Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional home environment/EF issues/advice?

I have begun a massive overhaul at home, in hopes of helping all of us function better.

--Ruthless decluttering. We are not exactly hoarders; in fact, by most people's standards do not have a lot of "stuff," but as each school year progresses, piles of paper seem to accumulate to the point of overwhelm.

--I am also purging just about all of our existing furniture/decor items, etc. and am going into a "blank slate" minimalist mindset.

--We are all very visual and I have always noted that behavior and mood (myself included) improves dramatically when things are simple, clean, and organized.

I am interested in any advice about how to help with simple systems to help my children organize their own belongings and contribute more to the household functioning.

Has anyone ever tried this approach? What sorts of things have been helpful in setting up systems so kids can become more self-sufficient?

I have a hunch if we could get the environment into a more peaceful state, we'd all function better.

1) What to do with kids' school work? Piles on the dining room table don't seem to help.

2) What about art/craft supplies?

3) Laundry: do your children do their own, and how do you manage this?

4) Electronics. iPads. Gaming systems. Chargers. These things find their way all over the house. I did finally purchase a binder for DS to keep his games in (and stored the cases)...but we have three gaming systems, all the accessories, all the cords (that are SO upsetting to me), just sort of hanging out all over the living room.

I'm wondering if anyone has successfully put together a home that supports better EF instead of flying by the seat of their pants and having occasional freak-outs (mine, not the kids') about all the crazy, messy, clutter.

Advice, tips, resources, etc., appreciated. I was so much better at this when they were young and their toys were in a playroom.

I'm assuming you decluttered his bedroom? We cleaned basically everything out of DD's room and she had a bunch of empty bins in her closet to put any stuff which ends up in her room (closet has a bunch of wire shelfs). We are making her pick stuff up off the flooor and vacuum about 1X per week so it doesn't become a trash pit.
She has an actual bin for the DS right in her room along with the charger.
For the other electronic stuff, we installed a set of cabinets/drawers along one entire wall in the family room (so they look built in), and this includes space for a TV. We actually used stock kitchen cabinets and a countertop from a home improvement store and painted the cabinets. It basically looks like a built in entertainment system. If I had my way, I would put all that charging stuff in one of the cabinets, out of sight, but Dh has that stuff scattered all over the house. The cell phones are charged by the land line in the kitchen.

DD sometimes does her own laundry but complains about getting it up/down 3 flights of steps. So I end up doing it most of the time. Probably need to be more consistent about having her at least load stuff in/out of machines.

I have a small wood desk in one corner of the kitchen and a shelf attached above it, with organizers with everyone's name. to shove papers. It drives me nuts when papers end up all over the kitchen counter/table.

2 kitchen drawers hold all that art/craft junk and there is a separate large box for crayons/markers sitting in the living room. Need to find a better place.

Yes, DS room is pretty bare and fortunately has a built in desk/drawer/shelf thingy. He still manages to accumulate *actual* trash because he eats in there all. the. time. which is supposed to be against the rules (I say supposed to be--but I've been really bad about enforcement--primarily bc the kitchen table is always covered in piles!)

I love this idea, and am working on something similar...cabinets with standard/bracket shelving above on a wall in LR that is essentially wasted space.

Laundry is the bane of my existence and the most maddening thing of all is when they put CLEAN clothes in the hamper bc too lazy to pick up. I am considering assigning each child a "laundry day" in which they have the washer/dryer with no interference. I think it might help to allow them to just wash everything on cold, together (this will drive me insane--I'm very weird about laundry--but perhaps I can relax a little).

I don't have a space for this but can do something similar. I worry about shoving away papers bc for us, out of sight is out of mind and we might forget important deadlines, activities, etc.


I have a heavy duty wire shelf with bins that is currently holding all of our tools, lightbulbs, etc., in the garage. Am thinking of bringing it in to the the dining room (not formal, open to kitchen), having DD label bins, and getting rid of all the packaging--for instance, all markers in one, colored pencils in another, scissors, glue, tape, etc. Could also use for school things? Rulers, protractors, paper, etc.? I am trying to let go of things being "pretty" and making it all more functional.

For laundry I always throw everything together and have never had a problem (unless there is something that is a bright color and it's never been washed before). I am able to re-sell almost all of the kids' clothes when they are outgrown so I assume that my lazy laundry methods don't end up making the clothes look too bad.

For bins, you could buy one of those rolling carts with pull out drawers, since you don't care how it looks.

This has been our problem as well. When I cleaned her room I found months old food, like dried up beef sticks, orange peels, etc. hidden in places. Luckily this has diminished dramatically since we reduced her med dose. She would sneak food into her room in the middle of the night because she was starving.

For us, much has depended on my setting and enforcing a few weekly pickup times, when everyone works at once to deal with their designated spaces. The upkeep is the hard skill for my family.

