In my last post, I had posted a 5-week home organization schedule. Last week’s goal was to identify the common issues and inconveniences we face with how things are organized in our spaces and to think and plan some organization ideas and methods. You can check the schedule here.
Unless meticulously constructed with new ideas, most houses in India follow a similar design. The common spaces in an Indian house are a living room attached with or separated by a dining hall, bedrooms attached with bathrooms, a common bathroom, a kitchen, and a balcony. Individual houses may have a terrace, parking, and verandah spaces. Some houses may have a utility area, a storage room, and a pooja room, which are rare in modern-day homes.
In comparison to western houses, Indian houses lack rooms for utility space, kitchen storage, backyard, garage, basement space, attic and front lawn. Most kitchens are smaller here without a centre island or breakfast counter. Bathrooms don’t have distinct partitions. Furniture mostly do not include storage cabinets except for the ones in the kitchen. Clothes are line-dried, demanding extra spaces for clotheslines or stands.
Nevertheless, many Indian homes are happy and beautiful despite the less-available infrastructural privileges. Perhaps adaptation is our key mantra! Perhaps, maintaining an organized home is independent of the design, space, and cabinets available! If you understood this point, you will also understand that having your home organized isn’t about the woes of ‘I wish I had…’ or ‘I wish it was…’
Identifying the small, everyday issues around the home is a good beginning. That’s what we did last week. As a follow-up of last week’s work, this post covers the common problems that surround organizing Indian homes. Every home is different, so everything in these lists may not apply for every home. I’ve created these images for easier go-through and maybe you can save the images to your device for later use.
The Kitchen
Kitchen is the space where most Indian women spend their peak hours of work! Unfortunately, in many homes, it is also the space that is given the least importance in home design. Most kitchens are smaller, less ventilated and have lesser workspace. Thanks to the modular kitchen set-ups; we have more kitchen cabinets today which are well-planned with partitions for individual items. Also, modern chimneys take care of the ventilation issues.
Here are the general inconveniences that are possible in the kitchen life.
Laundry and Wardrobe
Laundry is a tedious cycle in most homes. Clothes dryera are not popular in our country and the traditional clothesline is the common choice to air dry clothes. It gets tough when the clothes are to be folded and placed in the closet. Folding is a time-consuming process and in homes with small children, folded clothes can get messed up easily.
Here are more to add to the sad tales of laundry and closet:
Furniture and Other Spaces
With the wide array of furniture we have to homes, some may help sort and organize our stuff well while others may add to the crisis of organization. It’s essential to identify how each one is contributing to our home.
Categories of Items to be Organized
In addition to understanding the difficulties, we also planned last week how things can be organized. Here’s a list of general items that are to be organized, stored, tracked and maintained in our homes.
Alright. Yes, problems do exist. How do we solve them?
We’ll solve one by one in the coming days. Discuss with your friends and neighbours about a problem you are facing. Their ideas may be of help to you. Google your problems; the master is sure to give you tons of ideas. I will also be posting solutions to common problems by the mid of the coming week. Above all, give a thought of what can be done to ease your everyday work.
Let’s head to week 2!
Week 2
Our task this week is to sort and declutter things as much as we can. As we do this, we will also foresee the future of what will happen to the things we organize. That can help us make arrangements for longer maintenance.
Some starters….
- As you start sorting and decluttering, keep handy cardboard boxes, plastic bags or bins.
- Use one for things you need to discard,
- one for things to reuse or recycle,
- one for things to be donated,
- one for things that need a service or repair,
- one for things you wouldn’t be using in the near future but want to store, and
- one for things you are not sure what to do with at the moment.
2. Try your best to sort things into categories, labelling or other methods to make your after-work easier.
3. Beware! You can easily get lost in the sorting process. Be determined to complete your tasks without delay or without getting diverted. Fix a time if it can help.
4. Pull out the clothes from the wardrobe. Clothes you are not fond of any longer, clothes that the kids have outgrown, clothes you have not used for more than six months – don’t put them back in the closet. Your mind is sure to attach memories, emotions, dates, and fondness to every piece of cloth.
Stay strong. Just D-E-C-L-U-T-T-E-R!
5. The same goes for shoes, handbags, accessories, books, old utensils, old toys – pull out everything one by one. Or if you prefer, pull out the entire stuff at the same time. You may have to walk on the mess for a couple of days but that’s the beginning of an organized home.
6. Study your kitchen storage. Are there too many dabbas? Ingredients you never used in months? Old utensils or broken crockeries you have no intention to use again. Discard or keep aside to donate.
7. Bring out your kids’ treasures. Sort out multiples of the same stuff (usually crayons, sketch pens). Leave one for daily use, store the rest. Donate or throw the toys and games they are not playing with any longer. Have batteries handy for items that need battery replacements. Have files and folders to arrange their artworks, crafts or other creations.
8. Do you have gym equipment that lie in a corner for no good?. Make a decision now. Get determined to use it or resell or give it away to a scrap shop.
I hope you all have a busy week ahead. Let’s work harder this week. Cheers!
