Create a Home Mail Processing Center

We may not be sending handwritten letters to our friends anymore, but there's always something still in the mailbox.  I wanted to give you three tips on how to create a home mail processing center.

1. Assign a home for incoming mail.  Whether it's the corner of the table in the hallway or a paper tray on your kitchen counter, you need a specific, designated spot for the mail once it comes into your home.  Nothing else lives in that spot. Whether you process your mail daily, weekly, or whenever you get around to it, at least you know ALL the mail is right there waiting for you.

2. Keep the following items near where you open your mail:

• Recycle bag or bin for openned envelopes and junk mail
• Shredder for any paper that has sensitive information but you don't need to keep
• Letter openner to prevent papercuts

3. Have specific, designated homes for papers when you BARF, or process your mail:

• Bills
• Action Items
• Reading Material
• File-able Papers

This can be as simple as writing "Bills," "Action," "Read", and "File" on sticky notes and making four piles on your desk.

You can also watch this vlog post by my colleague Susan Stone about how she processes her mail.

Amanda Darlack is a professional organizer with Living Peace LLC and a preschool teacher at Gordon-Conwell Nursery School in South Hamilton.

Image: Felixco, Inc., FreeDigitalPhotos.net