You have read the organizing books, even hired a professional organizer, but you cannot get your family on board to keep your house organized! Sound familiar? It's okay! Organization fails happen. And when they do, it's easy to place the blame on your kids, your partner or even yourself, but that isn't going to solve anything. At Calm Order, we focus on removing blame and taking a closer look at behavior to see how we can adapt the current organizing systems to better match our client's lifestyle ... "bad" habits included.

One client called us fed up with their teenage daughter's habit of leaving all her skin care and hair products scattered on her bathroom countertop. "I put in an organizer on the back of her bathroom door, right beside the countertop. Each product had its own pocket, I thought it was brilliant. Well, it didn't work!" the client cried. "My organizing system can't survive when my family won't help."

Her young daughter, like most, was busy. She dances, plays volleyball, loves to draw, follows the latest hair trends and is constantly busy with homework. This was her reason for not using the over-the-door organizing system. Calm Order has seen this behavior before. This girl is a dropper.

Instead of fighting it, we recommend putting a basket on the bathroom counter to corral her products while she is going through her morning routine. She can put away the product into the organizing system on the back of her door when she has more time. Better to leave the countertop clear enough to wipe down.

The young girl had other "drop" zones in the house where her hair elastics, jewellery, water bottles and lip balms accumulated and it drove her parents crazy. A bookshelf in the basement, right next to where she practiced dance and worked out was one drop zone, and the phone desk near the back door was the other. Calm Order suggested the same strategy. Place a gathering basket or tray (with her name on it) at both "dumping" spots. Not perfect, but certainly a step in the right direction. How does the saying go? If you can't change them, find a way to work with them

"Full disclosure, I'm a dropper," smiled Karen Allbright, owner of Calm Order. "For me, it is most obvious in my bathroom. I guess I haven't outgrown my teenage habits." Allbright continues, "Getting ready in the morning, I just don't take the time to put my hair product and make-up back in its place. But it is easy for me to keep it all corralled in countertop vanity basket. I don't want to come home after work to a mess. It just feels easy to put it away properly as I go through my bedtime routine. I like to start the next day fresh."