Peter Walsh Helps Messy Teens Get Organized
Professional organizer's tips for families on decluttering messy bedrooms.
Nov. 19, 2009— -- Tired of your kid's messy bedroom? From homework to after-school activities to getting into college, today's teens have a lot going on in their lives. How do they clear out the mental and physical clutter and become more organized?
Professional organizer, best-selling author and Oprah's favorite clean-up guru Peter Walsh has the answers.
Walsh has written a new book called "It's All Too Much, So Get It Together" that tackles the most common excuses that teens and parents give when it comes to cleaning, and offers tips on how to overcome those excuses to live clutter-free.
Walsh visited one typical family to show how common the problem really is. Patti Davis and her two daughters, Caroline Wilson, 13, and Sarah Wilson, 11, live in New York.
The sisters share a bedroom -- a very messy bedroom.
"You are here because we have a mess on our hands," Davis told Walsh. "We have an explosion of books and clothing."
Walsh's motto is that less junk equals a clearer mind and a better life. The first step, he said, is to get rid of as much stuff as possible. Next, Walsh asked the girls what they want from their bedroom.
"A clear open space to do anything, because if there are clothes on the floor we are not going to want to work in here," Caroline said.
For many teens their bedroom is where they do everything, from homework to entertaining friends, so it needs to be clutter-free. After some serious cleaning in the bedroom and the closets, Walsh added a few key storage and organizational items to help the room stay neat.
A desk piled high with junk was transformed into a clean surface for homework. A dresser buried in clothes became a place to display all her family photos. But will they be able to keep it up?
"Now that it's been done once … it will be so much easier to keep clean," Caroline said.
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