25. Organize Your Laundry Room

Start by eliminating anything that does not belong or can be thrown away from the room.

Design a place for everything. Shelving to store items, mini trash can for dryer lint and misc garbage, rack to hang clothing, hooks and wall mounting products to get items off the floor. If you need to place storage high, make sure you have a step stool in the room for easy access.

Also, things to consider:

- Have adequate lighting: if it is not well lit, you will avoid the room like the plague.

- Group objects by category: laundry detergents, fabric softeners, hangers, etc.

- DO NOT keep heavy bottles overhead.

- Have a small garbage near the dryer for lint and misc garbage.

- Hang wall mounted dryer racks for clothes that cannot be placed in the dryer. Some newer dryers have racks that can be placed inside of the dryer. You lay your clothes on top of the rack and they are dried without being tumbled inside of the dryer. I use mine for tennis shoes and sweaters.

- Hang wall mounting or over-the-door racks for your ironing board/iron and misc items.

- Have a basket for mismatched socks. Eventually socks will find their mate.

My favorite tips are more about the use of time: keep the laundry room moving daily. Have a constant rotation of clothes moving through the room. One load in the washer, one load in the dryer. Once clothes are dry, fold them immediately as they come out of the dryer. Once folded, place them in stacks of who they belong to - have each person put away their own clothing. This way you will not a have a huge pile of clothing to be folded or washed at the end of the day or week. Also, pulling clothes out of the dryer and folding or hanging them immediately will reduce the chance for winkles. Less Wrinkles = Less Ironing.

To make sorting laundry easier, add dots with a laundry marker to the waistbands and necklines. One dot for the oldest girl or boy, two dots for the second oldest, and so on. When kids are close in age, sometimes it's hard to tell whose clothes are whose -- the dots take out the guess work. This system also works for handy for hand-me-downs -- just add a dot when it's ready for the next family member.

Another suggestion is to have a different style of sock for each family member. This will save time by taking the guess work out while sorting socks.

***The most important tip is to have ample space for the clean laundry. No one enjoys cramming clothes in over stuffed drawers and closets.****

24. De-Clutter Junk Mail

Did you know the average American receives 41 pounds of junk mail per year? Junk mail not only clutters your house, but it produces more CO2 than 9 millions cars on the road. Follow these simple steps to remove the junk mail from your home and help protect the environment at the same time:

1. Place a recycle bin and trash can by your front door. Before you enter the house with your mail, give it a once over and immediately trash and recycle unwanted pieces. If you are worried about identity theft, place a shredder near the bins and shred any pieces containing your name and address. Check with your recycling center to see if they accept shredded paper. This will determine if you place the shredded paper in the trash or recycled bins.

2. Gather all your catalogs in the house. Spend some time calling each one and ask to be removed off their mailing list. Don't worry, most catalogs are available online for shopping.

3. Call 888.567.8688 to remove yourself off mailing lists.

4. Call the number on every piece of junk mail that arrives to your home and ask to be removed off of their mailing list. This included credit card offers, insurance promotions, sweepstake entries, etc. If you don't have time for this, you can sign up with agencies that can do this for you. www.41pounds.org and www.dmachoice.org are great resources for minimal fees.

23. What To Do With Your Hotel Toiletries

If you're like me, you will take home every hotel toiletry provided prior to checkout. You paid for them, right? Once you get them home, what do you do with it so they don't clutter your house?

- I like to keep them all contained in my guest bathroom so my overnight guest can use them. Comes in handy if they forget to pack to something.

- With new TSA restrictions, they are the perfect size to pack for your next vacation.

- Let your children use them in the shower. Little kids love to play in the shower and bathtub and giving them a little bottle of bath gel or mini soap makes it just a little more fun.

- Donate them to a local charity. Lifeworks Austin is a local charity that gives the toiletries to homeless street youth.

- They make great stocking stuffers.

- Buy a cute bag and give them to friends/teachers/boss/dog sitter as thank you gifts.

