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Unclutter Your Home: 7 Simple Steps, 700 Tips & Ideas
Life Without Clutter!
Can't imagine it? Let Donna Smallin show you hundreds of tips, techniques, and ideas for organizing the worthwhile, getting rid of the obsolete, and making time for what really matters, like friends, family, and personal growth.
Eliminate unnecessary belongings without guilt or regret Contain the clutter with simple storage techniques
Minimize the paper pile-up in your home
Regain your closets, cabinets, basements, and attics
Simplify daily routines to keep clutter-free forever!
Can't imagine it? Let Donna Smallin show you hundreds of tips, techniques, and ideas for organizing the worthwhile, getting rid of the obsolete, and making time for what really matters, like friends, family, and personal growth.
Eliminate unnecessary belongings without guilt or regret Contain the clutter with simple storage techniques
Minimize the paper pile-up in your home
Regain your closets, cabinets, basements, and attics
Simplify daily routines to keep clutter-free forever!
- GenresNonfictionSelf Help
187 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1999
5 people are currently reading
79 people want to read
About the author
Donna Smallin Kuper
17 books45 followersI am an organizing strategist, certified House Cleaning Technician and author of a dozen books on how to unclutter, organize, clean up and simplify your life. My latest release is Clear the Clutter, Find Happiness. I invite you to sign up for free organizing tips at www.unclutter.com or join my Unclutter.com Organizing Support Group on Facebook.
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
May 31, 2017
While dated, this is a good book to help you analyze why you hang on to things. The author gives you seven tips:
1. Assess your situation - why does the clutter happen?
2. Plan for success - establish attitude, target dates to complete parts of project,
3. Lighten your load - free up space and time by letting go of things you don't love or need
4. Contain yourself - find a place for everything you love or need
5. Revamp clutter zones - organize possessions to fit your life style
6. Simplify with systems - systems for managing paperwork, toys, chores, etc.
7. Ban clutter forever - remove yourself from unwanted mailing lists, catalogs, flyers, don't pick up trinkets, shop for entertainment, etc.
1. Assess your situation - why does the clutter happen?
2. Plan for success - establish attitude, target dates to complete parts of project,
3. Lighten your load - free up space and time by letting go of things you don't love or need
4. Contain yourself - find a place for everything you love or need
5. Revamp clutter zones - organize possessions to fit your life style
6. Simplify with systems - systems for managing paperwork, toys, chores, etc.
7. Ban clutter forever - remove yourself from unwanted mailing lists, catalogs, flyers, don't pick up trinkets, shop for entertainment, etc.
January 21, 2011
Nerd Alert: I loved this book. Ironically, it got lost for a few hours in some clutter in my car. It was a good motivator with simple organizational steps.
February 3, 2022
This was ok…it was next to something else at the library I was looking at, and I’m always interested in books on this topic, so I grabbed it. As par for the course of this particular library being tiny, it was the only one on the topic, and it’s extremely outdated (not the book’s fault).
It mostly contains lists of tips, and I found about two or three that were interesting and applicable. I felt like a lot of them would actually add to a clutter-y home? All the use of bins upon bins upon boxes upon egg cartons and cereal boxes. Maybe if you are SUPER cluttered to begin with it would help? I guess too, after reading some other cleaning books/blogs, I already had come across a lot of this info.
My main takeaway was to remember to ask the right questions of myself. Not—what can I do to clean this up?, but—what can I do to keep this from happening again? Is there a missing system?
Anyway, if you see it at the library, it might be worth a skim to refresh your memory on the topic.
It mostly contains lists of tips, and I found about two or three that were interesting and applicable. I felt like a lot of them would actually add to a clutter-y home? All the use of bins upon bins upon boxes upon egg cartons and cereal boxes. Maybe if you are SUPER cluttered to begin with it would help? I guess too, after reading some other cleaning books/blogs, I already had come across a lot of this info.
My main takeaway was to remember to ask the right questions of myself. Not—what can I do to clean this up?, but—what can I do to keep this from happening again? Is there a missing system?
Anyway, if you see it at the library, it might be worth a skim to refresh your memory on the topic.
February 27, 2015
Here are my favorite hints from Donna Smallin's Unclutter Your Home: 7 Simple Steps, 700 Tips and Ideas (1999):
Store small, breakable tree ornaments in empty egg cartons
Create a launchpad area for kids in hall closet or along one wall of the kitchen; stack plastic crates, 1 / kid, for collecting lunch boxes, HW, etc
To organize accessories: clip a couple shower curtain rings to your clothes rod, hang handbags, scarves, belts
Put old bookcases into closets for instant shelving
Jewelry Box Clean-out: lay it all out on a table or bed, throw away anything broken, single earrings. Put to one side the sets you wear often. Look at what's left and decide to keep, sell, or give away.
