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The Psychology of Clutter; Why it Has to Go

minimalist

Your home should be your sanctuary, a place to rest and relax after a hard day. But a cluttered home can make relaxing out of the question. Clutter not only makes our homes look bad, it can also make us feel bad. Rarely do we consciously recognize clutter as a significant source of stress in our lives. When in reality, clutter can leave us feeling anxious, helpless, and overwhelmed. Clutter constantly reminds us that our work is never done which also creates feelings of guilt.

Decluttering and organizing can give you a feeling of control over what is happening in your world. With home organization comes order and with order comes calmness. Plus, the less clutter you have to deal with, the easier home maintenance becomes. And who doesn’t want to spend more time relaxing and less time on home maintenance?

Step 1: Evaluate

Don’t take up valuable space and mental energy with items you no longer use. Start with one area at a time and finish decluttering that area before moving on to another. Feel a sense of accomplishment as you see your successes little by little. Ask these questions as you are purging and really think about the emotional reasons you may be hanging on to each item.

  • Does this add value to my life?
  • Have I used this in a year?
  • Do I have more than one of these?
  • Would I buy it again?
  • How many times have I used it?
  • Does it fit?
  • Do I have space for this?

If there are items you are still unsure about, fill a box with items and place these items in a closet. If you haven’t opened the box in a year, donate it to charity without taking a peek inside!

Step 2: Organize

Quite often, clutter is caused by simply not having enough storage or not having the correct type of storage. Build your storage solutions around the belongings you have left after purging. Try to store items in “closed” spaces such as cabinets and drawers as much as possible to reduce the strain of visual clutter.

Step 3: Identify Clutter Traps

Kitchen counters, night tables, coffee tables, entry halls, and bathroom counters can all be a battleground for endless, visible clutter. Try using attractive baskets and containers in these areas to house items you like to have at your fingertips. Just remember to purge these containers frequently to avoid pile-up.

Step 4: Maintain

Once everything is organized, the key to eliminating clutter for good is to stay on top of it on a daily basis. Set a 5-10 minute timer each day to tackle the clutter monster.

During your quest to de-stress in a decluttered, organized home, you may discover that your best option is to store some of your lesser used items. Zippy Shell is open and ready to serve your storage needs in the best way possible. Call today or click here to get a quote!

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4 Tips To Make a Small Laundry Room Seem Larger

laundry room

If you have a small laundry room, you probably know the struggle of trying to keep all your needed items organized and accessible. Fortunately, you don’t need an over-sized space to create a functional and pleasant room to wash, dry, and even fold laundry. Check out our 4 favorite tips for making a small laundry room feel bigger.

GO VERTICAL

Many small laundry rooms have quite a bit of vertical space. It tends to go unused because most of us cannot reach high shelves or cabinets. But you can use install shelves of varying heights and organize items by usage. For instance, if you rarely ever use your iron, you can store that on the top shelf while keeping your detergent and fabric softener on the lowest shelf. If your budget allows, you can invest in a stackable washer and dryer. This would create useable space for cabinets or a table.

BE CREATIVE WITH THE SPACE

Modern problems require modern solutions! That means you need to get creative. If you have a side-by-side washer and dryer, you can lay down a board across the two appliances to create a table of sorts. You can use this as a flat space to fold your laundry. Another place that goes overlooked is the doors. You can hang pantry organizers or even over-the-door hooks in order to store even more items.

HANG A ROD

If you have a lot of air-dry only clothes, you need a place to hang them up when they come out of the washer. You can install a curtain rood or even a sturdy tension rod for a great place for your more delicate laundry. If you have cabinets in the way, you can install a hand towel holder (the ones meant for bathrooms) upside down that will hold hangers.

HANG CURTAINS INSTEAD OF DOORS

If you have doors on your laundry room that cause problems or take up more space than they are worth—take them down! Sliding laundry room doors can’t be used for storage and they take up space on both sides of the door frame, even when they are open. You can take these down and hang decorative curtains to keep the area hidden.

We hope these tips will be helpful to you as you try to open up the space in your small laundry room. Be sure to stop by our Facebook page and share your laundry room organizational tips with our online Zippy Shell community. If you have an upcoming move, give us a call at 888-947-7974 for a free, no-obligation estimate. We also offer storage services that allow you to pack up your things at your own speed. When you are done, we will safely transport the portable storage container to one of our secure storage locations. We can store your things for as long as you need. When you are ready, give us a call and we will transport the container to your new home. Whatever your moving or storage needs, Zippy Shell has got you covered!