22. Create Keepsake Boxes For Your Family

Each family member has items that they cherish and would like to keep. These items may not be of monetary value, but hold a sentimental value to each person. For example, my husband keeps all the birthday cards he receives every year. These cards hold no value to anyone but himself.

A great solution for these types of items is to create a "Keepsake" box for every person in the family. The boxes can be any size or style, but just make sure they are large enough to hold everything you need, small enough to be easily stored and have a lid. I purchased 18 gallon Rubbermaid containers for my family. 23.9" 15.9" x 16.5". On the outside of each box I have labeled them with the name of the family member that it belongs.

Each box contains items that have sentimental value to each person, or in my kids case, will have sentimental value in the future. They include items like:

- artwork/school work

- special toys

- baby books

- first outfits/shoes

- birthday cards

- Tickets from events they have attended

- Awards and medals

Once the kids move out of the house, they can take their keepsake boxes with them.

21. What to do with your kids school and artwork?

Kids bring home so much art and school work. What do you do with it? The first priority would be to purge unwanted pieces. Determine if looking at your child's math homework in a few years will be important. Odds are, no. Keep things like notes the child has written to you, the first time they wrote their name, outstanding artwork, etc. Once you've decided what to purge, make sure your child does not see you throw it into the recycle bin. This could send them into hysterics and you may end up bringing everything back into the house. Go to the recycle bin alone!

Here are a list of suggestions on what to do with the items kept:

- Use colorful artwork as wrapping paper. Grandmas love this.

- Take photos or scan them and create a portfolio or memory book. Shutterfly, Apple and SouvenartBooks are just a few resources that sell fantastic printed books that you design with your own photos and scanned art.

- Select a few great pieces and have them professionally framed. Wha-la! Beautiful custom art for your home or a gift for family member.

- Fold the artwork in half and use as a "thank you" card.

- Storage for larger pieces can be made out of a poster board. Take the poster board and fold in half. Tape the side perpendicular to the fold leaving the parallel side open. This creates a giant folder. The kids can decorate the folder with drawings, their name, age and grade level.

- Store items in your child's keepsake box. (See post 22 on how to establish a keepsake box).

20. Organize Your Plastic Food-Storage Containers

Plastic food-storage containers can take over a cabinet space in no time.

1)Gather all the containers and match them with the appropriate lids. Washing containers/lids in the dishwasher can distort the shape causing the set to not fit together.

2)Recycle any unmatched lids and containers.

3)Take a good look at the remaining matched sets. Are the lids cracked or containers stained. You might want to recycle these as well.

4) You can organize your sets one of two ways. Keep the lids attached and neatly stack all containers on top of each other by size and style.

Or, remove the lids and store together. Take the containers and stack them inside of each other. This method takes less s

pace in the cabinet, but may take longer to find a matching set. Pick a system that works best for you.

19. Organize Your House To Leave For Vacation

There are many steps involved to prepare your house for you to leave on vacation. I wish it was as simple as just walking out the door. Unfortunately not. Following is a checklist for you to use to make it easier to get out the door:

1. Houseplants - water all of your houseplants prior to leaving. Depending on the length of your vacation, you can insert water globes into the soil for automatic watering, plant in a self watering container, or ask a friend or neighbor to come and water the plants while you are away.

2. Mail - Nothing screams more that you are away than piled newspapers on your front porch or an overflowing mailbox. Place a hold on your newspapers and mail. Have a friend or neighbor come and collect the mail/newspapers is also an easy solution.

3. Thermostats: Unless there is something in your home that might suffer heat damage, turn your a/c off. If you prefer to leave it on, set your thermostat to 85-90 degrees. Raising the temperature will help save on your electric bill. If you are leaving in the winter months, do not turn off the heat for risk of freezing pipes. Keep the heat to at least 50-55 degrees.

4. Trash: Empty all of the trash can in the house. Who wants to return home to a stinky house? Arrange for a friend or neighbor to place the outside trash can on the street on the appropriate day for trash collection. Make sure they are reminded to put trash can back in their proper place after collection.