Choose either gold or silver jewelry; most fair-skinned people look best in silver; dark-skinned people in gold.
Add a shelf or turntable under kitchen sink for easier access to cleaning supplies, paper towels, dish detergent, etc.
Hang pots and pans; buy a ceiling or wall rack, or use chains to suspend a section of ladder from the ceiling!!!
Put lg. twist ties around cords coming from computers, modems [or fishtanks]: makes one big rope rather than snarl of small ones
Use LG vinyl covered hooks to hang up bikes, folding lawn chairs, snow shovels, sleds [there's always more vertical space than horizontal in our living quarters]
IF room allows, leave cooler in trunk during summer months, great for picking up groceries and frees up space in garage
RETAINING RECORDS:
Save bank statements, canceled checks for one year, or three full tax years if you itemize on tax returns
When the new month's bill arrives, toss the old UTILITY BILL
TAX RETURNS: keep for six full tax years--how long the IRS has to audit your tax return
Use a safe deposit box or fireproof lockbox to store the following: wills, marriage, death, birth certificates; leases, trust papers; bonds; mortgages
Set up a file for each child to include SS #s, medical forms, school transcripts, and report cards
Create your own RECIPE BOOK using a three ring album with magnetic pages
Play CLUTTER TAG: use stickers, tag left out items for one week, different color for each family member; children may enjoy it, help them remember to put away their own belongings
Help kids spot the relationship between clutter (or the lack thereof) and time: on an evening when the house is tidy, make popcorn or cookies or something the kids ask for, telling them there's time for it since there's no clutter to pick up
It may sound harsh, but only keep what you want when it comes to gifts received. "Unwanted or unused items clutter your home, and you hate clutter!"
DAILY RITUALS: Finish what you start
Take 15 min. before bed each night or first thing in the AM and straighten up: that's 1 hr, 45 min / week
PERIODIC PURGES:
Clean the garage once a month
Make a list of projects you want to tackle and how much TIME you think each will take; when you have some time, pick one from the list
Get rid of whatever you haven't used in a year
Store small, breakable tree ornaments in empty egg cartons
Create a launchpad area for kids in hall closet or along one wall of the kitchen; stack plastic crates, 1 / kid, for collecting lunch boxes, HW, etc
To organize accessories: clip a couple shower curtain rings to your clothes rod, hang handbags, scarves, belts
Put old bookcases into closets for instant shelving
Jewelry Box Clean-out: lay it all out on a table or bed, throw away anything broken, single earrings. Put to one side the sets you wear often. Look at what's left and decide to keep, sell, or give away.
Choose either gold or silver jewelry; most fair-skinned people look best in silver; dark-skinned people in gold.
Add a shelf or turntable under kitchen sink for easier access to cleaning supplies, paper towels, dish detergent, etc.
Hang pots and pans; buy a ceiling or wall rack, or use chains to suspend a section of ladder from the ceiling!!!
Put lg. twist ties around cords coming from computers, modems [or fishtanks]: makes one big rope rather than snarl of small ones
Use LG vinyl covered hooks to hang up bikes, folding lawn chairs, snow shovels, sleds [there's always more vertical space than horizontal in our living quarters]
IF room allows, leave cooler in trunk during summer months, great for picking up groceries and frees up space in garage
RETAINING RECORDS:
Save bank statements, canceled checks for one year, or three full tax years if you itemize on tax returns
When the new month's bill arrives, toss the old UTILITY BILL
TAX RETURNS: keep for six full tax years--how long the IRS has to audit your tax return
Use a safe deposit box or fireproof lockbox to store the following: wills, marriage, death, birth certificates; leases, trust papers; bonds; mortgages
Set up a file for each child to include SS #s, medical forms, school transcripts, and report cards
Create your own RECIPE BOOK using a three ring album with magnetic pages
Play CLUTTER TAG: use stickers, tag left out items for one week, different color for each family member; children may enjoy it, help them remember to put away their own belongings
Help kids spot the relationship between clutter (or the lack thereof) and time: on an evening when the house is tidy, make popcorn or cookies or something the kids ask for, telling them there's time for it since there's no clutter to pick up
It may sound harsh, but only keep what you want when it comes to gifts received. "Unwanted or unused items clutter your home, and you hate clutter!"
DAILY RITUALS: Finish what you start
Take 15 min. before bed each night or first thing in the AM and straighten up: that's 1 hr, 45 min / week
PERIODIC PURGES:
Clean the garage once a month
Make a list of projects you want to tackle and how much TIME you think each will take; when you have some time, pick one from the list
Get rid of whatever you haven't used in a year
March 21, 2024
3.5 stars
This book is incredibly outdated......and I loved it! Helped me reminisce about how life was 21 years ago. Times were simpler. VHS players. CD's. The milk crate storage trend. Developing film. It made me smile.
