Category Archives: Household Services

Organizing Your Garage

by Count On Me 4 All
Messy abandoned garage full of stuffCan’t fit something into your closet? Stick it out in the garage. Not enough room in the basement? Put it in the garage. No time to find a place to store it? Unload it into the garage.

Our garage can be the easiest place to dump things, yet it is also an area of our home most often seen by others. People can get their first impression of us by the state of our garage. Each time we open the garage door to drive in and out, or even when we leave it open for an extended period of time, people walking or driving by can judge us upon the state of our garage.

Cleaning and organizing our garage does not have to be expensive or impossible. Lilly of Listotic, wrote a blog 28 Brilliant Organization Garage Ideas. It is a filled with great tips that will inspire you to take on your own garage and complete a garage makeover!

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Setting Up a Filing System to Save Time

by Count On Me 4 All

Financial documents in foldersMom, where is the letter of recommendation that my science teacher wrote for me? Honey, where is last month’s phone bill? Kids, where are your report cards that you brought home last week? If you can lay your hands on these items quickly, then you are in good shape. But if like some of us, the search for these items becomes an endless hunt, then you know something needs to be done to prevent you from wasting your valuable time in the future. The answer to this problem is a workable filing system.

When helping a family organize their home, one of the most essential things I do is help them set up a filing system. An efficient filing system must be one that works for the user and is easy to manage. It needs to have categories and subcategories that fit in with your families needs. It helps to have it color-coded as well. Continue reading →

Tackling Your Mail

by Count On Me 4 All

mail pile_14868221_xsMy daughter arrives home from school and dumps the mail on the counter that she has just retrieved from the mailbox.  My husband arrives home a couple of hours later and quickly scans the day’s mail.  The scene is repeated each day and the pile of mail grows as the week progresses.

Our weekends are filled with a series of chores that need to be completed before the new week arrives on Monday. One chore that many of us face is sorting through the week’s accumulation of mail. Preventing the mail from piling up will decrease the time and energy it takes to clear out the mail each weekend. Setting up a system, and having the correct tools on hand, can help us achieve a better mail system. Elizabeth Larkin has written an article to help us attain a method to tackle our mail piles.

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Taking An Inventory of Your Belongings: An Important Task

by Count On Me 4 All

Clipboard with Inventory message and checkboxesLast week I was helping a couple create an inventory of their belongings in preparation for their move to Florida. They needed a precise inventory of what would be loaded on to the moving van for insurance purposes. I made an Excel sheet and recorded each item, when it was bought, and how much it cost. Taking an inventory of our belongings is an important task for all of us to complete, whether we are moving or not.

The sky grew with a yellow hue. James heard a noise similar to a train. He ran to the basement and ducked under the workbench. When all was quiet he came back upstairs and his house was gone. The tornado had picked up his home and all of his belongings and spread it all across the county. When the insurance agent arrived to estimate the damages, he asked James for a list of all that he had lost. Trying to list all he had lost, especially when in shock from all that had happened, became a daunting task.

Suzy Strutner wrote an article for the Huffington Post which explains why inventories are important and how to complete an inventory of your home.

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Clean Out Your Closets For the New Year

By Count on Me 4 All

clothes in closetWith the New Year just around the corner, many of us are thinking about our New Year’s resolutions for 2015.  Clearing out the clutter in our lives is many times at the top of our list of resolutions.  Below is a great article from Good Housekeeping by Lauren Piro, to help in this process. Continue reading →