Functional Cleaning & Organizing with Dana K. White

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Speaker 1: Hi. This is Laura Vandercamp. I'm a mother of five, an author, journalist, and speaker. And this is Sarah Hartunger. I'm a mother of three, a practicing physician and blogger. On the side, we are two working parents who love our careers and our families. Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about how real women manage work, family, and time for fun, from figuring out childcare to mapping out long term career goals. We want you to get the most out of life. Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura. This is episode two hundred and eighty three, airing in the middle of January of twenty twenty three. I'm going to be interviewing Dana K. White, who is known online as a slob comes Clean. We talk a little bit about that wording slob. Neither of us love it, but that is what she is known at now. But she's very much into accessible organizing and decluttering, and indeed her book titles are definitely oriented that way. She's got one called Organizing for the Rest of Us, another that is Decluttering at the Speed of Life. And finally, I think this might be my favorite title, how to manage your home without losing your mind. And lots of people love Dana because she's not going to show you the Instagram perfect sort of this is what it should be. She also assumes you have a million things going on in your life, so you can't take all your possessions out and put them on the floor and this immediately be done with it. She also makes it clear you are not going to be done with decluttering forever, so like, put that thought right out of your mind. It's going to keep happening. So I really enjoyed talking with her. Sarah, I'm curious you have made many decluttering goals in your life. Are there particular clutter issues that you think are an issue for you personally? Well more for our household? So the kids' rooms are a continual source of I just never feel done, And I guess I wouldn't care that much, except I feel like what happens is like there are certain toys or items that the only purpose they seem to have is to make a mess. It's like two minutes are spent playing with them, and like, yet I feel like I've cleaned them up eighty times, And I just would like my life to have less of those things in it and some of the kids rooms. Definitely, my husband sometimes starts projects and doesn't finish them. Now to his credit, there are certain projects that I would probably never start on my own, so it's good that he starts it, but then the messy middle might linger for a long time. For example, our garage started getting cleared out, and a bunch of toys and our kids sleep away camp gear are in our bedroom and have been there for three months now. I need his help to complete the project, but I can't blame him because I probably wouldn't even started the project on my own. So yes, those kind of things are a pay point. And then finally, there are certain surfaces in the kitchen that I just want to be clear, like just I don't know, like it makes me feel better when they're clear. And yet they just suck up papers and kid detroitus like there's a vacuum incorporated into them. So those are my trouble zone. Yeah, yeah, I'm definitely I like to have the kitchen counter clear. I don't know what it is. I like to have it be clear. That just makes me feel like everything is more under control. Of course, that's where people dump stuff because it's very central, right, that's why people dump it there. And you know, I do my best to help everyone move stuff along if things go to their place. And then Michael bless him will get the big idea that like, let's put lots of candy balls on the kitchen counter, like for snacks for the people. I'm like, no, no, not that, not that. It's this one spot that I want to So I moved like the little snack bulls over to the side, covered right so people could grab stuff from there. He's like, I don't think that's a good spot for them. I think it should be more central, like moving up the No, no, no, you're not getting it anyway. But you know, we still have boxes from the move. It's just it's never urgent the stuff that's in it. We clearly don't need the move having happened a year ago. So that's a project that probably needs to happen at some point. But yeah, I'm scared of the messy middle we talk about, Dana and I talk about that that. You know, especially when you do have a complex life, things happen, and so you can't get all this time to organize, and so then if you wind up with piles, you feel even worse than if if it was you know, you never started in the first place. People should check out so Dana K. White has a lot of excellent YouTube videos where she talks through different cleaning and organizing techniques. So if one of your goals for twenty twenty three is to have a neater home, doesn't have to be magazine perfect, but if your goal is just to have a more functional, needer home. She has lots of easily digestible tips, usually about ten minute videos that she's very engaging, so I definitely check out listening to her. My favorite YouTube is planner YouTube and organized YouTube, so I'm super excited to check that out. And on a related note, Best Laid Plans is now on YouTube, so if you're looking for yet another source of distraction, you can go ahead and check that out. After you've watched all of Dana's organizing videos, you can check out my planner stack for twenty twenty three. Yeah, Sarah is now on YouTube putting out content in her new life as a content creator. While she was doing this forever, but now that she's branched out and doing more things, so definitely check out Sarah on YouTube as well, and in the meantime, here we are interviewing Dana K. White on organizing for the rest of us. Well, Sarah and I are delighted to welcome Dana K. White to the program. So, Dana, can you introduce yourself to our listeners. I'm Dana K. White. We were just talking about why I put the K in there. I put the K in there because there's a guy