I am a full-fledged, 100% extreme, organizational nerd. But! Even I can use some help in this area and love following Corinne at Grid + Glam on instagram for all of her expert tips and frameworks for getting things organized. I started to adopt her Sunday reset method to set me up for success when I’m feeling overwhelmed with a busy schedule. And during my own week-long New Year’s house organization overhaul, I’ve loved leaning on the advice she shared with her followers about setting up systems that work long-term. To kick off a week of posts here on the blog about New Year’s Resolutions and starting 2020 off on the right foot, I’m so excited to share this interview with Corrine from Grid + Glam! (See my other resolutions posts in the series here about eating healthy and going green). 
Kate: Can you start by telling me a little bit about yourself, and how you started Grid+Glam?
Grid + Glam: Yes! I’m an Organizing Junkie, Mompreneur, and Founder of Grid + Glam. I help busy women not just get organized but stay organized — with style. I do this through in-person organizing and my brand-new Membership Site! Grid + Glam is the brainchild of my perfectionist tendencies and organization addiction. Its name comes from the perfect marriage of functionality (grid) and aesthetics (glam) — because while we all want our homes to look perfect, they have to function for our day-to-day lives. I truly believe that when we are organized, we have the energy and capacity to live a joyful, fulfilling life and I want that for all my clients.
K: Being organized totally gives me joy, so I get it! After the madness of the holiday season, lots of new “stuff” that’s come into our homes, I know that this time of year is when I’m always itching to get things in order.
K: “Get organized” is such a common New Year’s Resolution for that reason, but sometimes it can be overwhelming to figure out where to start. What are some realistic, quick changes we can do to make an impact?
G+G: You are not alone – the biggest challenge for most people is deciding where to start. I think the biggest gift you can give yourself is to take the pressure off by letting go of the idea of what your house and life should look like. Or that there is one right way to go about getting organized. Instead, I encourage my clients to think about how they want to feel in their homes and in their lives. When you approach organizing from this standpoint, it starts to feel more like a gift you are giving yourself, rather than another annoying or overwhelming task on your to do list. From a practical standpoint, pick something easy that you have no emotional attachment to like a kitchen junk drawer. Set a timer for 10 minutes, throw out all the junk, and group what is left into like categories. When you see how much you can accomplish in such a short time, you feel inspired to do more!
K: That totally worked for me, I wrote a big list of every year I felt needed tackling in my home and over the course of the week between Christmas and New Year’s I tackled one small space a day – cleaning out my messy desk drawer and putting in some nice and neat drawer organizers was so satisfying and I started to build momentum over the week. I moved around to bigger projects each day, like tackling all of my tangled baubles and getting them into jewelry organizers where I could actually see what I have! It was so great to refresh a little bit each day, culminating in a big reorganization of my pantry/prop closet which was QUITE the event, ha!
K: Our house is generally very organized and neat, but it takes some big effort for me with a toddler in the house. Do you have any tips for staying organized with young kids in the house as we kick off the New Year?
G+G: Yes! Give yourself a few years. No, I’m only kidding. But I do think it’s helpful to remember that toddlers soon become little kids and little kids are capable of cleaning up after themselves. The easiest way to live in a constant state of organization is to get everyone who lives in the house onboard and pitching in. In my house, we are all responsible for keeping the home organized, and of course that has evolved as my kids have gotten older. My best tip when you have little ones is this: never leave a messy room. You will never, ever be in the mood to go back and clean it. So after playtime, allot 10 minutes for you and your little ones to put everything back in their home before leaving the room. Same with the kitchen – my kids had to stay in their seats in the kitchen until everything was cleaned up (they still do, but now they help). Not only did this mean I would return to a clean kitchen after bedtime, but also that habit now allows my kids to effortlessly sit through long dinners in restaurants with few complaints.
K: One of the things that drew me to your site was your weekly reset that you post on your Instagram stories and how it helps you set yourself up for success each week! I’m totally inspired by that and have tried to adopt some of your practices in my own weekend routine. Do you have advice for how to use that approach for a new year’s reset, how do you kick off the year on the right foot?
G+G: I’m so happy to hear that because I do feel like the reset is one thing that allows my week to be so much less hectic than it otherwise would be. The premise of the reset is to do the minimum amount you can to set yourself up for a successful week. But you don’t just cross your fingers and hope for the best. You decide what that will be, put a system in place, come up with your own checklist, and start checking tasks off. The same exact framework applies to a new year’s reset. Decide what you need to accomplish to feel good, come up with a realistic plan, write it down, and just do it! Don’t think about. Don’t give yourself room to complain. Just do it! The other key piece for a new year’s reset is to decide what you are finally ready to let go of. And I don’t just mean physical items. But what commitments, obligations, worries, and fears can you allow yourself to purge to make 2020 feel the way you have wanted to feel for so long?
K: Writing things down is always a game changer for me, for big goals and little tasks! I feel like when I put those reset practices into my to do list or calendar, I’m way more likely to do them (like meal prep, get laundry put away, etc.). And I love the idea of not just cleaning out your closets but cleaning out the non-physical things that might ne holding us back in the new year – such great advice!
K: Are you making New Year’s resolutions this year? Would love for you to share them with our readers if you’re comfortable!
G+G: I haven’t fully fleshed them out, but my big commitments are to work less, spend more time with my husband and kids, and have more fun! I’ve spent the past two years working a ton, building this company that I love. I am restructuring my workweek so that I have a built-in structure in place that will allow me to unplug for good once I pick up my kids. I am committed to keeping up with my mental decluttering challenges. I feel so much lighter and happier since I started the journey in August, and I am so excited to see where it leads me. And I’m so excited to be launching my membership site because it’s going to allow me to help more people in a day but have more flexibility in how I structure my work. 2020 is going to be a good year!
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