"By the time you finish reading, you'll have 480 helpful tips and ideas to organize your house and your life."
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Get Your Ducks in a Row: 480 Simple Ideas
to Organize Your House and Your Life by Rosalie Nourse Trafford Publishing
book review by Carol Anderson
Everything you wanted to know about de-cluttering your life is in this simple, easy-to-follow how-to-book. It is only 111 pages long, has twenty-three well-organized short chapters, and consists of 480 tips on organizing life. The author begins by looking at clutter and reasons to de-clutter and keep things organized. "Bins, baskets, crates, and trays" are the focus within these tips which explore ways of organizing your car, closets, bedrooms, kitchen, and garage; to coping with the copious amounts of paper in our lives; time management; and personal time. Many of these tips are eco-friendly, such as using reusable grocery bags, water bottles, and coffee mugs.
Think Hints from Heloise, and you will have a basic understanding of this book. Simplify, simply, simplify is the theme regarding organizing your life in this ever-increasingly cluttered world of ours. Some tips demonstrate valuable ways to not only decrease clutter, but to decrease time-consuming mindless chores. The chapters on organizing the kitchen and the home office offer the most pertinent help. For example, numerous thoughts about kitchen storage bins and using separate file folders to organize important papers.
This is aimed at the stay-at-home mother who does all the household chores, albeit updated regarding current technology such as computers and DVDs and values such as recycling, while taking care of her husband and children. Things discussed include asking your spouse to help you make the bed on weekends, teaching your spouse and children how to do laundry, showing your spouse what you bought for Christmas gifts so that he won't be "as surprised on Christmas Day as the recipient," and having the "man in your household designate a specific site for placing the items he needs to take with him each day." Regardless of your family structure, you'll indeed find tips that are beneficial.