Organizing Your Household Paperwork Files

An article by Joanna    3 Comments

How do you organize your paperwork?

We have a filing cabinet that has been used several ways in our home over the years. It’s been an end table, a night table, a catch-all, a valet for my husband… but very rarely has it ever held documents in a well-organized manner. At one point I even purchased a small filing box to hold our actual paperwork because it was filled with… well I don’t remember what at the time, but it wasn’t organized paperwork, that’s for sure!

It’s on my list of things to do while nesting. And it’s just my luck that the baby hasn’t decided to greet us all before it is finished!

So today my goal is to reorganize it.

I’ve been staring at it for five minutes. So far it has yet to organize itself.

Yesterday I purchased new hanging file folders and new manila folders. They are sitting every so calmly next to the filing cabinet. You would think they would get the drift and start jumping in, but…


It looks like I’m going to have to do it myself. Mega bummer.

On the other hand, the recycle bin will be getting lots of action today, I’m sure! See, there’s a silver lining everywhere.

Because I’d much rather spend time researching and planning how to do something than to actual do it, here are some links that I found that I really like and am using to help get this organized:

- How to Organize Your Important Household Papers
- ACES Family Resource Management (Scroll down to G-229: Organize a Home Filing System – it’s a PDF)
- ABCs of Household Paper Management

PS – Did you see that Flylady and Cozi have partnered up to offer a Flylady Online Organizer? It looks totally awesome and I’m going to try it… right after I get this household paperwork tamed… Check it out here.