52 Weeks to an Organised Home: Coupons and Post

Another challenge on my list is to sort out my coupons. This isn't too difficult becasue I don't have many. My printer isn't working so I can't print out any vouchers and most of the vouchers that come through my door are completely useless to me.

However, I do have my Tesco vouchers and the odd coupon I do keep hold of. I used to keep my coupons in my files but found I forgot about them, out of sight out of mind after all! So now I pin them to my pin board in the kitchen where walk past them all the time so I'll never forget to use them!

Another thing is to make sure you pop some in your purse. I have a few compartments in my purse where my coupons (mainly supermarket ones) keep nicely and don't get mixed up with my cash or coins- that's just annoying.

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Now, I tackled another task at the same time seeming as though the coupon one didn't require much effort! I have been bogged down by my mail for a long time. It's on the dinner table, it's near the DVD units, it's on the bookshelf heading towards the file where it should be stored neatly and organised...yeah right!

Until tonight that is. I got out my folder and gathered my post, sat in the front room with a cookie and made a concentrated effort to well, concentrate! Now my bills, bank statements etc are in their correct wallets in my folder and not laying about where I don't want them or need them. I also won't loose anything of importance!

I have also made myself a little postal box to go by the front door. if the postie comes and I am in a hurry then I can pop my post into the box and open it later. I can keep mail there that doesn't need to be moved just at that moment and I feel a whole lot more organised!

52 Weeks to an Organised Home: Recipes.

The next challenge on 52 Weeks to an Organised Home is to sort out my recipe books. I don't have a lot of recipe books but I had enough to making my upstairs bookshelf look overcrowded and squashed.

The first thing I did was to look through my books. I looked at the ones I use, the ones I never seem to use and then the ones that are not even mine in the first place! There were several that belonged to my  Mum so I popped them into a bag with some other bits I needed to return to her.
After that I placed the ones I never used into my big charity sack leaving me with a small pile of books.

Now, I had been wanting a shelf put up in my kitchen for weeks but the Other Half had been doing so much overtime (and is a lazy old so and so) that eventually I just put it up myself!
So, I now had a shelf for my smaller books which isn't a lot but as it goes (and luckily) it's the smaller books I use most often so they are now sat on my shelf which I finished off nicely with some homemade bunting, a postcard of cupcakes and my pink cat:

I do have a few more books on there!

My other books, now nicely slimmed down to a more sensible amount could be moved after I also donated some children's books we never read anymore. Once I had done that there was a whole spare space for my recipe books. Hooray! No more squashed paper backs!

Cupcake Mumma.

52 weeks to an organised home

There are no photos from last weeks Fridge sort out but i have indeed made a major revamp! Each item I buy from the weekly food shop now has a dedicated shelf in the fridge. In my old fridge the lower drawers broke which was a real bummer. I got a new one from my Mother in Law when they upgraded which was a great thrifty bit of saving and a great donation!

Now I have a usable drawer I have a new place for my vegetables and fruit I wish to keep in the fridge. On the bottom shelf I have decided to keep my orange juice cartons and anything similar. I then have yogurts on the shelf up. We each have our own yogurts which may seem a bit odd...We were buying Tesco yogurts 4 at 50p each and then we discovered Aldi could sell the same amount in the region on 1.70ish which is a few pence saving but I'm happy with that. Then i have my yogurts to pop in, 2 packs of dairy free and then Other Half has his selection which will depend on whats on offer (yogurt snob).

On the 3rd shelf is the cheese and meat section. We buy some ham, a huge block of mature cheese and soft cheese for the children. Little Miss also likes Billy Bear and sometimes we'll buy little cheese treats which are nice snacks. They can all be kept together.

Top shelf is for anything else, butter we stock up on because supermarkets have phases of running out of my dairy free butter and as I like baking I don't wish to run out! I have some hummus up there at the minute as Little Man has learnt to get in the fridge, hummus fingers aren't my idea of fun!

I cleaned up every shelf and the door which holds my mayonnaise, milks, alcoholic free wine, eggs, garlic (seems to last longer!) and any medicine that needs holding in the cold. Now it's all neat and tidy I will take the same approach as my cupboards and clean weekly after a food shop.

This week sees me tackling my recipe books. I don't have a dedicated space but maybe this could be my opportunity to get Other Half to pop a shelf up? I do have loose bits laying around and an almost empty book so If I have the time I shall sit down and transfer my scribbles into my recipe journal.

Hope you're doing as well with organising your home. Hannah x

My 30 Day Declutter!

I discovered a new blog today A Thrifty Mrs..and what really caught my eye is this:

And it couldn't come a moment too soon! Now that Christmas is approaching, and i am just generally getting fed up of the state of my house now, I think this new little project is going be a delight!

Although maybe not that easy? See this task requires you declutter your house of 90 items by the end of November. Part of me things 'Yeah sure I can do that' the other..not so sure!

As I feel pretty motivated, i think I'll start by going through the toy boxes. I want one for upstairs and one for downstairs (my lounge is tiny and I need some free space)

From there:

There's the 'cupboard' (narrow space) under the stairs

There's the other cupboard

There's the bathroom draws full of random crap

There's under my bed...

Under the children's bed...

There's the cupboard under the sink..full of unused crap stuff

There's our canvas wardrobe which is still in need of emptying

2 bags of paper that needs shredding

DVDs that need going through

My side table in my children's room (doesn't fit now we swapped) that's full of 'stuff'

And goodness knows what else!

Problem is, i'll have to stop finding the treats and treasures in my charity stores and market sales!!