The Anatomy of a Command Center

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If you are visiting for the first time, check out my other organizing posts here.

I'm a big believer that every home needs a command center. A landing zone, grand central station . . . call it what you will, but I bet you have it whether you know it or not. Now, it would function a whole lot better if it was organized, so let's get crackin'.



Here's my command center - nothing fancy, but totally functioning. It's in my kitchen - all command centers should be easily accessible. I'm lucky enough to have this, but it would work in an office, on a wall by the garage door, at a console table. Anywhere that is easy to get to.

Every command center should include:

• Calendar


• Message Board


• Place to throw your keys


• An out-box


• A place for everyone to put their papers.

Let's dissect, shall we?

This is my calendar purchased from here. I've used it for a couple of years and it works well for me. My kids are pretty little and I still control 90% of their calendar needs, so no need to have a big one where everyone can add to it. As they get older, I'll probably do that. Usually on Sundays, Mr. Engineer and I sit down and calendar for the week.



I use a 5x7" spiral notebook as my message board. Remember, my kids are little and aren't really writing or reading messages - so this works for us. I've seen chalkboards, whiteboards . . . tons of different types of message boards.


We throw our keys here - and have for years. In our old home, we also threw our keys in this little box. We keep it in a cubby above the desk.




Next to our keys, is this cubby - our out box. We put out-going mail, videos to return, and such.


I have a file drawer that holds files for everyone. In it there is a file for each person, bills to pay, and store coupons. Those files pretty much take care of all the paper work in our home. At least once a week, we go through them and clean them out (Obviously, I haven't done it this week, yet).

If you don't have a file drawer, you can use a box. You can use clipboards, baskets, in/out boxes . . just so you have a place to put people's papers. You know they are going to have them!

I also have a cubby for homework in our command center. Both I. and G.'s homework comes in a folder, which we just throw in this cubby.


So . . . let's say I. gets home from school. She empties her backpack and throws it on the desk. Of course, ideally she wouldn't do that - but she does. I grab her homework and put it in the cubby. If there are any papers I think are worthy enough to actually save, I shove it in her file. Any papers that have a date on it get set on my calendar until I can get to it.

Let say . . . I get home from getting the mail. I throw away all the ads and credit card stuff before I even get in the house. One quick sort and put mail in the files. It takes one minute and the piles are gone.





Let's say . . .Tom is looking for keys . . . easy to grab them.

This is what works in our home, it is very simple but gets rid of the dump that comes when people come home. I don't need things perfect - just functioning. The papers aren't filed perfectly, the keys are just thrown in the box. The thing is, though, everything has a place.

This is what it usually looks like during the day:


When I clean the kitchen at night, the desk also gets a quick clean.

This works for us, do you have something similar?