Davonne Parks

Your Role At Home Is Valuable

Schoolroom Before & After {Plus How You Can Set Up An Awesome Learning Space For Your Kids}

Well, this is embarrassing:

Our classroom – the space where my kids are supposed to actually learn – recently looked like the above photo. Clearly, we needed to do something about this before the upcoming school year.

So my kids and I purged. Normally, I like to rip the bandaid off and just get the job done, but we were so worn out from our gigantic office renovation that just thinking about spending full days decluttering made us want to cry. So we went up to the schoolroom for an hour or two several different times before moving on to something more enjoyable.

It took a few weeks, but slowly and surely, we chose things to get rid of. Anything they’ve grown out of – gone. Beginning reader phonics sets – gone! Fun science supplies that were given to us but we haven’t touched in two years? Also gone!

Within a few weeks, we had a very large pile of items we weren’t keeping. Things on the left are for donation, items on the right are trash:

Whether you’re homeschooling or just need a place for your kids to put their backpacks and do their homework, there are a few things to keep in mind:

1) Get rid of a ton of stuff.

If you’re constantly moving around junk and it takes your kids hours and hours to clean their bedroom or school area, then you probably have too much stuff. Purge, purge, purge!

2) Group like items.

I talk about grouping like items more in this article about conquering kids’ clutter, but basically, if you have crayons in 5 different places and Legos all over the house, it’s difficult for your kids to find what they need and to clean up their own things. Solve this problem by grouping like items, purging the excess, and storing supplies you use often in easily accessible containers.

3) Make sure your system is easy to maintain.

If your kids use something for 10 minutes but it takes 2 hours to clean up, the item probably isn’t worth the hassle. Toss it.

Likewise, a complicated system of color coded beads or craft supplies is likely just going to get mixed up and will take hours to clean. Have a bead box and let the colors be mixed together. If your child really wants an item to be color coded, they’re welcome to color code the items on their own free time 😉

{A basket with school books & supplies all readily available makes schoolwork easy to get out and easy to put away each day. Win!}

4) Take a day off to declutter.

I know the idea of taking a day off just to declutter sounds scary, but hear me out on this one! Whatever time you lose by taking a day off of school, work, or other activities will quickly be gained back when you’re not searching for needed items.

When your kids are studying hard in their freshly organized space, you’ll know it was completely worth your effort.

 

Check these Articles Out for More Organization Tips:

 I’d love to hear: What’s the school or homework system like in your house? Do you have any tips to add to mine?

My Horribly Embarrassing Hostessing Moments {And Why I Still Invite People Over}

Game night with friends is wrapping up and nearly everyone else has gone upstairs. Noticing food remnants on the carpet, I drag the vacuum cleaner from its spot in the closet and plug it in. When I glance up, I notice one guest is still lingering nearby, seemingly unsure of what he should be doing. Always the problem solver, I decide to help out so I hand the vacuum cleaner to him then skip off to throw away the paper plates.

After his family is on their way home and my children are snug in their beds, it occurs to me that I probably shouldn’t have given the vacuum cleaner to company. I text my friend and apologize for my painfully embarrassing lack of etiquette towards her husband. They’re gracious to me and get a good laugh out of it but I desperately want to erase the event from our memories.

And I add, “Do not hand a vacuum cleaner to your guests unless they specifically ask to vacuum the carpet” to my mental hostess check-list.

Along with, “Make sure the hand towel does not smell like wet dog.” And, “If you invite someone over, make sure you’re actually home when they arrive.”

Some people can learn through others’ mistakes. I, on the other hand, usually have to embarrass myself or get into a huge bind before things finally click. The good news? The more any of us practice something, the better we’ll get!

So I want to encourage you – invite your friends over. Be willing to laugh at yourself when you do something horribly in-etiquette. Rest in knowing that a true friend will overlook your faux pas. Take comfort in knowing that Jesus always loves you anyways – every imperfect, quirky part.

Is your house clean? Invite the guests! Is your house messy? Invite them anyways! Yes, make sure there’s room at the table to eat. Go ahead and Clorox the grossness off the toilet or shove the toys in a corner, but don’t worry about every tiny detail. People live in your home. It’s okay to not be perfect.

