Home Organization When You're Living Somewhere Temporary

Here is my very sophisticated home organization process.

I see the mess. I stare at the mess. I walk away from the mess thinking, this really needs to be fixed.

Then I come back, see the exact same mess, and think — with considerably more conviction — no, seriously, this needs to be fixed.

Repeat indefinitely.

Until one day something snaps and I become completely unstoppable. I research. I measure. I find bins, baskets, drawer dividers designed by people who have clearly never shoved an entire category of belongings into a drawer five minutes before company arrives.

I find the solution. I order the solution. The solution arrives.

And then the solution sits next to the problem.

For weeks.

Waiting for me to organize the thing I bought to help me organize the thing.

I know. No comments needed here.

Home Organization Is Strange When the Home Isn't Really Home Yet

We're living somewhere temporary right now, and it makes everything harder in ways I didn't see coming.

I don't want to spend a fortune perfecting a place we're going to leave. But we're also living here — every single day. My daughter is growing here. My husband and I are working here. Meals are being cooked, coffee is being spilled, ordinary Tuesday nights are happening right here in this temporary kitchen.

So there's this line I keep trying to walk.

Don't bother, you're leaving eventually — versus — but this is still your actual life.

What I actually want is simple. I want mornings to feel easier. I want to reach for something in the kitchen and find it where I left it. I want to sit down at my desk and work instead of first relocating a small pile of objects that have no business being there. I want fewer tiny, draining decisions before 9 AM.

I'm not chasing a perfect home.

I'm chasing less friction.

Buying the System Is Not the Same as Using It

I currently own a shoe cabinet.

The shoes are not in it.

The shoes are exactly where the shoes were before the cabinet arrived. The cabinet's contribution to our household so far has been existing near the shoes and, I imagine, feeling quietly disappointed.

To be fair — and I want to be very fair here — this was a group project.

My husband also saw the cabinet. My husband also walked past the shoes. My husband, who loves efficiency and researching solutions and figuring out how things can work better, has also not put a single shoe in it.

We are in this together. Equally. Symmetrically. United in our commitment to almost organizing the shoes.

This is a pattern. I spot a problem, research it thoroughly, order something to fix it, and then place that something right next to the problem while life continues happening around both of them. Eventually I get annoyed enough by the original mess and the unopened solution sitting beside it that I actually do the thing.

And then — without fail — I lose my mind about it.

I stand there staring at a newly organized drawer like I've discovered something extraordinary.

Why didn't we do this months ago?

My husband knows exactly why. He lets me have the moment anyway.

That's love.

The Pretty Basket Debate

He and I agree on most things when it comes to organizing. He likes systems, efficiency, figuring out how things can work better. We're on the same team.

Except for one small philosophical difference.

I believe function and form matter. He believes in function and occasionally wants clarification on why we need another basket.

"What's that one for?"

I look at the beautiful woven basket that fits the space perfectly and think — what kind of question is that?

"It'll hold things."

"What things?"

"Things, babe. Things."

He holds the radical belief that before purchasing a container, we should know what goes in it. Which, fine. Is fair. Marriage really does find your blind spots and shine a light directly on them.

Our Two-Year-Old Has Different Ideas

My daughter's approach to home organization is deconstruction.

I build a system. She studies it. Then she takes it apart — not to be difficult, just because she's two and a neatly organized toy basket is not a finished project to her. It's an invitation.

She is, essentially, our quality control department.

If the system can't survive her, it was never going to survive this family. And honestly? That's useful information. Because any system that requires everyone in this house to behave like a professional organizer is not a system. It's a wish.

I need routines built for the people we actually are.

Not the tidier, more disciplined versions of us I sometimes pretend we could be.

The Three Mugs

I brought three mugs into this temporary home.

Did we need them? No. But each one has something written on it that matters to me.

One says: Let all that you do be done in love.

Every time I pick it up, I think of 1 Corinthians 16:14 — because that is the verse, word for word, and it found its way onto a mug in my kitchen. It doesn't solve the shoe problem. It doesn't clear the counter or find my daughter's missing sock.

But standing there in the morning, pouring coffee, reading those words — something settles in me.

And I've been thinking about why.

When you're somewhere temporary, you start withholding yourself from the space. Why arrange this? Why make it nicer? We're leaving anyway. You keep waiting for the permanent place before you fully unpack — not just your boxes, but yourself.

But my daughter doesn't know this is temporary. She's just growing. My husband and I don't stop needing a functional workspace because the address will change someday. We're eating dinner here. Laughing here. Having the hard conversations here.

This is not the waiting room before our real life.

This is our life.

And that one realization has shifted something in me more than any bin or basket ever could.

What I Finally Figured Out

I've been asking the wrong question.

Every time I see a messy space, I jump straight to what should I buy? But the better question — the one that actually leads somewhere — is:

What isn't working, and why?

Why do the shoes end up there? Why does the counter fill up? Why does cooking feel harder than it should? Once I understand the real problem, then I can figure out what would actually help.

Because the basket isn't the system. The drawer organizer isn't the system. The shoe cabinet is absolutely not the system, as the shoes have made very clear.

They're tools. That's all.

The system is an obvious place for something and a realistic habit of putting it there. It's a kitchen arranged around how I actually cook. A desk that can be reset in two minutes, not twenty. A toy storage solution a two-year-old can use without my help.

It's making today easy enough to repeat tomorrow.

That's it. That's all I want.

Temporary Doesn't Mean It Doesn't Deserve Care

We don't have to wait for permanent to make things gentle.

I can make this kitchen easier to use even though it isn't my forever kitchen. I can set up a workspace that actually works even though someday it'll be somewhere else. I can give my daughter's things a real home inside a home we're going to leave.

Comfort isn't wasted just because it's temporary.

Neither is beauty. Neither is effort.

We do this thing — all of us, I think — where we wait for the final version of life before we really start living in it. When we move. When things settle. When work calms down. When the kids are older. When we finally get there. Then we'll create the routines, buy the flowers, let ourselves exhale.

But life keeps happening while we're preparing to live it.

So I'm going to organize this home. I'm going to look at what isn't working, figure out what would actually help, and build routines that fit the family we are right now. And somewhere along the way I'm going to open a drawer and think:

Oh my God. Why didn't we do this months ago?

My husband will know why.

I don't need him to say it.

I'm growing.

About the Author | Day 246 of 365

I'm a coach, a writer, an entrepreneur, and a mom — and apparently someone who once bought an organizational system and stored it directly next to the thing it was supposed to organize.

For 246 days I've been writing about what real life actually looks like — the big things, like healing and starting over and learning to feel steady when nothing around you is, and the smaller things, like a shoe cabinet that has yet to meet a single shoe.

What I'm learning is that making a home isn't really about permanence.

It's about choosing to care for the place where your life is happening right now — even when right now is messy, temporary, and full of a toddler who views every organized drawer as a personal challenge.

So I'll organize it. I'll make it easier. I'll keep the mugs that mean something.

And yes, I'll probably buy at least one more pretty basket.

Because this chapter deserves love too.

It's still part of the story.

Day 246 of 365. Let's get organized. 🐧