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Moving Soon? Time To Make Your Home Inventory List!

Couple unpacks and uses a checklist

If you have a move coming up, you may be getting ready to make a home inventory list. If not, we recommend that you take the time to complete this important step. Not only will it be useful for insurance purposes, but it will assist you and those helping you pack and unpack. Take a look at our tips for creating a home inventory list before you move.

BREAK IT UP INTO ROOMS

At first glance, creating a home inventory list can seem overwhelming. By taking each room or section of your home and tackling them one at a time, you can break a large task into something much more manageable. You don’t even have to go through your entire home all at once. If you have the time before your move, you can plan to complete one room a day, or even a week—what ever works best for your schedule.

SKIP THE SMALL STUFF

Not every item you own must make the list. The depth of your list is completely up to you. If you are making a list solely for insurance purposes, you may want to stick with larger, or higher value items. If you have the time and would like to go the extra mile to have a comprehensive packing and unpacking list, all the better! You don’t need to list every book or dvd that goes into a box, however. You can simply state the number of items in the box, along with its current and future location.

TAKE PICTURES OR VIDEO

As you are documenting your items on paper or moving app, take pictures of your furniture and high-value items for insurance purposes. You can also take a video going through each room, highlighting the larger items. Don’t forget to document the estimated value of the items.

NUMBER YOUR BOXES

Some people have found it helpful to number each box and document the number on your inventory/moving list. This can make it quite easy to spot missing or misplaced boxes. Using numbers that correspond with a list can make the labelling process faster. Instead of writing a full room name and all the items inside the box, you can just write a number and look to your list to know what is in the box and where it goes.

MAKE COPIES

Before you pack up your important documents, make copies that you save digitally. This can be very important if something were to happen to them during transit. You should also make copies of your home inventory list and hand it out to those who need it for unpacking and organization purposes.

We hope these tips help you as you start to plan your upcoming move. If you would like a free, no-obligation estimate for a long-distance or local move, Zippy Shell is standing by to help!

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5 Tips to Maximize Your Pantry Space

Organized Pantry

In most homes, the area designated for the pantry is typically far too undersized for our needs. The standard pantry tends to be packed full of overflowing boxes and bags of food. This sometimes leads to waste when the “out of sight, out of mind” food in the back goes unnoticed for too long. If this has happened to you and you are ready to try something new in your pantry, take a look at 5 of our favorite tips to help get that space back under control.

MOVE YOUR SHELVES

If you have adjustable shelves, change the heights of your available space to more closely fit your needs in the pantry. Depending on the types of foods you are storing in the pantry, you may benefit from adjusting your shelving to have less height, giving you the ability to add an extra shelf or two. If your shelving is not adjustable and you feel you are unable to appropriately use the large spaces without stacking boxes and cans, try using hanging shelves. These are racks that have “arms” that hold onto the shelf and giving storage space underneath. You can find these in many sizes and choose the ones that work best for you.

LET THERE BE LIGHT

Adding lighting, whether motion detected or touch-activated, will not necessarily add space to your pantry, but will make it feel bigger and more accessible. Lighting is not typically added to the standard pantry, but you can buy lights that you stick onto the wall to give your pantry some much needed illumination. We suggest opting for rechargeable lights as opposed to ones that use up a lot of batteries.

USE YOUR DOOR

You can use the back of your door to increase the storage space in your pantry. You can buy specially designed shelving, or you can DIY some extra storage space using a hanging shoe holder.

ARRANGE CAREFULLY

Sometimes, simply changing how you arrange your food items will create a lot of space. You not only need to arrange items of most use in the front but try to arrange the taller, more visible items in the back and the shorter items in the front so they do not get lost. Don’t waste space by putting small cans on your largest shelf unless you intend to have them stacked to take advantage of the vertical space.

UNIFORM CONTAINERS AND BINS

Anyone who has ever played Tetris knows there are a few pieces that you wait and hope for because the uniformity helps fill out the space. Instead of trying to fit together a bunch of different sized cereal boxes and bags of flour, buy clear plastic containers of similar shapes and sizes to better arrange your food items. This will also help keep household pests out of your food! Buy bins that you can pull out easily to store loose items.