But whatever you do, please don’t hand your guests a vacuum cleaner unless they ask for one 😉

I’d love to hear: What embarrassing hostess things have you done? Let’s laugh together in the comments!

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I Moved Back Home! {My Blog Home, That is}

Those of you who have been readers for awhile may remember that I used to blog over here at DavonneParks.com on a regular basis. I tried out a lot of topics in this cozy corner of the internet, just trying to find one that fit, that felt like me, while at the same time resonating with other women. Motherhood? Written about it! Marriage? Absolutely. Intentional living and spirituality? Check, check.

And for nearly three years, all of my attempts to build relationships with potential readers fell flat.

Then one day, I slapped up a post about organization. It was one of the easiest articles I’d ever written, because the topic came so naturally to me. I was sure nobody would read it.

But I was wrong. People read my organization article and actually left comments, emailed me, and brought their friends to my site! So right there, in the midst of writing about marriage, motherhood, and spirituality, I continued to toss in an occasional homemaking post.

And I noticed a pattern. My organization articles received comments, re-pins, shares, and subscribers. All of my other posts? Crickets.

I emotionally wrestled with this for months: Organization? Cleaning? Really?! But I want to blog about important things! This website is supposed to be my mission field!

I finally came to terms with the fact that helping women to create a haven-like atmosphere in their home is an important ministry. Because when we can offer a soft place for our families to land and when we can welcome others in without hesitation, we’re uniting together to offer havens – refuges – from a sometimes harsh world.

So, in an attempt to create an easy-to-spell and easy-to-remember website, I found an available domain that reflected my long sought-after blog focus and happily started typing away!

What I didn’t know at the time was someone had already been blogging at a similar website address. My heart sank when I realized my mistake, because it was never my intent to create confusion – in fact, confusion was the opposite of my intent!

So, after a lot of deliberation, thought, and prayer, I am moving back over here to DavonneParks.com and I intend to stay! All of the articles I’ve written on my other website and your comments have been moved along with me. What does all of this mean for you? Hopefully nothing!

My desire is to make this transition as smooth as possible. Subscribers will continue to receive email updates, and I’ll still be writing about homemaking. I’ll update article links in my eBooks and other places, and will send a new subscriber email with updates after those are ready, hopefully within a few weeks, so you can easily download the updated versions.

If you have my website or Social Media sites bookmarked, you’ll definitely want to update those with the new links. To help you out, I’ve included simple buttons below that you can click on to update your saved information.

::New Social Media Links::

In a way, it feels like I was away “visiting” a different website for a couple of years, and now I’m all packed up and moving back home. It’s creating a little extra work, but coming home is also giving me a surprisingly nice, cozy feeling. I think that once you come visit me here after I’m all unpacked, you’ll like it too.

I’d love to hear: What topics are you hoping to read about soon? Leave a comment or hit “reply” and let me know!

I Used to Be a Hoarder: How I Broke Free and 7 Ways You Can Too

My heart twisted in fear. What now, God? I silently pleaded. Where do we go from here? Questions tumbled through my mind as I nervously rubbed my abdomen in response to the movement I felt from my unborn child. He or she was due the following month.


Barely older than teenagers, my husband and I clutched hands, our palms clammier than they’d been the first time our fingers had intertwined over 2 years prior. Due to no fault of our own, our jobs had just ended that afternoon, without notice or warning.

We had no plan, no idea of what to do next or where to go. Nobody would hire me at 8 months pregnant. He felt a sense of urgency, wanting to generate an income now for his wife and child. There was no unemployment. No time for resumes and interviews.

So we opened a business.

It had been his dream… someday, perhaps 10 years down the road, when we felt more established in life and had money saved to start a company. But now? So soon? We weren’t ready.

We jumped in anyways.

We spent the next several years well below poverty level, scrimping to get by, thankful every time a client paid before the cupboards were bare and rent was due. And though we never solicited help, we gratefully accepted each hand-me-down that was offered to us, from furniture and clothes to vehicles and toys.

