we've gone through the 10 things, I just think it's quite complex, isn't it to get to this stage. But it's where we all want to be. It's the reason why we want to go on a decluttering journey, ultimately, is for a low maintenance and organized home. So thank you so much to the listener. Ingrid, do we even know who the person is what the name of the person is? Who who called in? Well,

41:01
you're calling me out a little bit here. Let's see, because normally I'm very good at taking notes. But 100%,

41:06
Ingrid's job 100%.

41:11
Yes, I made a faux pas here because I did not write this listeners name down. Because we would have said we could have said well, thank you, Trudy or Lisa or parent or so

41:21
we're just going to imagine, well, we know it was a female that much we know. Right? Okay, that's all we know. So if you are a female listener out there, and you suggested this podcast to us, thank you so much. It was looking for you to do it. And actually, the interesting thing is, if you also have a question for us, we've got something exciting coming up, because in two episodes time, we have episode 300. And every time we do a what we consider to be a kind of Lundmark podcast, which come honestly, fast and furiously. No sooner if we don't episode 250 landmark podcast, then it's now worth 300, well, actually 50 episodes ago. And so we were thinking about what can we do differently? So this time, we're involved in you, Ingrid. Oh,

42:09
Lesley, I am so excited about podcast episode 300. Can you even believe it? I mean, I know every time we say that with every kind of 50 episodes, but it's like, wow, anyway, nevermind, we had an amazing idea. We were like, right, we need to ask our listeners to submit questions to us. Because we would love to know what you want to know. If you've got a decluttering and organizing question you would love to have us answer. Now it's your chance. So in the show notes of this podcast, we're going to put the details in because what you need to do is you need to send us a video with your question. And then we're going to answer 10. Listeners questions in the podcast episode 300. So yeah, let's be honest, this is not going to be 30 minutes, right? It's probably going to be a bit longer than that, if we're going to answer 10 questions, but I'm excited. But it's,

43:06
yeah, don't worry about the video situation. Because it's very easy. We've got a great piece of software that will make it easy for you to record a video. But we do go out on YouTube. So you need to be happy to broadcast yourself to the world. So yeah, so that's it. So we're excited. We're excited to get questions from our listeners to ask us.

43:26
I know, obviously, if

43:28
we can't answer them, we just won't do those ones, right.

43:32
They're too personal, that we might take them out. If

43:36
you've actually got feedback for us do that separately. Now, let's say gives me my brew might not make it to the three on this episode. So anyway, that'll be exciting. And that's coming up in two episodes time. I

43:47
know. I know. So yeah. I'm so ready for that. I love it. I love it. And we love you are lovely listeners for being here for listening to us week in week out. Thanks so much. And don't forget to get that follow us or subscribe button on your player. So you don't miss that app specially that 300 episode because we don't want you to miss out. Now, lastly, let us know what of these 10 Top Tips is going to be really workable for you. What are you going to implement? We want to know from you leave us a comment, or leave us a comment on YouTube. We listen and read everything that you send us. Thank you so much. We appreciate you and we'll see you next week.

44:35
Thanks so much for listening to the declutter hop podcast. Don't forget to subscribe to us in your podcast player so you don't miss an episode. And we'll see you next week.
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Recent Posts
Episode 390 – 10 changes that make the biggest impact in your home

Episode 389 – Overcoming mobility challenges when decluttering with member Rory

Episode 388 – Start as you mean to go on – plan 2026 for decluttering success

Episode 387 – Our 2025 year in review – the big Declutter Hub round-up

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Episode 298 – 10 top tips for a low maintenance and organised home

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Episode 388 – Start as you mean to go on – plan 2026 for decluttering success

Episode 387 – Our 2025 year in review – the big Declutter Hub round-up

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