We hope these tips are useful to you as you work to maximize your pantry space! If you have a local or long-distance move coming up, give Zippy Shell a call at 888-947-7974 for a free quote. We also offer mobile and onsite storage to help you cover all your moving and/or storage needs. We look forward to hearing from you!

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Organizing Tasks To Complete This Week

Goal Plan Action

The global COVID-19 pandemic has caused rising levels of anxiety around our country. While social distancing, many people have an abundance of time on their hands but also an abundance of worries. One way to combat the worry and anxiety is to tackle the organization of your home. While it won’t change the behavior or the repercussions of the virus, it can give you a feeling of control over what is happening within the confines of your home. With home organization comes order and with order comes calmness.

Decluttering is the first step to organizing. The less items you have in any space, the easier it will be to organize them. Get started in these areas:

The Pantry: Many of us are cooking more at home these days, so a well stocked pantry is a must. But before you stock it, be sure it is decluttered and organized. The ability to spot every single can of soup, snack, and box of pasta at a glance can cut down on trips to the store. Start by removing everything from the pantry, checking expiration dates, and wiping down the shelves. If you have an excess of some items, consider reaching out to elderly family and neighbors or donating what you don’t need. Use clear baskets and bins to group like things together. Use labels on the bins and the shelves themselves to make sure everything goes back to the proper spot.

The Refrigerator: When you’re hungry, you don’t want to spend time hunting for the right ingredient. You want to easily find the item you’re looking for, so let’s get the refrigerator organized also! The goal is to make it easier for you to cook healthy meals at home and cut down on trips to the store. Working in sections, take food out to clean away crumbs and spills inside the refrigerator. Using clear bins in the refrigerator is also a great way to get organized. Group like items such as a bin for fruit, one for drinks, one for sandwich fixings, etc. Another pro tip is to use a lazy Susan for open jars and condiments that sometimes get lost in the back.

The “Office”: Not every home has a dedicated office, but If your job has shifted to working remotely, or your kids are doing their schoolwork at home, you’ll need to clear some work space. Set aside a clutter free space to help you stay focused and be more productive. Now is also the time to organize important papers in your office area. Having your identification, employment documents, tax documents, insurance paperwork, and medical forms in one easy-to-locate spot can be incredibly helpful during this time. 

The Entertainment Collection: Entertainment, it means many things to different people. During this time period, it could mean your bike riding gear, fishing gear, puzzle collection, craft supplies, garden tools, board games, card games, books, music, movies, and the list goes on. Pull out and discover some old favorites to pass the time and set aside items you don’t enjoy anymore for donation at a later date.

Take the opportunity to cross things off your organizing list that you wouldn’t normally have time for in a pre-coronavirus routine. Decluttering and organizing can help you feel more in control and more productive. While you are organizing, Zippy Shell is open and ready to serve your storage needs in the safest way possible. Call today or click here to get a quote!

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8 Tips to Maximize Your Walk-In Closet Space

If you recently moved or getting ready for a big move, you probably have ideas on how to better organize your new space and make it work more efficiently for you and your family. One space in particular—walk-in closets—can pose a challenge when trying to find ways to organize your things to allow for easy access and at the same time, a place for things you do not use as often but do not want to put into storage. Out of sight equals out of mind—so how do we find a happy balance? Look at our tips for easy ways to organize your new walk-in closet.

START FRESH, EVALUATE, AND DECLUTTER

Once your closet is completely empty, give it a good deep clean. This will be your best opportunity for washing built-in shelving and cleaning the flooring. Next, you should go through all the things that you plan to keep in your closet. Each piece should be categorized. As you go through each item one at a time, be sure to ask yourself if you want to keep, donate, or sell. The more you can let go, the easier your task will be.

GET INSPIRED AND MAKE A PLAN

If you just are not sure which direction you want to go, take some time to do some internet browsing. Pinterest is full of ideas for every type of closet. Small or large closet, you will find inspiration that helps you move on to the next step. Before you start moving everything back into the closet, take some time to plan and gather all the tools and supplies you need to make your vision come to life.

