For my attention challenged friends, here's the short version:…read more
If you need help purging, finding the right home for your items, creating systems that actually make sense, and adding labels so everything stays that way, hire Room to Bloom. If you are overwhelmed and craving the peace that comes from less clutter and everything having a designated place, it is worth it.
Long version:
We bought our home in 2020, and it was a full gut renovation. We are still living only on the first floor, while the upstairs remains mostly unfinished except for a small office. Our house currently has no linen closet, and we are sharing one small bathroom as a family of five. Because of this, we have been storing items in places that do not really make sense, simply out of necessity.
At one point, I bought a large IKEA cabinet and put it in one of the kids' rooms just to store towels and sheets. With a family of five, we do a lot of laundry and accumulate a lot of stuff. We also have a side entrance that slowly became a dumping ground for anything we wanted out of sight. Every six months we would clean it, only for it to turn back into a junk room pretty quickly. Since we are not using the upstairs yet, we largely ignored the problem.
Over the summer, I had a vision for the space with a custom bench/hall-tree and storage, so I bought multiple IKEA cabinets.
A few family members had passed away or downsized over the years, and I had inherited many seasonal items and kitchen items. The volume alone felt paralyzing.
We got the floors done and the cabinets in place and even after multiple passes of purging, I still felt overwhelmed by stuff and stuck. One of our kids has special needs and she often goes into the younger kids room and dumps out baskets and empties the book shelves. It's hard to keep up and I felt totally defeated.
I decided to ask for help and I'm so glad I did!
One of the most helpful parts was having an impartial, logical person there to talk through decisions without emotion or pressure. Krysta helped me move items out quickly so I did not second-guess myself, and she reorganized spaces in ways I never would have thought of. She also consolidated items so things that belonged together finally lived in the same place. She brought her trusty label maker, which made all the difference in creating systems that will actually last.
We have a long dresser in the dining room that also turned into junk drawers and randomness. After collected all the baskets and storage bins we could use for the foyer, we began gathering items that didn't belong in other rooms and got to work.
We already had a craft cabinet in the foyer, so she said it made sense to move all craft supplies out of the kids' room and into one centralized location. It was her idea to switch out which cabinet was designated for crafts and games and it ended up making much more sense. She also solved the recurring problem in the kids room by bringing arts and craft related items out and storing other items away safely so our other child couldn't access them anymore. We designated drawers for non-Christmas gift wrapping, bday party supplies, paint, games, flashlights, candles, light bulbs, beads, crayons, markers, etc., shelves for kitchen items not used daily, paper, everything has a home!
While I'm not sharing pics of the kids room, I do have many of the foyer (I still have to paint the cabinet doors and get them hung- it's on the list lol) and the donate pile.
If you have been considering hiring a professional organizer, do not hesitate. Krysta accomplished in one day what I had been trying to do for months, honestly closer to years. I am so grateful for her help. Thank you, Krysta!!!