{"id":32,"date":"2011-07-14T18:08:33","date_gmt":"2011-07-14T18:08:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/?p=32"},"modified":"2011-07-14T18:08:33","modified_gmt":"2011-07-14T18:08:33","slug":"declutter-your-home-fast-and-enjoy-time-with-your-friends-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/declutter-your-home-fast-and-enjoy-time-with-your-friends-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Declutter Your Home Fast And Enjoy Time With Your Friends"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Have you noticed that when you have guests coming over, you clean and de-clutter like crazy before their arrival. <\/strong><\/p>\n

You may even start tidying up visible areas in your home a day or two in advance.<\/p>\n

You look around your home just before your guests arrive, proud of the cleaning and organizing you\u2019ve done, and wish your home always looked this good.<\/p>\n

And if you entertain on two separate occasions within a few days of each other, your organizing time was shorter.<\/p>\n

You may also have made progress on another mess that you ignored previously because you just ran out of time.<\/p>\n

I know this pattern well.\u00a0 My friends and I joked often about how our homes get so cluttered day-to-day that it takes an \u2018event\u2019 to clean them up.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

When I really saw the upside of this pattern of behavior in my home, I made a decision.<\/p>\n

I will purposefully invite my friends over to my home regularly.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

We will meet at my place for coffee rather than the local coffee shop, or I will invite that family over that we haven\u2019t seen for over a year (hey, the house was always too messy to extend the invite).<\/p>\n

AND each time I had guests coming to my home, at least one mess in the house will be better under control than before.\u00a0 Not perfect, just better.<\/p>\n

I felt less pressure than de-cluttering before a party or a family holiday event.<\/p>\n

My friends — my real friends that is — didn’t really care how cluttered my house was.\u00a0 They were happy to get together.<\/p>\n

Yet, I still wanted my home to look and smell nice before they arrived.<\/p>\n

The amazing thing is, it takes much less time to declutter a messy area when your guests will be showing up in less than an hour, than if you assign yourself a leisurely Saturday for the task.<\/strong><\/p>\n

As a result of this planned entertaining, the main floor of my home got consistently neater and more organized.\u00a0 Cleaning and organizing the house before larger events became quicker and easier too.\u00a0 And, I solved our piles-of-shoes-at-the-front-door issue along the way!<\/p>\n

This \u2018Invite People Over\u2019 method of decluttering works because when you invite friends over, you are setting yourself a deadline.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

And it\u2019s human nature is to be more focused on the task at hand \u2013 decluttering and organizing your home — as the deadline draws near.<\/p>\n

After all, you’re not going to un-invite your friends last minute because you haven’t finished cleaning — you’re going to finish the cleaning.<\/p>\n

By regularly going through this process of inviting friends over and decluttering your home before their arrival, your home will be neater and more organized on a day-to-basis.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

You will feel good about your home, and less hesitant to invite people over.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

You will likely notice spaces in your home that are persistent areas of clutter accumulation.\u00a0 Once you have identified these clutter problem areas, you can address them with a more permanent solution.<\/p>\n

So, if your dining room has gotten messy and you want to clean it up, invite friends over for dinner.\u00a0 With our busy lives, there are always friends we haven’t seen for a while who would be more than thrilled to get together.<\/p>\n

Kitchen counter needs tidying up?\u00a0 Invite a friend or neighbor over for coffee.\u00a0 Tidy up the kitchen counter before your guest arrives.<\/p>\n

Then, relax and enjoy the time with your friends.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Yours in friendship,
\nBarb<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2011 www.ClutterClearingMadeEasy.com.\u00a0 All rights reserved.<\/p>\n

_________<\/p>\n

Want to use this article in your Ezine or Website?\u00a0 You can, as long as you include the complete article and the Copyright information.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Have you noticed that when you have guests coming over, you clean and de-clutter like crazy before their arrival. You may even start tidying up visible areas in your home a day or two in advance. You look around your … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41,"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32\/revisions\/41"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/clutterclearingmadeeasy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}