INVEST IN THE RIGHT KIND OF HANGERS

If you open Amazon and type in ‘hangers’, you will enter a world you may not have known existed. There is a hanger for almost everything you can think of: pants, belts, ties, scarves, skirts, sweaters, double hangers, space-saving hangers, and more. If it fits within your budget, consider purchasing type-specific hangers that will help you save space in your closet, as well as improve the look and functionality of the space.

COLOR CODE

One easy way to organize your hanging or folded garments is to separate by type and color. This will make it aesthetically pleasing and make finding what you need a breeze.

LET NO SPACE GO UNUSED

Whatever space your closet offers needs to be used to its fullest extent. Don’t be intimidated if you have a lot of vertical space and not much else. You can find inexpensive shelving units that are quite easy to install yourself. You can then organize your things in a way that the least used items go up high and the frequently used items are within your reach. Don’t forget to label anything that goes into a box, bin, or bag!

TRANSPARENT BOXES AND BINS

Using see-through or clear plastic bins to store things will allow you to still see what is there without them being in the open. When we put things in boxes, we tend to never use them again because we forget about them. Clear bins can help solve that issue.

GET CREATIVE

If you prefer to not purchase specialized items for your closet—create your own! You can affix hooks on your closet wall to hang certain items like jewelry or belts. Curtain rings can be used to hold scarves or ties. We have even seen someone use soda tabs to slip over one thin metal hanger to allow for a second hanger to be placed—allowing for two pieces of clothing to be stored in the same space as one.

SEPARATE AND STORE

Be sure to take any offseason apparel and shoes and put them into space-saving storage bags. Label each bag with a detailed description of the contents just in case you need something before that season rolls back around. This should free up a good bit of space allowing you room to easily find the things you need every day.

We hope these tips help as you get settled into your new walk-in closet. If you have any interesting tips, stop by our Facebook page and share it with our community. We’d love to hear from you!

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7 Tips to Help You Stay Calm During a Move

happy moving couple

Studies show that moving is one of the most stressful life events. The level of stress may vary depending on the reason for the move (i.e. divorce vs. an incredible new job opportunity). No matter the level, there are still common factors that make a move stressful because of the number of details involved. The key is to stay calm during a move not only for your sake but also for the sake of your family. Here are 7 tips to help you stay calm during a move:

Time is your friend: The best gift you can give yourself to help reduce the stress of a move is ample time to plan your move. Organization is extremely important when balancing all the details of a move. You will not only be more productive; you will also have more time to work through any potential obstacles when you give yourself enough time.

Hit the ground running: The first day you decide to make a move, begin the process immediately. Whether you have the beauty of extra time or not, don’t procrastinate and wait until the week before to get started. Start packing your things as soon as possible, especially those items you won’t need early on. Planning is key in a move and a moving checklist can also help you prepare for success.

Let others do the moving: If planning a self-move is too overwhelming, save yourself the stress and let the professionals worry about moving day. Zippy Shell can help with the heavy lifting and refer you to professional loading and packing services.

Be mindful of your moving expenses: According to the American Moving and Storage Organization (AMSA), the average cost of a move is approximately $4,300 (for a distance of 1,225 miles). Create a budget, stick with it and keep more “green” in your wallet.

Keep important documents with you: Don’t take the risk of losing important documents (passport, birth certificate, bank records, school documents, etc.) during a move. Keep items in a secure folder or lockbox and make sure it stays by your side.

Beat stress with something you love to do: Beat the stress by taking some time to do something you enjoy such as taking a nature walk, reading a book, or enjoying time with friends and family. By “stepping away” from the moving process, you will feel refreshed and energized to keep working on the moving tasks at hand.  

Eat, sleep and focus on the positive: When we are under stress, it’s easy to gravitate to unhealthy foods, sleep deprivation, and negative thinking. Instead of scarfing down a pizza, packing until 3 am while cursing the moving process, fill your belly with healthy options, catch some zzz’s to avoid fatigue and focus on the positives of your move. Whether it’s a fresh start in a new town or city or a chance for a better job, try and keep the negative thoughts at bay.

Whether your move is exciting or a nuisance, focusing on staying calm will help the process goes much smoother. Exercise these 7 tips for moving success (and lower blood pressure!) And remember, if you need to store some items that aren’t moving with you, consider a climate-controlled facility with Zippy Shell!