named Dana White who is not me, but he's super famous. He's the UFC guy. So like a lot of times husbands will be like data, why oh, she talks about that data White meaning and organizing. So I'm the one who talks about decluttering primarily home maintenance stuff like that. But it all comes from the perspective of this was the thing I was terrible at, Like my house was a total disaster, and so I wanted to be a writer, and back in two thousand and nine, I basically made a compromise because I wouldn't start writing because my house was such a disaster. I was like, no, no no, no, I got to get this figured out first. And so it was like my compromise to figure out my house. I thought I would make it perfect in a couple of months and then write about things I felt qualified to write about. And it is now much past two thousand and nine and I am still writing about the same thing. But it's because I've learned a lot. I've learned how to keep my house under control. I've also learned that this is part of my personality for it to be a struggle for me, and trying to use traditional decluttering and organizing advice was what was causing the problem. Like it was never going to work for me to do it the way that other people did it, because that's just that's not how my brain works. So I found what does work for me, and this is what I write about now. Yeah, and your online persona, I mean, when people aren't googling the UFC guy you colors a slob comes clean. I'm very curious about that word slob. I mean, what do you mean by that? Like, what was the state of chaos in your life with regards to your stuff. Yeah, so I have to be clear that I hate that word, like I didn't want to use that word. But again, in the beginning, this was supposed to be temporary. I had made up a fake name I was calling myself no NI, which is short for anonymous. I made that up, you know, but I had no intention of anyone knowing it was me. And I used the word slob because that's the word that came to me in this moment where I had this idea to do this temporary thing to keep myself on track, and so I couldn't think of another word. I was wanting to be a writer, but I couldn't think of another word, you know. But I'm ultimately glad I used that word because, first of all, you know, even though yes, I was using a fake name, I had already used the worst possible word, right Like, I had admitted this thing that I had always I had always said, but I'm not a slob. I'm not a slob. And I was like, okay, I've already said slob. Now there's no point in trying to pretend. And so it forced me kind of into being completely honest about what my house was like. But it also ultimately helped me as people identified I was like, oh, this is how my brain works. That was like, oh, okay, I am a creative person and I really struggle in my house. A lot of creative people also struggle in their house. I didn't know that before I started, but I went, oh, okay, this is part of who I am anyway. But as far as what my house was like, it's not like I couldn't have people over. I just needed two weeks to get ready. So I would spend the first week decluttering, which I wasn't actually decluttering. I was stuff shifting. I was shoving everything in the master bedroom because that was the door that I could lock. And then I would spend the second week cleaning, because I you know, even though I like things clean, and I couldn't get to all my surfaces because they were covered in stuff. So I generally had a room in my house that was completely unusable, and it kind of shifted from place to place because I would try to get that room under control, but I wouldn't actually declutter. I'd just moved the things around, and so then another space would become completely unusable. And my house as a whole was consistently very very very embarrassingly messy, like I did not want to have people over. When I say two weeks, I actually mean that, like it's it's funny and I say ha ha ha, but I literally would pretend I wasn't home if somebody ring the doorbell, you know, like it was that bad. I was that embarrassed of my house, you know. So my dining room, which was the first room that people saw, the table was generally completely covered. The floor had stuff all over it. You know, it wasn't a foot deep like it was in that one room that was completely out of control. But it was embarrassing, very embarrassing to me. Although that word embarrassing is interesting because that's social judgment, right. Embarrassment is an emotion that is coming from ways that are different with how we wish to be perceived versus how we think we are being perceived. I mean, did it occurred to you at some point in there that maybe it's like, well, I could have people over anyway, I mean, as long as they sit on a chair. No, no, okay, it was bad enough that I have come a long way. Okay, I've come a long way in that my house is under control. It's still like my kitchen right now, it's messy. But if somebody said they were coming over, give me three minutes and I would have it back in our But it's nowhere near where it was back then. So it's been what I've been doing this for thirteen years or something. My house is very very changed. I have also changed in my perspective of understanding how important it is to have people in my house even when it's not perfect, you know what I mean. Like, I have changed a lot in that and so I now am like, come on in, it does not have to be perfect. And yet this place that I was at, somebody telling me, and I heard that many times, like oh, just show people how you really live. And I was like, yeah, then if you're saying that, you don't understand what it's actually like. Like it was that bad, I mean to the point where the thought would cross my mind. I had young children at the time. The thought would cross my mind that on the wrong day, the wrong person coming in. It made me concerned that someone would report me, you know what I mean. Yeah, that maybe me being dramatic, but those were thoughts that crossed my mind, you know. And it wasn't I could get it to where I