Sunday, January 10, 2010

Car Organization

I am pretty anal retentive about organization in my car. There is a good reason why I am like this. The main reason is that once upon a time I used my vehicle for business purposes and would often find myself driving other coworkers or even my boss around in my car during work. I never wanted to embarrass myself in front of my peers or managers by having a filthy car. Hence my ongoing habits about keeping my car clean stemmed mostly from that.

And I think that's a good thing. But it certainly is not easy always carrying 4 kids around. They do have a tendency to drop things, leave their toys or games on the floor, or just leave the car in general disarray.

But I have discovered a few tricks that I do all of the time that help to combat these issues.

1. Keep a small garbage bag in the car at all times. I found a neat one similar to this one
and hang it around the neck of the front seat headrest. The kids know that any and all garbage goes in here. I empty it whenever I get gas.

2. Keep a small towel under the seat of the car or in the trunk. You never know when you will have a spill or a sick child. The towel can be pulled out for easy cleanup!

3. I always keep a small box of wipes in the car for reasons similar to #2. If there are any spills and you need something wet to clean up then these are perfect. Your kids might need to wipe their hands for some reason. The wipes are great for this.

4. Keep a stash of quarters in the glove box. I religiously vacuum my car at the gas station using one of those mega-powered vacuum cleaners. They are great for crumbs or for the clay that my sons drag in during baseball season. Your car will always look great when you give it a routine vacuum and you will feel visually peaceful not to have to look at cluttered floors and seats.

5. Clean out the surface clutter in your car every time you go home. When my husband was driving and we would pull up to our house, he would always say "I will get my stuff later" and he would then never do it. Eventually after days, it would look like a pigpen with papers and junk everywhere. I finally got him into the habit of not procrastinating and that means taking your stuff with you from the car to the house as soon as you arrive home. Try to stick to that habit and you will see how much better your car looks because of it.

6. I keep a first aid kit in the trunk of the car. It's like insurance. Hopefully you will never need to use it but in case you do, you will be not be sorry you did it.

A lot of these ideas are not difficult or costly to implement but the benefits are so tremendous. You will soon find that your car is no longer a junk pile and will no longer be embarrassed to have people riding in it.

2 comments:

Kara said...

Great tips! I need one of those trash cans for sure:)

Terry said...

Kara - thanks for your comment. I have been using my trash can for a few years now and it's a godsend. The best $20 I ever spent.