The other thing is making sure that everything actually has a home to go to-- that there is enough room on shelves for all books, that there is a designated box for collected rocks.....

Clutter and mess stress me out so I try to keep things as clean as possible.

Here's what I like to do (of course YMMV).
1) school work - I have two boxes for each kid in a closet. The top one is for everything from this year. Everything goes in there (or if I can get away with it the recycling bin if I know I would never keep it). At the end of the year I go through and pick out the highlights to move into the second bin which has all of the stuff since they started school. Everything else goes in the recycling bin.

2) Art/Craft supplies - I have a 3 trofast bins with lids so they stack from Ikea and a shelf they sit on. For shelving/organizing Ikea Trofast and Kallax are my two favourites (Kallax previously known as Expedit or something like that). I have a 2x4 Kallax in our mudroom closet so everyone has a cubbie and bin which I love. I also have a couple downstairs and one in the living room for toys/games/stuff. The kids each have a Trofast in their room (my kids are 6 & 8 so they still have toys and junk). We also have younger kids over a lot so we still have a lot of the baby toys as well.

3) Laundry - we do all of our stuff together mostly because we don't own that many clothes so my kids can't wait a week to get enough stuff to make a load and run it. Everyone's clothes go into two baskets (one dark, one light) and whenever one is full it goes into the washer. The kid's main contribution is to sort, fold and put away everyone's stuff. Occasionally they put it in and run the machines as well.

4) we have a closed cabinet under the TV that all movies, games and the console go into. We also have one end table in a corner that is the charging station. All extra cables and stuff are in a basket on a shelf in the office.

For me I have to have a home for everything and it has to be easy to put it there or else it doesn't and then it contributes to the mess. It is harder with kids so when things get really hectic and devolve I'll start with a room and keep it clean so I have a place to retreat that doesn't make me crazy. I then slowly expand so I have 2 rooms, then 3, then 4.... until the house is back to bliss I should also admit that rarely make it to all the way to the storage room.... I'm able to block that one out and it is the dumping ground to keep the rest clean.

Our house has gotten better (helps once half the kids leave home, since we don't have tons of space), but still a work in progress! Our approach:

-- we actually do use the dining room table for schoolwork. We bought a cheap bookshelf for the dining room (yes, my dh cringed, but we move it out for fancy dinners), and books, notebooks, etc go on the shelves. We have a sorter with slots for activities/music/school papers/church stuff (youth group, confirmation...) etc. We have small bins for papers, pencils, markers, tape, staplers, spare calculators, etc. It has helped a TON!

--kids have to declutter their rooms every week, as well as the basement (where we keep games, toys, etc). We don't have a lot in their rooms besides clothes, books, magazines (we have bookshelves and magazine holders) and a few awards/trophies, etc.

-- we have four plastic (portable) file cabinets- the kind you can easily pick up and carry. Two have 12 hanging files with a few things from each grade we want to save. Two have about the same number of files for each class/activity from the current year (we keep these in the dining room as well). At the end of the year, everything else gets thrown.

--we have 2 big binders for each kid with lots of plastic sleeves. One has music stuff (programs and recital pages from things, usually with a note or picture thrown in) and the other has certificates and awards - Mathcounts, science fair, honor roll certificates, etc...

-- as far as laundry, I have to admit that my kids don't do a lot of their own laundry (but they definitely CAN do it). They bring down their laundry every morning and sort it, and after running/sports, they bring down their sweaty clothes and put them right on the washer. I am a SAHM and I do laundry every day, and dh is kind of a laundry nut (he can't stand dirty laundry, so he is always doing it). Kids put away their own laundry every day after school. Kids strip their beds, wash and dry sheets, and put back on every weekend.

--we don't really have a lot of electronics, so that isn't a problem

--the boys aren't into crafts, but we do have one standing cupboard in the basement (from IKEA) where we keep all craft supplies, which we still end up using for science fairs or school projects. When my girls were younger we had tons of crafts. We had a card table in basement, the same IKEA cupboard, plus a few portable bins of stuff. We also had a small table in living room that had doors and it still has labeled bins of sharpies, markers, colored pencils, and highlighters. We also have a few wicker bins in the living room where we throw workbooks. dictionaries, current novels, etc. Oh and we always had a bin in each kid's room labeled library books. We don't need it so much now that they are older and reading longer books, but when we had 25 books out at a time from the library and they would get mixed up on bookshelves or lost under couches, it was a godsend.

Two of my kid struggled with EF, one more seriously, so a lot of parental help was needed. We went through her binder and backpack EVERY SINGLE DAY or she would end up with half-eaten food, half-done homework, forgotten permission slips, and unwashed gym clothes (I'm talking high school!). She is in her mid 20s now and still not perfect in this realm, but I feel like we've taught her a lot of good coping skills and she is much improved.