could have people over. But again it was basically shoving tons and tons of stuff in the master bedroom, which meant that the master bedroom. I mean, it wasn't until probably the last several years that I've felt comfortable just leaving that door open, partly just from kind of I don't want to say trauma response, but you know, like a response to like, oh no, no, that door has to always be closed. But because that was the dumping ground all the time, and so it always had piles of things that needed to be dealt with. I'm sure we have a lot of listeners who can relate to this, and one of the ways we want to do this episode just to give people sort of practical tips, right because you know, here Dana has reached rock bottom with her you know, stuff everywhere, feeling like, you know, her house might be reported or something, and yet you came up with very practical ways to start making things better. So we were not doing a full Marie condo get everything out of the house, I don't know, on the front lawn or something, and we ditched ninety percent of it. I'm like the opposite of that, but yeah, they like the opposite of that. In fact, before we go to our ad break, I want to talk with the one of the first things you tell people to do, which is to do your dishes. Now, maybe you can back up, because I heard this and I was like, do people not do their dishes every day? Like, maybe you could talk a little bit about that. Yeah, I think that's yeah, there's a lot of people who don't do their dishes every day. So here's basically what it came down to is I'm an overthinker. So I would look at a few dishes in the sink, and if it even registered that they were there, my thought process was, Okay, I am a busy person. I've got a lot going on, and I I don't have time to stop and do the dishes right now. I'm gonna wait till there's enough to really make it worth my time. Well, the next time it even registered in my brain that there were dishes, it was up over the top of the sink, and I was like, ugh, I'm a really busy person. I don't have time to do all those dishes. I'm gonna have to wait until I have time. Well, the next time it ever registered, they were covering all the counters and I was watching a single fork to be able to eat dinner, and it was like between the two inches of water between the bottom of the faucet and the top of the dishes. I mean like that that I call it slow vision. You know, because like I don't see incremental mess I see perfectly clean. I see overwhelmingly messy, but I don't see what's happening in between. But I knew that whenever I said I'm going to get my house clean, I started in the kitchen. Because the kitchen was always a disaster, it makes sense to start in there. And then it would take me hours to get through the kitchen, and then I would never get to the rest of the house. And so when I was at rock bottom and I was like, I don't even know what to do, I just said, I know that people whose houses are under control don't have kitchens like mine, Like their kitchens are under control if you randomly stop by their house. So I was like, I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm just going to try to keep the dishes fin and doing that helped me realize, like, only after doing them every day did I realize one day's worth of dishes only takes like ten minutes. I didn't know that because in my brain I thought doing the dishes is an hour's long task because I was catching up, and so if I did the math, then it was like, well, if it takes five hours to do the dishes. After five days, then it takes an hour every day to do dishes, right, Like, that's just logic, Except that's not how it works, right like, ten minutes to do one day's worth of dishes, But then the second day, if I put it off, takes at least an hour, and then the third day takes hours because I now I'm having to shift all these things around and move it, you know, So it's not just a simple process anymore. But I didn't know that until I was doing them every day. So once I started doing them every day, I was like, oh, this is how people do. You know. It's a quick little task. But I didn't know that because I always put it off. Got it? So do your dishes every day. That is the first first step, and you're to take a whole house. Yeah, I'm sorry, Well it does. Well, we'll take a quick ad break and we will be right back talking about more tips to have a neater house in twenty twenty three. All right, well, we are back with Dana ky White, who is the author of several books on cleaning and decluttering. She is known as a slob comes clean online. Not so sure about the words slob. Neither of us are. But that was how I have a brand, at how it began at the beginning. So we're going to do the dishes every day, and once we have those sort of little things to keep things from getting out of control, it sort of has a flywheel effect, right, yeah, it does. I mean, like when you go back to the reason I started with dishes is that I knew I always started in my kitchen and it always took me hours in my kitchen. Well, once the dishes and therefore the kitchen were not out of control anymore, then it's like I could move on to the next thing so much more quickly. And so because of that change, that's where my house really started to change. And also is a thing too that the person who's overwhelmed and has never felt successful in this before, like I was, it gave me a place to start because before I would do a little bit here, do a little bit there, while that didn't and change my house and so okay, well better come up with a new plan. But knowing, oh no, the dishes, if I can just keep the dishes done, it gave me a place whenever I felt overwhelmed, just do the dishes. And there's something about that that really, you know, bled into the to the rest of the house exactly exactly. So another tip that you share, which, by the way, she shares these great short YouTube videos, So if you are looking for motivation to get your house under control, you should check out Dana kay White's youtubes. They are awesome. One of your tips you had