Today’s Families live in a very stressful time. Here are some tips to help you prioritize your life issues and declutter your surroundings. When you get overwhelmed with all the family issues, many times we can also bury ourselves in too much stuff.
- Prioritize Together: Get the family involved Together identify what matters most. Focus on clearing physical spaces like common rooms or kitchens to reduce visual clutter, which can lead to stress.
- Create Decluttering Zones: Assign different family members to specific areas of the house to clean and organize. This builds teamwork while reducing the overwhelming feeling of tackling everything at once.
- Daily Routines: Incorporate simple routines like a 10-minute daily tidy-up or “clean-up time” after dinner. Put things back in place. This can help maintain a sense of order without adding stress.
- Mindful Spaces: Once you free an area of clutter, designate spaces in the home for relaxation. This can give family members a place to unwind when things get overwhelming.
- Letting Go: Help the family, especially children, learn to let go of items they no longer use or need. Make this fun by donating things to charity, emphasizing it as an opportunity to give to others.
- Emotional Clutter: Emotional stress can be as taxing as physical clutter. Encourage family conversations to release emotional tension, set healthy boundaries, and practice empathy toward one another.
- Family Time & Breaks: Schedule regular family time or “no technology” time to connect and decompress together. Watch a movie together, share your days’ activities, or play a game. Balance between work, play, and relaxation helps reduce stress.
Family Priority Planner To Destress
Determine as a Family the Priority of things in their lives. Following is a form to help identify their shared priorities and values, which can guide all your decluttering efforts.
| Priority | Why It’s Important | Actions to Support This Priority |
| Example: More Family Time | Strengthens our bond | Schedule a weekly game night, declutter the living room for more space |
Each family member can contribute their thoughts, and then you can use this form to ensure you all understand and agree on what’s most important.
Room-by-Room Decluttering Checklist
A checklist that breaks down tasks by room can help manage decluttering step by step. Here’s an example for a living room:
| Room: Living Room | Task | Done (✔) |
| Sort through books and magazines donate or recycle | ||
| Organize shelves and discard old papers and insignificant items | ||
| Declutter unused items | ||
| Recycle or donate unused furniture | ||
| Create a “home” for remotes, chargers, etc. and organize all media equipment. |
This can be duplicated for each room and customized according to your family’s specific decluttering needs.
Daily Declutter & De-Stress Schedule
To prevent overwhelm, create a daily or weekly schedule for decluttering, which can also include relaxation and self-care time. Set reasonable allotted times for that activity realizing it may not be completed in that day, but it will get easier to complete as clutter decreases.
| Day | Task | Time Allocated | Who’s Responsible | Stress-Relief Activity |
| Monday | Declutter kitchen countertops | 20 min | Parent 1 | Family walk |
| Tuesday | Organize toys in the living room | 30 min | Kids | Movie night |
This helps families pace themselves and incorporate moments of relaxation.
Donate, Keep, Toss Form
As families declutter, this form helps categorize items.
| Item | Donate | Keep | Toss | Notes |
| Old toys | ✔ | Donate to local charity | ||
| Broken lamp | ✔ | Not repairable | ||
| Family board games | ✔ | Keep in designated cabinet |
It allows for more organized decision-making during the decluttering process.
Emotional Clutter Worksheet
Emotional clutter can be as overwhelming as physical clutter. This form helps identify emotional stressors and find ways to manage them.
| Emotional Stressor | Source of Stress | How We’ll Address It | Who’s Responsible |
| Feeling overwhelmed by schedules | Too many after-school activities | Cut back to 2 activities per child | Parents |
| Disagreements about chores | Lack of clear expectations | Create a weekly chore chart | Parents & Kids |
This can lead to open communication and emotional decluttering within the family as well as the ability to
share and assist one another in handling these items.
Chore & Responsibility Chart For Decluttering
To maintain an organized home, assigning chores can be helpful. Here’s a simple template:
| Family Member | Task | Day of the Week | Done (✔) |
| Parent 1 | Laundry | Monday | |
| Parent 2 | Dishes | Daily | |
| Child 1 | Clean room | Saturday | |
| Child 2 | Pick up toys | Daily |
A clear visual aid that shows everyone’s role in maintaining the space can reduce stress and ensure consistency
Family Meeting Notes
A form for tracking family discussions about progress, challenges, and goals related to decluttering or other family priorities. Select categories to address and organize such as tools, clothes, supplies, toys, games, etc. Gather and organize all like items and determine storage place. Combine duplicate items when possible and dispose of items you don’t use or need any longer.
| Date | Topic Discussed | Actions to Take | Who’s Responsible | Deadline |
| September 25 | Decluttering toys in playroom | Sort through toys and donate unused ones | Kids | October 1 |
This can help keep everyone on track and accountable.
Attached is an Excel format of the above forms that can be utilized for these purposes. The forms can be edited as needed and printed out or utilized online.
https://2m75.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Decluttering_Forms_Family_New.xlsx
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