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Taking Care of Your Home in Confinement

By Annelyse Gaston-Carrre

Graduate Student

It鈥檚 official: here we are, confined for an unforeseeable amount of time. As the weeks pass by it can be hard to find activities to stay busy. However, this confinement period is the perfect occasion to redecorate your home with what you already have on hand. Below are some easy tips to help you get started.

Cleaning

1. Go room by room

In order to properly sort out your house, focus on cleaning one room at a time. Once you have chosen your first room, start by sorting out everything hiding in the drawers, in the cupboards and on the shelves. You will quickly accumulate a pile of objects that you have not used in a long time. Take your time when sorting聽through your things;聽you can decide to do either one room per day or dedicate an entire week for sorting through everything. It all depends on the size of the room and how much聽free time you have. The important thing is to go at your own pace.

2. Keep it or toss it?

It鈥檚 always difficult to part ways with聽possessions 鈥撀爀ven more so when they have sentimental value. When deciding whether to keep or toss something, ask yourself these questions: How useful is this object? Can I live without it? Am I ready to get rid of it? Be honest and sort accordingly.听

Reorganizing

Once you鈥檝e finished cleaning everything out, it鈥檚 time to reorganize.听Having a well-arranged room can make聽your home feel聽more elegant. It聽can聽also create聽a feeling of serenity when everything is in its place. There are a few easy ways to get started reorganizing. Start by putting unneeded items in storage. With warm days coming our way, replace the聽winter clothes in your closet with t-shirts, shorts and dresses. Make sure to keep some jeans and sweaters just in case, then put the rest in storage in your closet, under your bed, or wherever you have space tucked away. Next, rethink your storage spaces. If聽you have a bookcase, rearrange it by sorting out your books by size, genre or alphabetical order. You can even add a few items to decorate the bookcase.

Rearranging your home

1. Save space

Confinement is also the perfect time to move your furniture around to save as much space as possible. Doing this once or twice a year can create the feeling of having a brand new home without spending anything!

Try repositioning your couch, tables or lamps, but keep a few things in mind. First, locate your room鈥檚 electrical outlets and figure out where your lamps, computer chargers and other electronics need to be. Be aware of natural lighting as well. For example, if you have a desk, you don鈥檛聽want to have the sun鈥檚 reflection on your laptop鈥檚 screen. Test and move things around until you find the perfect layout.

2. Harmonize

When decorating a home, harmony is important, and balancing the number of different colors in a room is the number one rule in decoration. If your bedroom has white walls, a gray bed, green night tables and a blue mat, the amount of color might create visual confusion. Instead, try to match the color of the night tables with the bed and add a white or a black mat. This will create a more elegant and serene environment. You can also add a brighter color (e.g.听yellow or red) by adding lamps, small statues or paintings that make the room livelier. Above all, stay constant and don鈥檛 mix too many colors.

Arrange an Office Corner聽

Being confined with family can be great, but it can make working more difficult. To stay focused, create a space where you can isolate yourself and concentrate.

1. Pick a room

If you don鈥檛 have a home office, choose one where you know you will be able to focus. If you work in your kitchen or living room, use the tables or kitchen counters as a desk. If you live in a small apartment you can use half of your table or the top of a low shelf.

2. Customize your office

Next, start customizing your work space. Add green plants near your computer or tape a planner on the wall to keep up with meetings and stay organized. For a personal touch, add family photos or your children鈥檚 drawings.

You can find more interior design tips and learn more about Annelyse Gaston-Carr猫re's work on her blog,

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