While spring may be best known for cleaning, for me, September is my big organization solution month. As the kids get back to school and we start falling into routines, I feel like if I don’t get organized now, I’ll never catch up. I went through our archives to put together just a few of my favorite products, tips and ideas to help you get ahead of curve. If you’re like me, you’ll need it.
GENERAL ORGANIZATION
A dry erase board (at top) can work wonders, and I love this modern wall decal version at Wall Pops designed by Jonathan
Adler. I also dig the dry erase calendars they sell, which is a great way
to keep from having to replace a wall calendar each year.
With good reason, our readers flipped out over the brand new Evernote Smart Moleskine which merges the best of analog (i.e. using a pen) with the best of tech (i.e. automatic syncing to your Evernote account). The future is now!
ADDRESS BOOK ORGANIZATION
On Cool Mom Tech we featured some of our favorite gadgets and apps to keep parents organized. My fave: The Brewster contact organization app which merges contacts from all your social media sources in one place. About time, right?
KIDS’ ROOM ORGANIZATION
These I-know-where-it-goes drawer labels are a genius idea for kids (and other household members, ahem) who
still need a little help remembering not to put the socks in the t-shirt drawer. Lots of pretty colors too.
SCHOOL YEAR MEMORY ORGANIZATION
A few years ago we discovered MomAgenda’s awesome School Years Memory Books which has a page and a folder for each year of report cards, class rosters and those awkward (er…adorable) school photos.
You can now do the same for your little athlete too, with MomAgenda’s brand new Sports Years Memory Book featured in our back to school shopping guide this year–appropriately, under “Parents’ Lifesavers.”
BILL ORGANIZATION
I find these 3 tips for organizing bills so helpful–including making use out of your epay option through your bank whenever you can. (If you don’t already? Get on it!) I also like the Neat Receipts portable scanner which lets you scan and organize your bills and receipts, meaning one less shoebox in the closet each year.
ARTWORK ORGANIZATION
The Neat Receipt scanner above is also a good tool for kids’ artwork, which can be filed and organized on your PC. But if you don’t want to invest in another gadget, ArtKive is one of two great iPhone apps we’ve found for scanning and storing all those
fabulous masterpieces digitally if, like me, you can’t bear the thought of throwing away any of your kid’s 10,000 pages of circles with two lines for feet. (What? They’re good!)
Of course you’ll still want to hang onto a few of those original glitter-and-crumpled-tissue paper masterpieces. On our back to school shopping guide, we recommend these colorful art storage boxes from See Jane Work. Simple, perfect, and in no need of high-tech improvement.
CRAFT SUPPLY ORGANIZATION
We’ve got a few arts and crafts storage solutions, from bins (Kristen’s favorite!) to big furniture for you craft mavels. One of my very favorite solutions though is this easy DIY storage jar craft project at House to Home, which makes use of all those animal figurines that you have hiding under the couch somewhere. Not just me, right?
