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Bullet Journal Ideas: Home Organization

Check out one of these brilliant bullet journal ideas – learn to use your journal for home organization! Declutter, clean, and more with these great tips.

Check out one of these brilliant bullet journal ideas - learn to use your journal for home organization! Declutter, clean, and more with these great tips.

Bullet Journal for Home Organizing

If you haven’t started bullet journaling yet, you should definitely give it a try. I have to warn you though: it can be highly addictive! There are several bullet journal ideas out there, and this post is all about how to use it for home organization.

What is a bullet journal? It’s a “customizable and forgiving organization system. It can be your to-do list, sketchbook, notebook, and diary, but most likely, it will be all of the above.”

The original bullet journal system is very analog: black and white, very simplistic. Many of us have turned it into more art and less black and white, while many others still stick to the simple system it was originally designed for.

There are multiple benefits, and it’s so easy to set up. Check out my other post on how to use a bullet journal if you want help getting started. Some people use their bullet journal for their daily, weekly, and monthly schedules.

Others love to use them for logs of all sorts, such as gratitude logs, future logs (goals), and more. I love that there is an index up front so you can organize your thoughts, your home . . .  your life!

Staying Organized

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To keep our house running smoothly, I use my bullet journal similarly to how I’d use a home organization binder.

I still keep a file folder for important information, but I write everything that I can into my bullet journal. I love that it’s small and portable, easy to write in, and has an index at the front so I know where everything is.

Take a few minutes to do a “brain dump,” and write down ideas of pages you want in your bullet journal. I used Pinterest for inspiration.

Morning Routine

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Everyone has a different morning routine, but mine goes something like this:

  • wake up
  • get dressed to my shoes (thanks, Fly Lady!)
  • make the bed
  • grab the laundry from the bedroom/bathroom on my way out

Getting started on the right foot ensures that at least the first part of my day will be productive. Forget the second half of the day . . . that’s not important right now.

Focus on being productive and organized for the first hour after you wake up, and the rest of your day will flow in the right direction.

What is your morning routine like? Write it down, make it pretty, follow through.

This is something older kids and teens could get used to doing, too. Creating a morning routine and sticking with it will reduce stress and anxiety in the mornings.

If you have more than one child, it could help prevent bathroom battles as well. 7:00-7:10 one gets the bathroom; 7:10-7:20, the next one gets the bathroom. Oh, who am I kidding? A bullet journal to solve bathroom battles! It was a nice thought, at least.

27 Fling Boogie

The 27 Fling Boogie is a decluttering system that was created by the Fly Lady, after she read Nine Steps to Financial Freedom and 101 Ways to Feng Shui Your Home. The basics of this system is that you gather up 27 items to throw away, then gather another 27 items to give away.

In Feng Shui, it is said that moving nine items in your home creates a different energy flow, which is where the number 27 came from (Fly Lady increased it by a multiplier of 3).

The rules are: the bag of trash has to be thrown away immediately, and the bag of giveaway items has to be taken to your car immediately. You can track items you’ve given away in your bullet journal for tax purposes later.

As you declutter, it gets easier (and takes less time) to clean your home on a daily basis. I read something about the “swipe and swish” on the Fly Lady website, and about cleaning “hot spots.”

You know what hot spots are! The mail hot spot is where you dump all of the mail each day. Prevent this by going through your mail as it comes in.

Get rid of the trash right away, pay or file the bills, and respond to any letters that may have come in.

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5 Minute Room Rescue

Oh no! Company is coming over in 15 minutes. What’s a Mom to do? Pick the worst 3 rooms and do a 5 Minute Room Rescue on each.

Grab a trash bag and a basket, and do a quick sweep of each room. This is a good thing to teach the older kids, too! Divide and conquer.

A Clean House is a Happy House

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For keeping our house clean, I use a combination of the Fly Lady’s tried-and-true system, and the 8-Minute Organizer, by Regina Leeds. Both methods help me in different areas of the house, and for different reasons.

The key to keeping your home happy and organized is finding a system (or systems!) that work with your life, your family, and your schedule. Some Moms love to clean, some have tons of time to clean.

Others, like me, want to get it out of the way as quickly as possible! Knowing what you have time for and making a realistic schedule will really help keep everything on track.

If you find that a system isn’t working too well, you can tweak it a bit or you can try a completely new system. That’s the beauty of a bullet journal: nothing is permanent.

You can scratch through it, tear the page out, or start a new system when you start your next bullet journal. Nothing is set in stone!

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Cleaning by Zones is something I learned from the Fly Lady. I have a spread specifically set up for Zones each month. If you want to be specific, you could create a spread where you write exactly what you clean in each Zone.

Kids can help with cleaning, too, so be sure to add in a spread for their chores – or even for ideas of what they can help with.

It varies by age, but they can usually help with clearing clutter, throwing trash away, gathering items into a giveaway bag, etc. As they get older, they can help with chores such as dishes, sweeping, and vacuuming.

Moving Forward

I think I’m going to start using a bullet journal to keep my business organized as well. I can plan out my editorial calendar, blog post ideas, income and expenses, and so much more. It’d be a nice way to keep it all organized for tax time!


If you have other bullet journal ideas for home organization, let me know in the comments. I’d love to hear them! I’d also love for you to check out these other organizing posts:

Woodburn Home Organizers

Monday 22nd of July 2019

What a great article full of so many practical tips. Organizing things in a written way really helps to develop the game plan for action. I really like the concept of utilizing a bullet journal. Thank you for the great idea.

Shannon - Wellella

Saturday 2nd of February 2019

Late to the party but came to say I love how you used the FlyLady concepts in your bullet journal! I definitely need to make a similar spread in my current bujo.

Megan

Saturday 10th of September 2016

Until now, I've resisted the idea of keeping a cleaning spread in my bullet journal, but I LOVE the way you've made it part of the morning routine. Everything goes so much smoother when the days starts right!

Slap Dash Mom

Saturday 30th of July 2016

I love the brain dump! I use mine daily and it helps me be so much more productive when I can literally just barf all of my ideas onto a page (or 7 pages..ehem). When I try making perfect little lists, it always ends in disaster.

Sue

Thursday 28th of July 2016

I remember the first time I went to the FlyLady site YEARS ago. The banner at that time asked (paraphrasing here) if you were a victim of CHAOS (Can't Have Anyone Over Syndrome). That resonated with me and a number of things I read in the daily emails helped not only because she gave you a starting point but because you realized there were others like you. It really has made a difference in my life.

Amy

Thursday 28th of July 2016

Thank you for the comment Sue! She is really awesome . . . all of her advice makes sense. Try it so far and loving it!