Solving.
Not “I solved.”
Definitely not “How to Solve.”
I’ve been thinking about this post for at least a week, but it was going to be “Solving the Messy Master Bedroom Mystery.” But then, today, in preparation for my 9yo’s slumber party tomorrow night, we tackled the boys’ room.
Oh my.
I know/knew that their room was a disaster. There were no delusions about it not being that bad. But still, as I worked on it, I felt that familiar bewilderment over how it continually gets back to that state.
Over and over.
And over.
We clean it, and enjoy the cleanness of it. We say we should keep it that way.
But we don’t.
I say we because every bedroom in our house has this problem. (See how I blame the bedrooms?)
I know in my head what it will take to keep the bedrooms out of disaster status.
- Less stuff.
- Consistent, like nightly, putting away of the stuff that is there.
I know this, but don’t do it. I’ve said many times before that I’ll do well at reminding the kids for a while, and then will walk into their room, trip over a pile of who-knows-what and realize that it has been over a month since anyone has picked up or put away anything. At all.
I don’t blame them, because their mama hasn’t done a good job of teaching them.
And my bedroom? Whoa.
It’s the week of goal/resolution making. I’m not going to call this a goal. Mostly because I have absolutely no faith in myself in this area.
But it has to change. If I’m ever truly going to be deslobbified, we have to figure out the bedroom thing. So I’m going to try what works for me.
Focus.
I know what to do. By doing it, hopefully I’ll figure out how to do it well.
I’ve solved the kitchen mystery. Even though I knew that it was messy because I didn’t do dishes consistently, I didn’t understand how to keep it clean until I had focused on doing the dishes consistently. Doing it helped me figure it out.
I no longer feel baffled by my kitchen. It still gets messy, but I understand why/how it got that way, and what I need to do to keep it clean.
Does this make any sense? I’m basically saying that I have no plan. I just want to focus on the bedrooms, pick them up consistently (you know, what normal people do), figure out the whys and the whats and the hows by writing, and hopefully over time it will start to make sense to me.
We have the same problem. What does help at least for a while in the kids bedrooms (and mine, too) is to have a twice a day pick-up time. The other thing is that the girls (since they share a room) are only allowed to have 1 category of toys out at at time. Then they have to put it away before they can get out a different toy and they have to ask me first so I can see if their room is ready to get something else out. It definitely has failure days, but the twice a day pick-ups usually help then.
Why is it I so often want to shout AMEN after your posts? 🙂 My master bedroom is always the last room to be cleaned/seen, therefore, it is always a mess. Fixing that is high on my new year's priority list!
My room ALSO is the last to be cleaned. If I don't have a checklist for myself, that I physically have to check off, I forget every day to keep up on stuff. This drives me crazy about myself.
Lots of advice on keeping a kids room clean is to set a good example and have your room and the other areas of the house clean.
Gee, thanks.
If i knew how to keep my room clean, would I need to look up how to help my kids?
I’m trying to teach them now so they aren’t messy at my age.
Not a knock on you, but others who seem to have it down and their idea of teaching is to repeat a list from Martha Stewart’s spring cleaning list.
Very inspiring post. I have battled for years with a cluttered bedroom. After years of clutter clearing and pairing down my possessions (a zillion times), I have managed to achieve a much tidier bedroom with the exception of the love seat constantly cluttered with clothes. Also, I removed my shoe rack to a secluded location near the entry hence, shoes don’t make it to the bedroom. I think the most effective solution is to give away as much as possible i.e. clothes, accessories, makeup and even shoes that we no longer use nor, like. Then, the rest will fit in the closet. Anyways, I still need to tackle my easy chair 🙂