Both the outside and the inside of American homes are changing this year, from an unprecedented increase in renovations to updates and home projects to work on on the weekends. For many families, however, renovating extensively or moving to a bigger home isn’t an option or isn’t an option yet. Still, as many as 30% of homeowners are remodeling or renovating to make their home a sanctuary and a retreat from the world, according to Homelight’s Q3 Survey of Real Estate Agents. You can aim for a sanctuary feel in your current home, however!
You can find a way to declutter your home so that there is space for everything from working at home to virtual learning for kids, as well as just creating a more harmonious and pleasant atmosphere to make your nights and weekends at home more cozy.
Help Kids Design Part of Their Own Space to Increase Ownership of the Decluttering Process
You’d be amazed how much children change their attitudes about a family clean-up day when they have the prospect of a little personal redecorating. If you can sweeten the deal with some new paint or a few posters or prints for walls, children see the benefits to making the spaces in the house free of clutter and instead designed the way they like them.
Get Family In On Donating or Giving Away Unneeded Items
As your children, partner, or roommates see your vision for a more comfortable home with less clutter, let them walk through the rooms with you to evaluate if some of the larger items can be removed. For instance, do you have more chairs hanging around than can be used by your family at a time? Maybe it’s time to retire some chairs at least until after dinner guests are a more common idea again. Children can be more excited about permanently removing items if they know they are going to a good cause, and donating furniture through non-profit thrift shops can be a way to help people who aren’t doing as well during this year.
Take Advantage of Unfinished Basement or Attic Space for Unused Items
Decluttering doesn’t mean just donating and throwing things away, however. If there are items that really need to be out of the way but you aren’t ready to get rid of them, evaluate your storage space options. Do you have any unfinished basement, attic, crawl space, or garage areas? Moving items out of you main living area can give a bigger feel to the room, and it’s well worth it if you have access to any storage at all. If your storage is full up, it might be time to take a second look at those items to see if they need to go as well!
Create Weekly and Daily Routines for Getting Small Spaces Back to Tidyness
Once you’ve achieved a decluttered house for your new COVID life, a space that makes you all feel happy and productive, create routines that help to keep it clean. Daily, that might mean one or more family members doing a sweep of the space to pick up dishes or other items that would accidentally get left out. Weekly, it means cleaning floors and surfaces in order to also notice if anything has gotten out of place since last week. With these strategies, your COVID home can look great and make it more of a pleasure to be indoors.
