declutter – Page 2 – Pollywog's Place Blog

It seems like our lives can get so hectic so quickly without us realizing it is even happening. I know that I seem to get one thing running smoothly but then ten other things seem to just fall off the track and then everything turns to CHAOS. We need our homes to be comfortable and not a place we dread being.

For me, the very first thing I need to do before starting this process is to find a little time for me & God… I often find that life feels overwhelming when I haven’t been able to have any quiet time for myself. I have tried getting up earlier but that just isn’t working out right now, I often would take a few minutes after lunch when the baby was down for a nap but our school routines have been out of whack since adding a new kiddo, when the time bedtime rolls around I am worn out. I do find little bits of time here and there to have little chats with God but I just haven’t been able to have my devotional time and I think that may be part of the reason that I am feeling so overwhelmed.

When something is frustrating me I often go to Him in prayer and ask Him to help me and show me ways that I can change or that we can change as a family. I ask Him to give me wisdom and guidance about the changes and things we need to work on so that they will benefit everyone.

Where do we start when it seems like everything is the problem?

We use this process in our home for a lot of different problems, part of it we even use for teaching the kids to make good choices. I’ll give a couple of examples of how we have used this system in the past.

1. STOP and identify the problem.

This might be the most difficult part of the whole process because sometimes it can be difficult to actually narrow down what or where the problem actually is when you are feeling overwhelmed. Many times there are multiple problems and sometimes the problems are not actually what we think they are. If you do find yourself with a multitude of problems then just try to focus on the biggest one first and work on ONE AT A TIME or you may find yourself even more overwhelmed and frustrated.

Maybe your home just feels way too small and unorganized. What’s the biggest problem area? Well, the one that bothered me the most was the kitchen because that was where I spend the majority of my time.

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Whew! It’s been a busy first week of the year but our house is finally ‘undecorated’ all except for the inflatables which are hanging over the back porch railings as they need to dry out.

Yesterday we had our first dance of the New Year at a new location. I tried not to do too much work as I didn’t want to be completely exhausted before the dance… I tried but with my arm, in the condition it is in right now, it doesn’t take much to wear me out at all. I went to one of our sheds to dig out a couple of outfits and then had to go back to find my dance shoes. While we were out in the shed I remembered that someone had mentioned they needed some little boy clothes so I found a tote of clothes our kiddos have outgrown and brought that to the house with us.