and that struck out as me, is declutter your dishes until they fit in the cabinet, which is really kind of part of a larger theme of cabinet space or containers. Yes, and I wonder if you could talk about this concept of the container defining the amount, because I think that's a pretty revolutionary concept for a lot of people too. Yeah, so this is one of those core well, it really is the core concept of everything that I teach, because it was transformative for me and for my home and how I saw my stuff and ultimately every decluttering question that I am asked, my answer starts out with will it all comes down to the container concept, you know, I mean, this is the thing. So what I'm talking about is I was decluttering one day and I was talking to myself because that's what I do, and I said the word container, and I was like, wait, contain. I always thought of containers as the thing that organized people like, they buy lots of them, they make their house look pretty. I would buy containers because I wanted to be like someone else's house. I wanted my house to be like that. I would bring the containers in, and my space never looked like that. I didn't know what was wrong. Well, when I realized that containers are meant to contain, They're meant to serve as a limit. They're a boundary, I was like, Oh, this is how their containers make their house look nice. My containers just keep it messy. Because I would basically fill a container, I still had stuff that I wanted to keep, and so then I would buy another container, and then another container, and then another container. And then I would go to put those containers on the shelf and they wouldn't fit on the shelf, and I would think, oh, my word, why is this so hard for me? And it seems so easy for everybody else, And so then I would buy another shelving unit, you know, And eventually I basically didn't have any room in my house for the stuff. And so when I realized, oh, a container's purpose is to be a limit. Then it helped me say, Okay, I'm going to fill this container by putting my favorite things in first, and once it's full. There is something about that impersonal boundary making the decision for me that helped me let go of things and helped me identify, oh yeah, out of all of these items like crayons or pens or whatever, these are my favorite, I technically don't need these other three hundred or whatever that I have, you know, like those, I think this is enough. What's in the container is and the container made that decision, and so I apply that to everything in my house. Every shelf is a container, every drawer is a container, every closet, every space my house itself is a container. And when I view it that way, then I let the boundaries make those decisions, and that frees me to make real progress. And part of that progress. Another tip that you give your listeners and viewers is to create a donate spot. And I wonder if you could talk about how that is a small habit, a small change that people could make that might help them make real progress on the decluttering front. Yeah. So, I you know, at one point I thought I will declutter my house, and then I will be done and I will never have to declutter again. And that's what most people who are overwhelmed to clutter. They just think there will come a time where I'm done with this. Well, as I decluttered and kept decluttering, and then life kept happening, and then I kept having to declutter more, I realized the reason some people's houses don't have clutter is because they're always decluttering. That's just reality. And realizing that sounds like it could be defeating, and yet it's actually a relief to realize, Okay, it's not that I've failed because new stuff has come in my house. It's just that in order to have a house to cunder control, I constantly have to be getting rid of stuff. And so realizing that made me decide I want to just live a life of constantly getting rid of things. And because of that, you know, it helps to have a donate spot where everybody in the family knows where that is. And as my family saw me getting rid of stuff that they once thought I would never get rid of, then they started to change their relationship with their stuff, and we just as a family as something came along that it was like, oh, these pants aren't great, or this toy is you know, I'm not really playing with this anymore. I don't, you know, I've outgrown this. Okay, Well, there's a donate box, so everybody knows where that is, and it just becomes part of that family dynamic of this is what we do, we get rid of stuff, and having that allows that to happen easily. And the donate box is only part of it, right because yeah, yeah, well another one of your tips that and I've done this too, and I'm sure many people have you said throw the pin away, So yeah, if maybe go into that a little bit, Yeah, yeah. So it's funny how much this impacts people because I we're talking about a pen, but we're really talking about a whole way of thinking about your stuff. You know. Is this How many times have I in my lifetime tried to write with a pin? It didn't work, and I stick it back in the drawer, either because it's automatic or because I'm thinking, well, if one day, if I was really desperate, then I would you know, run it under hot water or you know, whatever it is that I might be able to do, or find some YouTube video that shows me how to revive dead pins or I don't know. So that mentality of just automatically keeping versus in this moment when I realize this item is not useful going ahead and getting rid of it. I'm going to go ahead and throw it away immediately. And it's a mindset that is easy to identify and practice with pens. That then starts to change how I think about all of my stuff. But for right now, just throw away the pen. Just make a decision over the course of twenty twenty three that if you come across a pen that is not working, instead of putting it in the drawer, just throw it away, make that small decision, and that will incriminally start to change your house, but also start to change how you