Create kits to stay organized

Keep things you use together in the same place

About six months ago, I shared a tip on my Before Breakfast podcast about mailing a check right after writing it. You don’t want things lingering in limbo!

That tip inspired a listener named Carolyn to write me about a related strategy. She told me that she keeps her check book in a little tub with stamps, envelopes, an address book, and address labels. She calls this her “bill-paying kit.”

It turns out that Carolyn also has a make-up kit, a cross-stitching supplies kit, a kit for the dog’s pills that includes soft treats to hide them in, and even a kit to hold the three cereals she combines most mornings for her breakfast.

I love this idea of creating kits for things you use together. Some things in life serve multiple purposes, but some almost always work together with the same teammates. Chances are, if you’re putting on concealer, you’re also putting on your mascara, so it makes sense to store them together. And if you ever move to a different place to put on your make-up, you’ll want to keep those things together in the process of moving them. A make-up kit serves that purpose.

Likewise, if you cross-stitch like Carolyn, you’re always going to use the same supplies together. But you might want to cross-stitch in the living room, or in your bedroom, or maybe on the porch if it’s nice out. So it makes sense to keep everything together in one movable container.

So why not think of some kits that would keep you organized — or that would encourage desired behaviors? Before I hired a cleaning service, I filled a little caddy with a toilet brush, cleaning spray, and paper towels, and then toted that around to our various bathrooms. Our dog has a little overnight bag with an extra leash and his special food that goes with him to the dog sitter’s when he stays there. After a few unfortunate times of dashing around the house to find athletic equipment, we almost universally store the kids’ stuff for each sport in its own bag. If something leaves the bag to go get washed, it must go back in immediately afterwards.

Now, as you might imagine, the existence of a bathroom cleaning kit does not actually make cleaning the bathrooms more fun. But creating the kit did lower the transaction costs of starting the project.

I find that boost in efficiency is particularly helpful for fun projects that are less likely to happen if you do have to do a lot of hunting. If working on your cross-stitch project involves finding the floss in one drawer, a scissors somewhere else, and then finding the pattern where you left it upstairs and hauling all of this down to the first floor where the light is better, you might give up or get distracted somewhere in the middle. If everything’s all together? The fun is more likely to happen.

And hey, kits are just kind of satisfying on their own. I know I’m always tempted to bid on various kits (muffin baking kit! Pizza making kit!) at fundraising auctions. Creating your own satisfies that same urge — and may nudge you to do something a little more often than you otherwise would. Or at least not keep hunting for stamps every time you need to mail a payment!