The very thought of giving away any one of those items felt incredibly wasteful because we never knew when we might need something we didn’t have the cash to buy.

As the years passed, however, many items started to feel like burdens instead of blessings. Entire rooms in our home couldn’t even be used because of the excess. The things we had saved “just in case” were filling in the spaces.

And with a preschooler in the house and a new baby on the way, we needed the extra space more than we wanted the additional stuff.

As I wrestled through the emotions of knowing something needed to change, I finally realized the real waste was not getting rid of things – the real waste was hanging onto items I rarely used.

Some of the items could be enjoyed by someone else who needed them. Other things simply needed thrown away. But all of those rarely-used items had one factor in common: They were preventing my family from truly enjoying our home. The stuff was pushing out space.

And we needed the space. For life, for love, for creating memories, and for having room to invite others in without hesitation.

{For years, we hosted birthday parties anywhere but home. The year my house was finally clean enough to invite people in without embarrassment was cause for celebration!}

Figuring out what caused me to hang onto stuff was pivotal in my own journey towards creating a clutter-free life. Because until I understood the inward why, I would never make lasting progress about the outward mess.

I don’t know what’s been causing you to hold on to your own possessions. Maybe you had a house fire that caused you to lose everything, so now you want to keep what you can. Maybe a family member died suddenly and things are all you have left.

Perhaps someone in your life threw your possessions away, making you feel like what you had wasn’t important. Or, maybe you’re following patterns of those who raised you because you were never taught to clean.

Whatever has been holding you back, whatever you’ve been fighting against – that doesn’t have to define your future.

You do not have to give your past experiences permission to rule your life. You can take back your time. You can be free.

Here Are 7 Simple Ways to Begin Your Own Journey To A Clutter-Free Life:

1) Identify what’s been holding you back.

Think about what has happened in your life that’s made you resistant to, or afraid of, letting go of your possessions. Honor your memories, and comfort yourself if you have to emotionally relive painful experiences. Give yourself time to process what’s been holding you back.

2) Talk to someone about your reservations.

Tell a trustworthy friend, share with your spouse, open up in the Tidy Up Facebook community, leave a comment on this post, or send me an email. Seek out truth-tellers who can help you process your emotions.

3) Imagine that your home is already organized.

Close your eyes and pretend that your home is clutter-free, organized, and peaceful. How do you feel? How does your home look? Do you notice all the extra space that’s available when stuff isn’t blocking the way?

4) Give yourself a quick success.

Clean out one small area in your home. It can be a dresser drawer, one shelf in the bathroom closet, your medicine cabinet, or your coffee table.

Donate or toss anything you don’t use often. Work on this space until it’s completely organized, then notice how energized and amazing you feel when you’re done.

5) Focus on one room at a time.

Add another quick success to the first. Clean out a second dresser drawer or a different kitchen cabinet in the same room you worked on in step 4.

Continue doing this, giving yourself several quick successes in a row, slowly building to the more difficult areas. Whether it takes one day or three weeks, keep working in this room until it’s 100% clutter-free and organized.

6) Have a maybe box.

Don’t allow yourself to become mentally paralyzed by indecision. Have a box or basket ready for those tough-to-decide items. If you look at something for more than 10 seconds, toss it into the maybe box.

Come back to that box after the rest of the room is finished – it’s often easier to make a decision for those items when you know there’s only one measly box coming between you and a finished project.

7) Remember that throwing away items doesn’t erase memories.

People give us things to bless us. If you’re burdened by rooms full of stuff you rarely use, the items are no longer serving the giver’s intended purpose. Letting go of the item doesn’t erase the original blessing, and it certainly doesn’t erase any memories. Not at all.

Giving away unneeded items creates space for new memories, while still honoring the old.

Personal Thought/Application Question: What’s holding you back from decluttering, and how are you going to work to overcome that? Leave a note in the comments so we can encourage each other.

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P.S. If you need help cleaning your house, make sure to check out the brand new FREE subscriber-only email course. It’s all about how to completely refresh your entire home in just 10 days, and you do not want to miss it! Read the details here.