Even though the book is heavily outdated, there are still lots of relevant tips for organization and decluttering. Some of the tips I found to be a bit redundant. Others had good perspective.
This book is incredibly outdated......and I loved it! Helped me reminisce about how life was 21 years ago. Times were simpler. VHS players. CD's. The milk crate storage trend. Developing film. It made me smile.
Even though the book is heavily outdated, there are still lots of relevant tips for organization and decluttering. Some of the tips I found to be a bit redundant. Others had good perspective.
December 26, 2023
The book is definitely outdated, which makes some of the tips unrelatable. But there were a few good tips in there.
July 10, 2016
This is a 180 page book that could probably be reduced to 10 pages. It
fills so much space by giving many examples, sometimes repetitive, and
sometimes inconsistent, of a few general principles. As humans, we are
better at generalizing examples to principles, than at specializing
principles to examples, so perhaps the laundry list of examples makes
the content more memorable?
In any case, there are some good principles here:
- get started now, even if you're unsure of the best way to proceed,
rather than never starting.
- make large tasks manageable by breaking them into small,
well-defined parts.
- make a little progress every day.
- develop habits through repetition, and don't give up the first time
you stray.
- get rid of things you haven't used in a long time, e.g. 1 year.
- decide what you want, and how you're going to get it.
Note that these principles mostly apply to life in general, not just
uncluttering your home.
fills so much space by giving many examples, sometimes repetitive, and
sometimes inconsistent, of a few general principles. As humans, we are
better at generalizing examples to principles, than at specializing
principles to examples, so perhaps the laundry list of examples makes
the content more memorable?
In any case, there are some good principles here:
- get started now, even if you're unsure of the best way to proceed,
rather than never starting.
- make large tasks manageable by breaking them into small,
well-defined parts.
- make a little progress every day.
- develop habits through repetition, and don't give up the first time
you stray.
- get rid of things you haven't used in a long time, e.g. 1 year.
- decide what you want, and how you're going to get it.
Note that these principles mostly apply to life in general, not just
uncluttering your home.
May 28, 2008
I've had this book for years and take it out periodically to attempt to de-clutter my life. It has great suggestions and if I followed all of them, my house might look a little more tidy. I refer often to the section about 'what papers to save' because I hang on to things far too long. One rule that I always follow from this book is to always say YES when an organization calls to collect donations. I have a rule that I can easily find 10 items to bag up and give away without too much searching or cleaning.
March 11, 2016
Lots of fun tips and ideas. Not much that I didn't already know. Remember that organizing is one of my things and I've ready many, many books. I liked it because it was motivating for me and I think it would honestly help the disorganized among us. The main thing is to remember to take small steps and to spend 15 minutes each night before bed putting your house back into order. I do that and I love it. Everything about my mornings are better when I wake up to a straight, neat and organized home.
November 12, 2009
The 7 Simple Steps weren't anything I hadn't read (and they were said better) in other books. Among the 700 tips, there were some good tips on motivation, tactics, etc. but this book is really dated (film cameras and early internet era) and a lot of the tips were useful only for people with children.
June 13, 2010
I read this book years ago but decided to get it out again.
Quick read. It's interesting that some of the things the author recommends are something I'm already doing - and they WORK for me. But a lot of the tips seemed to fly by me - too much detail, too many details for me to remember.
The book is a tad outdated, too.
Quick read. It's interesting that some of the things the author recommends are something I'm already doing - and they WORK for me. But a lot of the tips seemed to fly by me - too much detail, too many details for me to remember.
The book is a tad outdated, too.
Read
April 14, 2015I have read this one many, many times. It is not just about uncluttering you home, it is also about uncluttering yourself. Read it again and I am so glad I have it. This is one for yourself and one to give as a gift, if you can find it.
February 25, 2010
Didn't actually finish it, had to go back to the library. Inspiring and overwhelming to someone who really hates to clean, but ultimately loves organization.
July 2, 2012
Good tips and ideas for decluttering.
July 19, 2015
Great tips but nothing I don't already know. Just good to read and get some new ideas and motivation.
March 3, 2016
Pretty quick read, and simply laid out with great ideas for organizing.
September 25, 2016
A slim book packed with tips that get to the point. 3+ stars.
November 6, 2016
Easy to say, not so easy to do. Hardest thing is letting go of old stuff. I'm in the process of letting go of old books, which have never been read twice and never will be. BUT SO HARD !!!!!!
Read
February 3, 2009648 Sma
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews