Welcome to day 19 of the challenge! If you’ve missed any of the challenge so far, that’s ok – you can catch up anytime. You can access the master list of all the challenges in this post here.
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Today we will be organizing something we all deal with in our daily lives. The mail. I find the daily task of bringing in the mail can be both exciting and a tremendous chore. Exciting are those delightful brown boxes with the smile on the side or a super treat is a card or letter from a loved one. (a real card is so exciting now since most things come in the form of an email). However along with the “fun” mail comes a bunch of not so fun. The bills, flyers, junk mail, etc. It tends to pile up on the kitchen counter and that’s how things get lost or bills get put off. So it’s time to get organized! Here are some tips on how to get your mail in order:
- As I’m walking back from the mailbox, I quickly go through it and pull out all the junk mail then throw it directly into the recycling bin. It never even enters the house! This usually accounts for about half of the days mail!
- For the rest of the mail, I divide it into groups: bills, personal, and to deal with later (this might be a flyer or coupon that I want to use at a certain store, or the local community center calendar that I need to look over for upcoming events.)
- Implement some sort of organization system such as a hanging bin or a stand up bin to put the mail in. We have one on our desk that has 3 slots: the first one gets the bills so I know those need to be dealt with first, anything else that is not immediate gets filed in the next slot.
- Mail that needs to be sent out is placed in a magnetic bin that is stuck onto the white board in our kitchen. Also stamps are kept there as well so I can quickly stamp the envelope and place it in the bin. The next person to leave the house takes the mail and drops it in the nearby mailbox.
Here are some examples of organization systems you can buy to help you keep your mail in order.
I absolutely love the wooden stand-up bin with all it’s slots. This would be perfect for my husband as he is constantly fumbling through old and new mail when it comes time to pay the bills.
I usually have a stack of mail at my kitchen, that i usually just read the important mail and the rest just leave there lol. These are great ideas to help me organize, and would def try it!!
This is one of the areas that I really need to work on. My kitchen counter always has a handful of mail that I haven’t gone thorough yet.
Thanks for the tips! These are easy and doable tips 🙂 the mail is something I don’t like doing very much either, but its mainly my job because I’m a stay at home mom and my husband works all day. I’m going to try these and see if I can conquer the pile of mail that likes to accumulate on my kitchen table
We never seem to stay organized, the mail ends up on the kitchen counter