Loving Stylebook

I have discovered an amazing app for organizing your wardrobe and planning outfits. It's called Stylebook! I think it's only available on the iPhone right now, but that works for me!

It has a closet section where you add photos of all your clothes. Don't they look so cute all little and organized!?

  Then you can make them into outfits...

...and put them on your calendar!

I think this app is amazing for several reasons.

1. It should help me have more variety in my outfits and not wear the same shirt every Friday. Or even worse... wear the same outfit on Friday and the following Monday!

2. It helps me think of more ways to mix and match what I already have to create more outfits because it is easier to see your clothes in this format than smashed together in a closet. You can pick out a shirt and then scroll through and see all your cardigans to see what matches. I totally get stuck in the rut of wearing the same things together when I could do a lot more mixing and matching.

3. Do you ever buy a cute skirt and then realize none of your shirts match it? Or buy a turquoise shirt and realize once you get home that half your wardrobe is turquoise now? Guilty! But with this app, I can see how a potential purchase could work with my wardrobe before I buy it! It also makes it easy to see that I have way too many t-shirts but not enough blouses so that I know what to shop for.

4. It makes getting dressed in the morning so much faster! Which is great for a night owl like me who moves like molasses in the morning.

5. It tracks how often you wear each item. Which will make cleaning out my closet a piece of cake. I can just look in my app and get rid of anything I haven't worn in the past year. And less unnecessary stuff in the closet = less time spent managing it!

6. It also can track cost per wear if you put in the amount you paid for an item. Those $200 boots you splurged on don't seem so bad when you realize you have worn them so much that it's only $1 per wear. I think it will also help me to see which things I wear the most so that I know what types of clothes it makes sense to spend a little extra to get better quality on like my black pumps.

I have about 95% of my clothes photographed and added to my stylebook now and about 2% of my jewelry. I guess I need to get on that.

I am so happy to have an app to keep my wardrobe organized! You have no idea how happy this makes the organizer in me. So happy that while I was sick in bed with the flu and discovered it, I totally snuck out of bed to add the first few pictures of my clothes so I could start playing with it. Yes, it made me feel worse but it was worth it! Ha ha.

Note: This is not a sponsored post. I just really like this app!

Organized Cleaing Schedule

Do you know what is always getting in the way of me having some fun by organizing?

Cleaning!

I like this photo because it looks like the bottles of cleaner are sad that they are stuck inside cleaning instead of playing outside.

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One of my goals for 2013 is to come up with a way to stay on top of keeping things clean with minimal effort. My usual system looks something like this:
A) Spend an entire weekend exhausting myself by cleaning all the things!
B) Fail to clean all the things -or-
Clean all the things and then not clean ANYTHING for the next month because I earned it!
C) Repeat

This system has several problems.
A) It stinks to spend a weekend cleaning instead of relaxing
B) It's impossible to clean an entire home in 2 days while taking care of a toddler
C) Some things need to be cleaned more often than once a month!

I have also tried schedules of different things that I need to clean on different days of the week. But the problem with that was if I missed a day I felt like I had to double up the next day. And then I would quit.

I think I have finally come up with a system that works for me! I am so excited and can't wait to share it with you!

Step 1
Make a list of daily chores. These are things you try to do every day. Don't get too crazy with this list. It shouldn't take more than 30 minutes. Set a timer!

My daily list looks like this:

• wash and put away dishes
• wipe off table and high chair
• wipe kitchen counters
• pick up/put away
• wipe bathroom sink/counter
• scoop litterboxes (if needed)
• take out trash (if needed)

For me, the key to sticking with this is to not stress if I miss some now and then... there's always the next day.

Step 2
Make a list of the rooms in your house that need cleaning. Depending on how many, you might have a one or two week rotation. I came up with five and assigned them to Monday-Friday. Exclude weekends from this schedule!

Here's what my rotational list looks like:

• Monday: Bathrooms
• Tuesday: Dining Room/Living Room
• Wednesday: Master Bedroom
• Thursday: Kitchen
• Friday: Guest Bedroom

I consolidated the two bathrooms because while I have supplies out, I might as well clean two toilets, two mirrors, etc. I did the same with the living & dining rooms since they are a big open area.

Step 3
Make a list of the things that need to be cleaned in each room. Then, on the day of the week assigned to that room, spend no more than 30 minutes checking off one or two things on the list for that room. DO NOT clean the whole room! Just a manageable chunk! The goal is to clean everything on the list once a month. But again, don't stress if you don't! Just start the next month with the things you didn't get to the previous month.

As an example, here's what my bathroom list looks like:

• Clean tubs
• Clean mirrors
• Sweep and Swiffer Wet Jet
• Clean litterboxes and replace litter
• Clean toilets
• Dust vents and lights
• Dust baseboards
• Clean window and windowsill
• Wash shower curtains and liners

I think what makes this system work for me is that I would NEVER do everything on that list on a weeknight. But just one or two? No problem! Just like breaking organizing into manageable chunks works,  breaking cleaning into manageable chunks works! I would much rather clean for an hour 5 days a week than an entire weekend! I definitely think the best part is that more of my weekends are free for fun with family and friends (and organizing projects)! That motivates me to get the cleaning done after work.

Do you use a cleaning schedule? What works for you? Also, I'd love to know your favorite cleaning products. I personally was amazed when I removed a rust stain from my shower with Mr. Clean Magic Eraser and can't imagine dusting without my Swiffer Duster!

Miss Me?

Hi, everyone! I'm baaaaack! Happy Belated New Year!

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And Happy Belated 1 Year Blog-aversary to Organizey Dreams! That's right... this little ol' blog started on January 2, 2012. Enjoy a virtual bundtini on me!

We have come a looooong way in organizing and de-cluttering since starting this blog. We had a successful garage sale and sold a lot of old books & movies to Half Price Books. But of course there is always more work to be done!

Since we no longer have to tackle entire rooms, my husband and I have decided to have Organizey Weekends! He's not too excited by the name, but the idea was his. Instead of me bugging him about organizing things all the time, once a month we will pick an area we need to work on and have a weekend focused on organizing it. I'm not sure what my posting schedule will look like, but I do plan on posting at least once a month now.

Some of the areas we would like to tackle include:

• desk
• guest closet (basically a 2nd storage unit at the moment)
• storage unit
• CDs (if you only knew how many my husband has!)
• toy storage
• master closet

 I am looking forward to getting even closer to having a super organized home!