think about stuff. Yeah, it's not going to magically write in the future like I hope. But I really thought that. I mean I didn't really think that, but you know what I mean, Like the action I was taking showed that that was what I was thinking. Yeah, you are known for your two decluttering questions. So once we've started throwing away our pen, we're doing our dishes. You know, we got our donate spot. As you are maybe attacking some of them the more problematic areas in the house. As you are going through the piles of stuff, there are two questions that you ask yourself about every object. I wonder if you could talk about those with us. I have seen lists of ten twelve decluttering questions, and that's kind of a lot of questions. I mean, I feel like people are just coming up with a prenible right, But I've seen those lists that I was always like, yeah, I mean, I'm sure if you had Grandma's such and such that you were trying to make some big decision about. Okay, I can see that. But I had so much stuff in my house. My house was so out of control that I was like, I got to do this quickly. And so as I was decluttering, I didn't decide ahead of time, As I was just trying to figure it out and getting stuff out of my house. I came up with two questions that allowed me to make super fast, non emotional progress. Because if I let myself ask questions like do I need this? Will I ever use this? Is this valuable? I'm gonna keep everything. That's why I had it all in my house, right, So I had to come up with very practical ways to make fast decisions. So the first question is if I needed this item, where would I look for it first? Okay, Now the key there is the word would, not the word should if I and people accidentally ask should sometimes like if you start asking yourself where should this go? Well, if you already knew where it should go, then it's already there, right like you can just take it there, but it's long as you're looking at this item, and you're just like I. Then I asked myself the question where would I look for this first? Like literally, if I was looking for I'm looking around at my desk right now, this microphone stand. Where's the first place in my house that I would look? What's the first cabinet that I would open whatever in the moment, Not that I am confident it's going to be there, but just where would I look first? And then I take it there right now? And that is actually the key to my decline process. So my decluttering process is designed to make progress and only progress and never cause you to end up with a bigger mess as you get distracted, I mean especially young moms, right like, if you have kids, distractions are guaranteed. Like that's the one thing in your life that's guaranteed is you're going to have to stop in the middle of something. Well in that hole pull it out, all out process that a lot of people recommend for decluttering, which I do not recommend. Then you've pulled everything out, or you've set things aside, or you've decided what you're going to do with something and you put it in a pile to do later because you think you're being more efficient. But then life happens and you either have to ask yourself that question again or that stuff is outside the space. So anyway, so the take it there now is key. So like, as I have an answer to where what I look for this first, I take it to that place right now. It forces me to deal with reality because maybe that place actually already has six of this same item or whatever. But I am doing that and so that at any moment when I get distracted that I've I've only made progress because that item is there. I haven't left anything in a halfway thing. If I can't answer that first question, if I'm like, oh, then I asked myself the second question, which is if I needed this item, would it ever occur to me that I already had one because I didn't have a place I would go looking for it, because it would never occur to me that I had one, which means if I needed it, I would have gone out and bought another one, would have ordered one, I would have done without. But as long as I just keep things because I think, oh, well, but I might need it someday, if I didn't know that I had it, so I wouldn't have gone looking for it, then I'm just going to end up with more of those same things in my house. And so I put the value on the space being functional and decluttered as opposed to the potential cost of me having to go out and replace this item at some point. And when I read your books, those questions struck me as very useful, and particularly the idea of taking it where it needs to go now, because then that skips over the whole existence of these in your mediate piles. Yes, and I think the piles is where a lot of people get tripped up, right, Yeah, I mean, that's that is people's number one frustration with decluttering. It's the number one reason people put off decluttering is because it feels like well, from the experience they've had in the past, like, what always gets worse before it gets better. So I don't want to start right now because I don't know for sure that I can finish. And especially when you have young kids, you're like, well, what am I ever going to know that I can finish? You know, I'm gonna have to wait until the kids are at camp, or I'm gonna have to wait until my mom takes them for a weekend, or I'm gon actually have to wait till they start school or whatever. I mean, like that is how the brain goes, and so you just keep putting it off. It gets more overwhelming than that makes you feel like you need even more time. So it's just this process that happens wherein when you are taking it there right now that allows you to say, I can declutter for two minutes, five minutes, an hour, and as long as I'm taking it there right now, I can stop at any point. And I don't have those piles. I don't have a box a keep box, you know. I mean, if you've seen I don't actually get on TikTok, but I hear from people They're like, oh, people are talking about doom boxes on TikTok, and I'm like, yeah, those are former keep boxes where