Is Your Home a Reflection of You?

Photo by Brooke Phillips.

As we begin a new year, we want to encourage you to reflect on a few questions we often explore with our clients. The hands on “organizing” and “packing/unpacking” work we do is important, however the deeper work we do often has more meaningful implications than we can express through before & after images.

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Take some time to consider these questions:

What do you love about your home?

What are a few of your favorite memories or meaningful moments that have taken place in your home?

What do you hope others feel when they spend time in your home?

Does your home decor and style consist of your own selections? Or is it a combination of gifts from loved ones and passed down pieces from family members?

Where do you find inspiration for your home?

Who do you trust to help you make decisions about your home?

Where do you go in your home to find rest?

What are values that you’d like your home to reflect?

What do you wish you could change in your home?

Are there areas in your home that cause you to feel overwhelmed?

What is one improvement you could make to your space that would increase your enjoyment?

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Photo by Texture Photo.

Before we begin any home organizing project, we create space to listen first. This allows us to gain a more full understanding of why a client reached out to us and what hurdle they are hoping to overcome. Life is messy, complicated, and unpredictable - and our homes are often affected by the events and seasons of our lives. We remind our clients that feeling shame around the current status of their home is not helpful, beneficial, or necessary. Rather, we encourage them to dream again of what their space could look/feel/be like. We remind our clients that their home is never too far gone & there is always somewhere to start.

Do you have an area of your home you’re ready to reclaim? Our team is ready to help.

Start the conversation today.

Sidenote: Just as we are continually encouraged and inspired by our clients stories, our team is made up of strong, resilient, and talented organizers who each bring a unique set of life experiences that enable us to serve clients facing all kinds of challenges. Read more about them here.

Why we love coming home…

My favorite thing about coming home is the people... whether it be my family, neighbors, or folks dropping by, it’s the place where we get to connect with our people, hopefully creating a space where everyone feels welcome.
- Taryn

Items from a guest, a child & the garden.

I love coming home because our house feels like a comfortable blend of where we’ve been, where we are, and where we are going as individuals and as a family. I’m a sucker for anything unique and old and I love that our home feels like a giant patchwork quilt: pieces of memories, people, and inspiration sewn together in a way that somehow all works.
- Caroline

Bookshelf of collected treasures, photo by Texture Photo.

Coming home feels like a big exhale to me. Our home is comfortable and simple, a place where we feel free to rest & play. We hope it can be that for everyone who comes in & out of our door.
- Katie

Morning light through the dining room.

I enjoy coming home because I have such a cozy space! My house is small & the main room is used as an entryway, living room, dining room, game room, homework area/office, TV room, weekend sleepover area, etc. When I walk in the door, all the future plans & past memories are there to greet me. And Stella. She’s always there to give me a warm welcome home as well.
-Kathie

Main room, featuring Stella.

Some of my favorite things are LOTS of sunlight, real plants (now that I’ve learned to keep them alive), candles, and good coffee.  At the moment, my family is living in a temporary residence that really doesn’t feel like home to me.  But I’ve still got my plants and coffee and I’m eager to get back into a space I can make all mine again!
-Rheannon

Plants and good coffee.

What do you love about coming home?

What's with all the pressure to be organized??

If you keep up with blogs, or honestly, any form of social media, you've probably observed this obsession with being organized that has surfaced over the past few years.

Let's talk about this trend.

If I'm being honest, all of the lovely pictures that grace the pages of magazines, Instagram streams, and blog posts make me swoon. They also make me less content with that I currently have and how my home currently looks. I often feel frustrated when I see the perfectly color coordinated kids rooms, the toys that are set exactly 3 inches apart from each other lining a shelf, the immaculately folded linens in a closet--these things are not realistic for me. I totally understand wanting a well designed and well organized home and the desire for things to look nice. What I do want to acknowledge is that I am a professional organizer, and my home will never look like those pictures unless I've specifically staged it for pictures (which would last all of about 30 minutes).

What I've been thinking about and trying to embrace lately is that being organized means different things to different people. The value of being organized is different for every person. I know for myself that if my house feels out of order, I feel distracted and overwhelmed--but my definition of "out of order" is not the same as everyone else’s definition. For example, I like for things to generally have a designated place, I like having clean surfaces, I don't like to store much on my counters, and I like things to be contained. Some people love to have lots of things on every shelf, and that's totally fine. For many, that doesn't feel disorganized or overwhelming at all. The truth is, we hope you never feel pressured by media, fashion, trends, friends, or family to become a version of "organized" that doesn’t work for you.

You may have noticed that many of our “before and afters” do not feature “after” pictures that look perfect- this is purposeful. Many of our clients are looking for practical help, things that can easily be maintained. Sometimes we complete a job where our client really values uniformity and a more picturesque final product, and we are happy to provide that result, but we never want to leave a client with something that doesn't feel realistic to their every day life. We realized that organization looks different for each person and we want to customize our work in a way that leaves each client feeling good about moving forward and maintaining their newly achieved order.

We love to help people who feel overwhelmed by their belongings, who want to let go, have the desire to purge, rearrange, re-invision their space etc. We've found that a very real sense of relief often comes when you purge and get more organized. Our greatest desire is that you feel content and able to enjoy your space without feeling burdened by it!