5. Refrigerator - Check to see if any food items will spoil while you are away. Milk, eggs, yogurt, cheese etc. Give these items to a friend or neighbor to use.

6. Clothes Washer - Make sure you are not leaving clothes in your washer to mildew.

7. Windows/Door - Check to make sure all the windows and doors are locked.

8. Jewelry Box - Hide your jewelry or place in a safety deposit box. Don't make it easy for a robber to walk in and grab your valuables.

9. Small Appliances - These items use small amounts of energy when they are plugged in, even when they are turned off. Unplug these items to save energy and avoid possible fire hazards while you are away. Examples of small appliances include: toasters, tv's, clocks, baby monitors, radios, stereos, printers, computers, lamps, chargers, dust busters, coffee makers, etc.

10. Lights - Turn off all the lights in the house except for one to deter burglars while you are away. Put this light on a timer to simulate someone is in the house. Make sure this light is visible from the outside.

11. Sprinkler - Determine if you want the yard sprinklers to run while you are away. If so, place the sprinklers on a timer to run more efficiently.

12. Appointments - Cancel home appointments that may be schedule during your vacation. You do not want the housekeeper, pest control, delivery guy, piano teacher etc. arriving and you not be home.

13. Garage door - Unplug the garage door. During storms and power outages, for some reason my garage door opens. I always unplug my garage door before I leave on vacation. I would hate for my door to open while I'm away making my garage a free for all.

14. Cars - If leaving any cars at home, remove all the valuables, roll up the windows and lock the doors. Park the car in the garage.

15. Yard - Check the yard for items that need to be brought indoors.

16. Phone - Turn off or turn down the ringer on your home phone. A constantly ringing phone is a good sign no one is home.

17. Emergency Numbers - Leave a key and emergency numbers to a friend or neighbor.

18. Organize Your Make-Up

Keep your make-up in one location. This makes it easy for you to find what you need while trying to rush out the door in the morning or packing for a weekend getaway.

1. Sort your make-up by color, style, or current season. Pick a system that is easy for you to follow and maintain.

2. Pick a place to store the make-up. You can store your make-up on a shelf, in a drawer or the best option is in a case or organizer made for make-up. Google make-up case organizer for several selections ranging is all prices. If you choose a shelf or drawer, use storage containers to keep everything in their place. Plastic bins, drawer organizers, glass bottles, vintage cups, etc. will work well.

3. Create a small travel case for your purse or the gym. You can grab this case and go without having to pull together your make-up each time you leave the house.

17. Purge Your Make-Up

Did you know that makeup expires? Over time, makeup can cause a bacteria which can be harmful to your face and cause infections. To avoid this problem, you should purge your make-up from time to time to rid of make-up that is expired, broken or out of season.

Gather all of you make-up in one location. Check for expiration symbols on the bottles. Some containers have a little icon on the bottom that looks like a jar with a number next to it, i.e. 12, 18, or 24. These numbers represent the number of months of recommended use. If the icon is not available, follow these rules to determine when to throw out your make-up:

Powders and shadow: 2 years

Cream shadows: 18 months

Foundation: 1 year

Lipsticks and lipliners: 1 year

Mascara and eyeliners: 3 months

Don't throw your old containers into the trash. Recycle them. Many make-up brands offer recycling programs to their customers. Check with your brand about their program.

- Origins accepts all containers from any make-up manufacture. Each location has a bin for easy drop off.

- M.A.C. - turn in 6 M.A.C. containers and receive a free lipstick.

- Aveda - turn in plastic caps from cosmetic, toiletry or food items that contain the number 5 on the plastic. These do not have to be Aveda product, they can be found on milk containers, mayo jars, ketchup, water bottle, soda bottles, toothpaste, shampoo, hair products, etc.

For tips on skin care and make-up, check out http://www.makeupbychrissy.com/. Chrissy Edwards is a fantastic Austin make-up artist http://www.makeupbychrissy.com/.