people were just like, yeah, I do want this, and so I stick it in a keep box. Well, if you have a keep box, what does that mean? It doesn't actually mean anything. It's not decluttered because it doesn't have an actual home. It has to either have an actual home in my house or it has to leave. And the way I determine the home is where I would look for it first, and then by taking it there now I embrace the reality of that space. Where as long as it's kind of an ambiguous idea in my head of oh yeah, yeah, I would look for this first in the master bathroom. Well, by taking it there now, then I'm actually acting on that and finding out, oh, there is a place for it here or you know what I mean, or I already have six yes exactly. And I think the reason people will resist that is You're like, well, it sounds like I'm going to be climbing the stairs constantly. I was like, well, okay, who among us does not need more steps in our lives? Like just you know, put on your pedometer and be happy about the fact that you're going up and down the stairs ten times as opposed to you know, you maybe get to skip the gym that day, so you've found it. And it doesn't have to be one item at a time, like you can take anything that you can carry in your hands, not in another thing that goes on that direction to that thing. But you know, I hear from people all the time who say, I didn't think I could do that because physical limitations, blah blah blah. And yet when I did it, the reality of actually being finished with a few small things as opposed to halfway done and messier because I started this big, huge project and then ran out of energy. I get so much farther when I take it there, Nail, like it just it works, it works, it works. So this was a particular question that my co host wanted to make sure I asked, which is, if you have tips for helping kids organize and declutteres or is that doing stuff for other people that we just cannot do. I don't know what I mean. I think with kids it's a different story, right because you are you're the grown up. You know, you're the director of these kinds of things. And so yeah, absolutely, I do think it's important to distinguish between decluttering and organizing because it feels like they're the same thing, but they are not the same thing. And what I experienced was just decluttering is what changed my house because when I had had this idea that I needed to get organized, then I was thinking of systems and things to implement, and I wasn't actually getting started. Where when I just said I'm just going to get rid of stuff, that's when my house started to change and ended up functioning the way I had envisioned when I thought I needed to get organized, just by getting the excess out of there. So with kids, that's especially important to say, we're not going to have big dreams of how this is going to look in the end. We're just going to go in and we're going to start through the decluttering process. And my decluttering process works really well with other people because it doesn't deal with emotions or value. It's basically just we're going to deal with the realities of this space, which means there's not a power struggle that goes on. So start with you know, my first step is trash. Just start with trash and let them identify the trash, which is hard as a mom to not be like, oh my word, that is trash, right, there, but like, let them do that, say, let's just get rid of the trash. Okay. Then the next step is the easy step. Is there anything in your space that actually goes somewhere else in the house, Let's get that out of here. And every time you get something out, that feeling of being overwhelmed lessens a little bit. You're seeing some progress and then asking those two decluttering questions. So within this room or wherever, where would you look first for your lego batman? You know? Okay, I would look for them in that container. We're going to take it there right now. And just going through this process helps them really start to see how this is supposed to work. Because kids, they may not understand all of that, but the beauty of the container concept is how well it works with kids and other people, and that is, Okay, you love your stuffed animals. Nobody's going to say that any of these stuffed animals are not valuable, because that will guarantee, I mean, that's guaranteed to make your kid hold on to it tighter, right like they you know, they love these stuffed animals great. Absolutely, this is the space that we have for stuffed animals. This is the shelf that we have, so put your favorite ones on there first. And that's fun, right, Like, it's fun to pick your very favorite ones put them on the shelf. And as you do that, then casually mention that if whatever doesn't fit, we'll have to get rid of, you know, but let's just focus on putting your favorite ones in there first. And the container concept lets every answer be yes, which is the beauty of it. So you don't have to have the conversation where you're trying to say, but you never play with this, but blah blah. You don't have to do that. You get to say, put your favorite ones on there first. And then if they come up with other ones and now it's full and they say, oh, but I love this one, the answer is yes, you can absolutely keep that. What are you willing to get rid of that's on the shelf, so we can make the space for you to put it on the shelf, right, Okay, So it's like, what can we take away to give space for this item? And then if they say, oh, I can't do that, Oh I'm so sorry, it is so hard, I know, but I have to keep it. Okay, then what are you willing to get rid of, Like it's always a yes. And then if they say, but mom, I want to keep all of my stuffed animals, they say, sure, you can do that. So are you what other you know, do you want to get rid of your race tracks or your I don't know, my kids are older now, but you know, like your legos or something. You know, what are you willing to get rid of so that we can have more space for stuffed animals, because it's the space that is making those hard calls and