A blog series just in time for Spring Cleaning-Top tips for the artist from a professional organizer

Part 2- A blog series on creativity and clutter...

Have you been bitten this year by the Spring Cleaning Bug? If you're just joining us in this series, you can read part 1 HERE.

I want to introduce you to Lydia Crouse. She is a mom to three littles, the wife of a detective, and a Professional Organizer. Lydia says she fell in love with organizing and interior decorating as a child and her parents have told stories of her rearranging her bedroom at midnight, and them walking in to their living room redesigned. You can follow and read more about Lydia's story on her IG page HERE.

Lydia says that walking with people through the decluttering and organization process is her passion. "Trying to organize alone can be daunting and overwhelming for most," says Lydia. "There is a mental heaviness that is released when I help people finally decide it is time to let go of an item or find a home for things that mean a lot to them. Your home or space should simply be a place you love, not a source of anxiety."

 

10 Tips from Lydia at Creating Simple:

1. Plan before you start buying organization products-the wrong organizing products or too much product actually adds to the clutter and takes up space.
2. Color code (ROYGBIV) when you can as a filing system or group cools vs warms
3. Label! It establishes a routine when putting things away aka you put things back in same place each time making it easy to find things when you need them. THIS IS KEY- when you know what you have and where it is, it frees up your mental load for creating
4. Remember, there is a thing as over organizing- you’re just creating more work for yourself
5. Create sections and categories that flow easily-sounds simple but as you organize ask yourself: does this make sense for this item to go with this grouping/category.
6. Turntables are wonderful to keep things from getting lost in the back
7. Use clear bins when you want to see what you have easily and closed containers when you need to hide bulk items that create visual clutter aka cords, electronics, scraps! It helps to use both because your eyes do not need to see every item you have all the time!
8. Use your art supplies as your decor and try to keep from adding extra decorations or furniture that’s not functional
9. HAVE AN ACTION BIN (this needs to be filed, this needs to be fixed etc) it’s like a drop zone for when you don’t have mental compacting to put it where it goes
10. Remember, you don’t have to keep everything. Ask yourself these questions: Do I really love it? Realistically, will I use it? Is it irreplaceable? It is way better for you to use something else or replace that item down the road (usually it’s with something even better) than it is to have clutter overwhelming and crippling you.

Organizing and decluttering isn’t a once and done solution. It’s an ongoing process. Just because a system works well at first doesn’t mean it’s going to work forever and that’s ok.

If you have questions about organizing or would like a virtual consult, you can reach out to Lydia on her Instagram Page at Creating Simple.

In the last part of my series coming in my next issue, I'll show you some before and after photos and then take you on a live studio tour to show you my system and talk more about my progress with my studio organization plan.

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*This is not a paid endorsement, nor did I receive anything free or any type of compensation for promoting Lydia