This week I want to share a small project that made a big impact in my kitchen – not too overwhelming and sooooo useful!

First, if you’d like, I wrote this a while ago, for more specifics:

Your Command Center: Knowledge is Power

Your command center is the information hub of your home.  Perhaps it’s a desk, maybe just a kitchen counter or table near the door.  But everyone and every home needs one.

Calendars and schedules, contact lists and team rosters, incoming mail and bills to pay, school supplies and reference materials.  Yep, all of this can be in a command center.

I reworked ours last week.  It took less than an hour, and this is the after picture.  I wanted to post it first, since it is a nice visual, and it makes me happy.

The command center surface is not large (by design), but it is in the kitchen, the very center of our home. That keeps it front and center, accessible to everyone – but that also means that it gets cluttered, and when it does, I have to look at it all the time.  And that occasionally drives me crazy.  So here are the before and after pictures, and my comments:

• Always start with a plan.  I know what I do and don’t like about our current arrangement, plus what I wanted the updated space to look like.
• I cleared everything off, and wiped down the space.
• I moved some books out that belonged on other bookshelves, and I even (gulp) got rid of the desk encyclopedia.  I kept the dictionary, thesaurus and bible, because I encourage my boys to actually look stuff up instead of asking Google.  However, the desk encyclopedia was mine.  From high school.  And that was a loooong time ago.  So it went away.
• Before, I had trays available on the kitchen desk for each child.  Not surprisingly, while school papers and assignments moved in and out, other stuff just piled up.  So the sloppy side-by-side trays were replaced by a vertical tray.  Much better.
• I powered through the school supplies, and ruthlessly purged what the boys don’t or won’t use.  Buh-bye.
• The charging cords and surge protector still drive me crazy, but I’ve been keeping the cords clipped up when not in use, or in the desk drawer underneath.  And I received a very cool product to review for an upcoming blog that may help with this, so more later…
• I went with “pretty”.  I don’t always care what my organizing tools look like, but since this area is seen by anyone walking through my house, I invested in matching and attractive items.  Nice, clean lines.  Ahhhhh…. (that is a contented sigh, by the way)
• A vitally important but often neglected part of a Command Center is the day-to-day attention and maintenance.  I made sure that only current information was present in the Command Center.
• I recently read a suggestion, to have a “waiting” folder, with items waiting for follow up.  Like rebates, reimbursements, copies of applications, etc.  So I added one to our existing files.
• So, in under an hour, I improved the look of the most lived-in room in the house, pared down and cleaned up our information, and cleared some clutter. Look around – Do you have a Command Center?  Is it time for an update?!  Give it a try!