not you as the mom. Does that make sense? And it works amazingly well with kids, Like it worked when my kids were little, and I hear from people on a pretty much a daily basis who are like, I didn't think this would actually work with my kid who tends to hold on to everything, And yet it does because the container just naturally sorts out in a fun way, honestly, what they love and what they don't love as much. Yeah, I mean I would throw in here that you could have a few extra containers in the kids room. I mean, you know, we don't have to make it look like a magazine, right, Like it doesn't have to be a minimalist paradise because I am not a minimalist by any means, but it is the space determines and that the reality there is that the room itself is a container and they need play space first, and so it's like, give them space, but it's not that you can't add another container. And yet if adding another container means that there's no room to play, then that defeats the purpose of this space, right, So letting those containers be the decision makers, that's it's huge, Dan. It we always end with a love of the week, something that is working for us right now in our lives. I can go first, so that you know, we I'm really appreciating that we have sort of six drawers on the side of our kitchen cupboard, which is where you would normally have a junk drawer, which you know, I'm sure the whole thing in the decluttering world where people have hard feelings about junk orwards or whatever I have. Well, we can actually have six random drawers. So now things that might have gone in there are sort of spread out into each of these drawers, and so it makes it easier to have a bit more function form. So we have a drawer that has the flashlights and batteries and a drawer that has the art supplies that the kids use in the kitchen, an a drawer with the little plastic baggies for making lunches. You know. You see how this is going. Yeah, and it's great. It's been really functional. So I've been glad for that element of kitchen design. How about you, what's working for you right now? Well, I hate to mention an expensive thing, but it was an investment, you know that. It took me years to decide, and I'm like, oh no, I love it. And that's my robot vacuum. Ooh yeah. I had not had one for a long time, and then I got one, and I got like the cheaper version that I was going to have to remember to start it, and then I was going to have to remember to empty it, and then it just kind of sat there and I never did much with it, you know, And so I finally was like, I think there was a sale at one point, and I was like, I think I'm going to do this, the one that has its own vacuum bag where it like empties itself and it's honesting and I got it, and I did not know how much I would love it. We have a German shepherd. They shed like crazy, you know, and it's like, oh wow, my aps look so much better because it's you know, going three times a week and you could set it to start when you leave the house, which is crazy to me, Like I didn't know all this. But I will say the one thing I am anti notifications on my phone, Like I do not like notifications, and so I always say no when they say do you want to send you notifications? And yeah, but I went back and changed that because it is very helpful for them to say, oh, Dusty got stopped and he got stuck somewhere, and I'm like, okay, yeah, so that has been a worthy notification for me. That's been helpful. But yeah, that has really been fantastic. And I have to say, as the person who thirteen years ago loved the idea of a robot vacuum and yet was scared because my house was always such a disaster that I was like, that wouldn't even work, it also is kind of a yeah, I can totally do this now and this is amazing. You have floors that actually could be vacuum yeah, which is a major breakthrough. Yeah awesome. All right, Well, people wanted there you go, a testament for the robot vacuum. There, Dana, thank you so much for coming on the program. Can you just let our listeners know where they can find you? So I'm all over the internet, as Dana K. White. You can look up a slob comsclean dot com. That's where you basically would find all of my home based information. Awesome, Well, thank you so much for joining. Yes, thanks for having me on. Well, that was great. It's always fun to hear tips that are practical that can make a big difference. Don't seem like they're so insurmountable that you know we won't even start them. You know, actually have a cleaner house. In twenty twenty three, I have resolved to throw away pens that don't work. When I discover that they don't work, they should go in the trash can, not back in the door. I think that's an excellent mindset in general. So, Sarah, can you read our listener question for this week? Yes, she writes, I know you've covered this topic a bit before, but I've been reading your blog and lag Live. That's one of our prior guests, and somebody who wrote a post on this topic over and over again, as well as random message boards about having a third child. But now five years on from having three, that's in my case, how do you find it? She writes, I know the logical answer is wait until I have two. This person is currently pregnant with her second and has a child at home, And while I'm fortunate to be expected that second baby, the planner in me really craves a better idea of whether this is going to be my last pregnancy or not. I'm not someone who seems to be naturally fertile, or rather, I have to stop running entirely to do so, which I guess isn't much compared to what some people must go through, but it feels like a lot to me. Also, I adore my son, but the sleepless nights were very long, and we still aren't always as sure to rest all night. Nearly two years in. Finally we're in daycare, and the relentless illnesses while both working full time has been much harder than I had accounted for. I worry having a third will mean I won't have as much time for the older kids. Again, when I feel like we'll be in a sweet spot, my illness is very amenable