Reduce Paper Clutter...Say What?!

We are gearing up for spring cleaning in our home...at least, our son is.  He wants to spring clean in the WORST way.  Good for him!  I'm proud of him for taking initiative and wanting to clean up.  Our daughter...she wants to dust the furniture.  And that is good, too!  I'm proud of her as well (she's only 4; I take what I can get...).

Before we can do anything spring cleaning-related, we have to clean up the piles of papers in the kitchen.  Lots of instruction manuals, guides and warranties sitting around from Christmas, and some broken appliances that needed replacing.  You know how it is.

I started doing this years ago...I found it on the Internet at least a decade ago, and I've been doing this ever since.  Now it's my turn to share with you!

Get yourself a 3-ring binder (or more than one; in fact, I need another one), those handy-dandy plastic paper inserts, and all your papers that are laying around gathering dust.

Plastic inserts...ooooooohhhh

Sort out your papers, should you desire, into sections - toys, appliances, misc, whatever floats your boat.

File your shtuff!

Put each paper into a plastic insert; or, if the paper has only one side, reduce even more by utilizing front and backs in each insert!

Pop those filled inserts into your binder, and voila!  You have a neat, tidy binder to refer to whenever you need those oh-so-important papers.  They won't get lost!  Any time you have a new paper, shove it in your inserts in your binder!  You'd be amazed at how much space it cleans up!

Look how nice that looks!

Go crazy with it. You know, you can do this with any kind of paper...bills, recipes, how-to things from the internet, kiddie papers, anything!  I have at least 3 recipe binders in my cabinet.  I use it all the time, especially at the holidays!  It is so handy, and keeps the recipes from getting dirty while I'm cooking and baking!

Easy peasy!

Happy paper sorting!!!!  And, hey, you know, if you have stuff you don't need anymore, you know where you can easily find the instructions!  That way, you can include the whole thing when you sell or donate your items!