Simplify Your Domestic Church!

In the past month I've made a new friend and become acquainted with a wonderful apostolate: Abby Sasscer and Home as Haven. Abby's mission is to help Catholic homeschooling moms (or any Catholic moms) simplify and organize their lives. Since she lives in my area, I was able to take advantage of her free home assessment (she accepts a donation to cover her costs). Two weeks ago, she came to my house, went over our entire home, and made recommendations tailored to my needs.

Armed with her pep talk about detachment, simplicity, and generousity, I went through all my storage (some of which hadn't been touched since we moved here three years ago) and gave away nearly two dozen garbage bags of clothes, household goods, books, and toys. What a tremendous difference it has made in our home! My husband is more content, even though most of the clutter was out of sight most of the time. I reorganized my laundry room and have even more plans to optimize it.

Although Abby noted that I already had some organization plans in place, one of my problem areas was labeling containers, so that other family members could take advantage of my "systems." (I suppose I'm one of those people who had the system "all in my head" -- but no one else could ever figure out where things went.) So I've been going through the home making labels -- the ones for the children's rooms were hurriedly written on tape, but now I'm making more sophisticated ones for our public areas, such as the kitchen, on our computer printer with Fontcraft demo fonts.

So I'm very grateful to have found Abby's work, and I encourage you to take advantage of her free downloadable book, Simplifying Your Domestic Church. It's wonderful to have a book on home organization that includes Catholic spirituality: don't we all need more motivation to organize and clean?

And since Abby and I have found that we come to many of the same conclusions despite our different viewpoints (she is motivated by achieving order, I by creating beauty), we are talking eagerly about a joint venture: perhaps a book on housekeeping for Catholics that can incorportate both motivators? Stay tuned, and in the meantime, peruse her book and website!