to outings and a sweet natured kid. I worry if we do stop it. Two will my heart always long for that third that never was? And are all the above reasons really that much of a challenge in the bigger picture? Oh, my goodness, lots to unpack there, I would say. People have heard me say this on the podcast before. This is probably one of the most common questions we get. And I don't know if it's because Sarah and I both do have more than two kids, and so it's something that people do bring up. But the question of whether people it's generally whether people should have a third kid. We don't get a whole lot of questions like should I have a fourth or fifth kid? I don't know. Maybe by that point people aren't writing into podcast hosts about that question. But we do get the question fairly frequently of should I have a third kid, which, of course we cannot answer for any of you. That is absolutely up to you, and you know your partner, if you have a partner to make that decision. That said, a few thoughts, Sarah, you want to one so I like Tangentially, I don't know this person, but I've known her over the years and I know she loves to plan, but I would advise this is one of those cases I really just don't think it's time to plan yet. I would advise against planning. There's just too many variables to spend energy worrying about when you're just pregnant with number two, and I just don't think there's really much of a downside to just trying to leave things open in your mind. Or maybe if you do feel like you need a plan, make a plan to weigh the pros and cons when your second kid is of a certain age, Like, I'm not going to think about it now, but this will be something to revisit when my younger child turns too, because honestly, I didn't even want a third kid. When Cameron was one years old, I was like, eh, we're good, and it wasn't until later. So I guess I just don't think I would trust what your feelings are going to be in the future. It may become very very obvious in one direction or another, and so this is like wasted kind of fretting. And then the other thing I'll mention is, you know you mentioned stopping running to get pregnant. I will put a gentle who cares on that, and I know, like I needed to hear that myself when I was having very similar issues. I also, for my first pregnancy, really needed to stop running very much to get pregnant. It wasn't really the case with the other two. But I wasn't running that much. And I don't think this person is a pro runner. I am certainly not a pro runner. And so if you want another baby, the temporary pause in your running is just in the grand scheme of things, It's just no big deal, Like who cares. Maybe your cumbo back won't be as strong, doesn't matter. And I've learned that as an older, wiser, slower person, and I'm enjoying running more now and wherever it takes me, it'll take me. But like what I was going to run back in twenty fifteen, my twenty twenty two, twenty twenty three meters, like who cares? That was over and if you want another baby, that should take priority in my opinion. Okay, I'm done. Yeah, No, I was just thinking about that. It could be a similar situation with you too. I mean that you were running so much when you were trying to get pregnant with Annabel, Will you're first. Like again like by the time you have a toddler, like, there just isn't as much time available for the intense running training. So she may actually not have the same issue. I mean, I don't know. I'm not her, I don't know her, don't know her medical issues or whatever, but that actually may not come up at all. I don't know. You could try and then if it's not happening after a month or two, then scale back on the running or whatever. In the grand scheme of things, that probably won't happen all that much. But yeah, no, I wasn't sure that this was It was just funny. It was we don't know if anyone should have a third kid or not. But I thought it was funny to ask the question of Sarah, like five years in, are you happy? What's she going to say? Like, I'm super happy I did it. But I do think that people who ask that question of people who have more than three kids, they want a certain answer, and I'm happy to provide it. I am so glad that we had a third kid. I actually, I do think it's like a level of chaos that I enjoy, or a level of challenge and a level of camaraderie in the family. That is a lot of fun, and I am pretty It's hard to know, but I think that I would be sad about not have hading, like if we had chosen not to do it, or if we were unable to have a third I think it would have been kind of sad about it. So yeah, if that helps, I'm glad to share it. Yeah, I'm not just recognizing it. She's already pregnant with number two, so maybe she did have to stop running to get pregnant with number two. I think, I get back here. I'm like, wait a minute, No, I messed up that order of things that I have friends who had like two IVF babies and then one surprise baby. So you also never know what will happen. You never know. Yeah, but I assume, yes, if she was writing to you about it, than she probably does in fact, think she would like to have a third kid. But it's the kind of thing it's hard to know. I mean, yeah, number two, things may go differently than you anticipate, in which case that may be something that you no longer want to pursue or maybe so go a different way. And not only do you want number three you want number four and five, So who knows. We'll hear back from her in a couple of years perhaps, but very much an individual question for anyone. Well, this has been best of both worlds. I was interviewing Dana K. White about how to have a neater home in twenty twenty three. We will be back next week with more on making work in life fit together. Thanks for listening. You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com or at the Underscore Shoebox on Instagram, and you can find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This has been the best of both worlds podcasts. Please join us next time for more on making work and life work together.