House to Home- How to Make Your Home Function

Whether you just moved into your house or you have been there for years making it home has a huge impact on your day to day life.

Before we jump in the weeds I challenge you to really pause and think about how you feel when; You walk into your house? You prepare a meal for your family? You get ready for the day? You need to go grocery shopping? Cleaning? Laundry? Bedtime?

Are you feeling anxious right now? Stick with me! In this two part series I am going to cover how to make your house into a home.

Friends, we are in the thick of it in our new house. Everyday we get a little closer, but it has really pushed me to define what makes a home. Ya’ll know I love a beautiful space and we will cover all those feels in the next post. It may surprise you to hear this from me, but function comes first.

Lack of function is what causes disorganization, chaos, stress, anxiety, and overall takes away from your quality of life. This post is all about really identifying the pain points in your home, and tackling them head on. Our home is meant to be our shelter from the world. You don’t need to wait for your forever home to make your house your home.

Define the Problem

Any decent problem solver will tell you, before you create a solution you need to really understand the problem. Think back to the how do you feel exercise. What areas of your home really cause stress for your day to day routines?

Whether its your entire house or just a few spaces, this is the first step in making your home function. If you are visual and like a checklist, like myself, take a stroll through your house. Make a list divided by room and jot down what isn’t working in each space.

Below you can see a sample of some pain points we have encountered. Keep it simple and if you get overwhelmed just pick one problem or one space to start with.

Simplify

Here is the honest TRUTH, most of us are so abundantly blessed that we are drowning in material things! I am saying this from experience. There is absolutely no way to have a home that functions if you are drowning in stuff.

For some people this can be extremely emotional and taxing, but it is also liberating. We are not meant to be “stuff” managers. Think about how much of your time is spent just managing your material belongings. I don’t know about you, but my time is really precious. When I recognize I am spending too much time shuffling items from one spot to another it is my sign to declutter.

This isn’t a one and done thing. It is something you have to maintain. It can be a seasonal process or part of your routine. I do a little of both. I have bins in each of my kids closets for items that are too small. You can read a little more about how we manage our laundry here. I also will periodically walk through the house and seek out items that can be tossed, donated, or sold. Seasonally I spend a little time in each space weeding out items we no longer need.

When you tackle decluttering just remember, your things are in your home to serve a purpose. If it is no longer serving that purpose it might be time to let it go. The more I have done this in our home, the more I have recognized the value in less material things.

In Mathew six Jesus commands us “Do not to store our treasures on earth where moths and vermin destroy and where thieves break in and steal. but to store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

I really keep these verses close to my heart when I find myself clinging to material belongings. All of this on earth is just temporary. We can’t take any of it with us. I heard an awesome quote in a Chip Ingram sermon last week. Our hearts follow our resources. This isn’t just money, it can be time, thoughts, energy, conversations.

Low Hanging Fruit

Back in my old software days we had a development campaign we called, “the low hanging fruit.” We went through our request list and identified items that took very little effort. Regardless of their priority we blocked out a chunk of time to plow through them. Ironically some of them had a huge impact, and the sum of them all was astounding.

It may be something simple. When we moved in, our slide out garbage was missing a screw and had a tiny grocery bag size bin. EVERY dang time I went to throw something away it plopped out of the cupboard. Then it was full in about three minutes. You better believe I put a screw in that baby and a larger bin by day two in our house. All those little 5 or 10 minute task add up to a little slice of peace throughout your day.

Organization and Systems

I am a huge fan of having a place for all of your things and a system for your task. One of my all time favorite resources for organization is ClutterBug. She has a great video, where she defines different organization styles. I love clean spaces, visual clutter is overwhelming for me. On the other hand, I need to easily see my things or out of sight out of mind. I also need very simple systems or they won’t stick. Anything alphabetized is never going to happen in my life. Knowing your unique personality helps develop strategies that will actually work for you.

Here are some examples of the organization strategies we have used in our home.

Entry

For years our entryway was a catch all for bags, shoes, coats, and paper clutter. The reality is our family keeps majority of their shoes and everyday items by the door. If I store them anywhere else, there is a land mine of shoes, bags, and coats in front of our door. We each now have a bin at the bottom of our closet where we can toss our shoes. I rotate mine out seasonally. We also have sturdy hooks in the closet for each person to hang their coat and bags. The other half of the closet houses extra winter coats. The top shelf holds easily accessible bins for winter gear.

Kitchen and Pantry

Cooking does not come naturally to me, it is just not one of my gifts. Which is rather unfortunate since we need to eat three times a day. All the more reason I need my kitchen to function. Here are some of my favorite Kitchen tips.

1. Ditching the extra gadgets and gizmos: Do you know how many items lived in my kitchen that I NEVER used. I finally parted with the random pickle storage container and life size blender. It is amazing how functional your kitchen becomes when you ditch the items you don’t need!
2. Easy meal planning and shopping list: Shopping with a plan instead of an appetite is huge. I found my favorite meal planning and shopping list printables on Happy Housie. Now our pantry is full of items we actually eat.
3. Slide out drawers: In our first house the lower cabinets were my arch enemy. Everything would get pushed to the back. I would find myself on my hands and knees just to fetch a pot. Our last house had slide out drawers in all of the lower cabinets. I am chomping at the bit to build some for our current kitchen. Every inch of my lowers were organized and easy to get to with these. If you aren’t handy all the box stores sell ready made drawers you can add to your cabinets.
4. Counter Bins: This may just be a Cassie thing, but my house feels messy if the counters are covered with appliances and things. I love using trays on kitchen counters to visual contain our essentials. Right now we have four “stations” in our large kitchen. A coffee station for the coffee pot, ground coffee, filters, and syrups. A cleaning station with counter spray, hand soap, dish soap, some lotion, and paper towels. One tray with a candle, large canister of cooking utensils, and a kitchen towel. The last is a prep station with some cutting boards and our knife block.

I could spend all day diving into the different systems we have in our house. The bottom line is, identifying your problems areas and solutions that will work for you key to a functional home.

Start

Yep, completely obvious. Pick a space and start. Do you know how many people buy all the organizing books, watch all the youtube channels, maybe even go out and stock up on bins, but NEVER start. Don’t be that person. I heard a quote I love in Rachel Hollis’ podcast about procrastination, “knowledge isn’t power, APPLIED knowledge is power.”