General tips: 

	If you haven't used it in a year, get rid of it. You'll never miss it. 'Nuff said.
	Don't let things with value be a burden. You can't get rid of this flatware set because it's brand-new and retails for $500? But you never use it, and it takes up room you need. So eBay it! Pay attention to the feedback rating of people you deal with and you shouldn't get burned. And you could make a bunch of money. Over the past 2 years, I've sold enough items to help buy new sofas, a VitaMix blender, and a brand-new upright freezer. And it's probably freed up an entire room's worth of junk -- wall to wall and floor to ceiling. I am not exaggerating.
	Charity. Take the time to itemize everything you give away. It really does count for cash when it comes to income tax time.
	Garage sales. How do I hate them, let me count the ways. Don't bother -- much more trouble than your time is worth. Ebay the things with value, donate the things that are not of value. The sooner these things are out of your way, the happier and simpler your life will be.

Toys. Kids in America today have more toys than they know what to do with. In fact, the clutter of it all can be so paralyzing that the kid is not able to enjoy ANY of the toys. I can't tell you how many times I have found my daughter in tears because she has dumped out too many toys, and is so overwhelmed she cannot figure out where to start cleaning it up.  She can't enjoy the toys, she can't clean up the toys, she can't live in her room... so she cries.

	Go through the toys and pack up anything they don't play with.  Pack up baby toys if your babies are now in grade school.  Pack up the Lincoln Logs if your kids have no interest in them. Pack 'em up.  Get 'em out of the closets.
	Most of us Americans are rich beyond the dreams of 90% of the world's population.  Share with those who have less -- call Good Will, the Salvation Army, Gleaners (in the Dallas area only), or any other local charity. Have them cart away the extra toys.  Your kids will never miss them.
	If you are short on cash, open an eBay account and auction off your extras -- some of these toys go for more than you would expect!
	Rotate.  Some moms rotate boxes of toys, only letting the children have access to a few at a time.  I never could get this organized, nor do I have a place to store the "rotated out" toys.  May be a good idea for some.

I ended up giving away an estimated 80% of my kids' things -- huge garbage sacks full of sometimes-NEW toys. After the initial whining, the kids actually started enjoying the toys they still had (I kept the favorites), and they were able to start keeping their rooms clean because there was a manageable amount of stuff.

	Knick-knacks.  Do you have the time to dust, re-arrange, and keep little hands away from your decorative knick-knacks?  I don't.  So I put away, eBay-ed, or gave away most of my knick-knacks. At this stage of my life, they are little more than dust collectors and kid-tempting breakables. For your treasured collectibles, consider packing them carefully and storing them in your garage or attic until your children are old enough to help care for them.
	Plants. Skip this if you have a green thumb -- I don't. Everything I touch dies because I have too much else to do and never remember to water.  Also, they are great mess-makers for little fingers.  I gave them all away.  Also reduced the dusting.
	Furniture. Even furniture -- if it's primarily decorative or not often used -- can be clutter!  I used to have a lot of wonderful little antique decorative pieces -- an old school desk, a gorgeous little bench that was too old to actually sit on, etc. They're all gone. If you're not using it, get rid of it.  Ebay is a great way to get rid of things you don't want and make a little money at the same time.

Media storage.  This was a big one for me.  We had tapes, tape inserts, and tape cases -- some intact, some broken -- spread all over the house.  It drove me nuts trying to match them all up day after day after day and keep them put away.  Getting this mess under control added hours to my week and square feet to my house!

CDs.  I bought a CD storage book at Office Depot -- it holds more than 200 CDs and has a zipper around it to keep the dust out -- about $35. I sat down with a garbage bag and my CD collection, and one by one took EVERY CD and the printed cover material out of its plastic "jewel case" and threw the cases away. I stored every single CD in one of the slots in the storage book, and if the cover was something I wanted to keep, I slipped it in in front of the CD. The storage book takes up only a fraction of the space of the myriads of plastic cases, and there's nothing to "match up." LOADS simpler.

DVDs.  I use the same storage solution for DVDs as I do for CDs.  (I do keep the cases for those, though -- I store them in a box in the garage; but you don't necessarily have to do that.)

	Cassette tapes. Same idea. I bought cassette storage albums from a library supply company (see http://www.vernlib.com/ or http://www.brodart.com/) and organized all my cassettes in them. I took the covers out of the plastic cases and slipped them into the front pocket of the storage cases to show which cassettes were in the cases, then stored them on bookshelves.
	Video tapes.  I'm still working on ideas for video tapes. Email me if you have a good solution!

Books. I adore books.  I have shelves all over my house full of books.  But the house will only hold so many, right?

	I gave all of the books that Charlotte Mason would have called "twaddle" to my local library and only kept the books I wanted my children to love.
	I also got rid of books that were too damaged to repair -- they only took up space.  If you know you'll never get to them, why look at the mess day after day?  Replace them.
	I organized my "keepers" using library-quality spine labels from Vernon Library Supply.  This is quite a project, but worth it.  When your children can tell at a glance which shelf the book goes on -- toddler, young reader, Bible, Ancient Egyptian history, life science, etc. -- it becomes much easier for them to put the book back where it belongs.  Maybe someday I will be able to document the system I used and put it on my web site.

The kitchen.  

	Gadgets.  I kept the one most useful item of its kind and chunked the rest. No more collections of different sized measuring cups and spoons. One good set of each, that's it.
	Dishes. I had about 8 sets of dishes I just loved, but never used. I kept my good china, my everyday dishes, and one set of Target plastic non-breakable "kidware". Everything else went to someone who needed it more than I did -- charity or eBay.
	Pots and pans.  I also got rid of mismatched pots and pans that don't stack and take up room, only keeping my one good set that stacks nicely and takes up a single shelf. I mean, how many pots and pans can you use at once, anyway?
	Dishtowels. I tossed ALL my old dishtowels and dishrags and bought cheap matching ones from Wal-Mart -- about $5 for 12. I found that by buying the "bar rags," which are smaller than regular dishtowels, each one required only two folds, not three or four. Since they're all alike, they're easier to find as you do laundry, and they also stack perfectly in the drawer. You might not think this would be a huge time-saver but it absolutely IS. You just won't believe it. Do it, do it!

Closets. Most closets don't utilize their space well. You probably have more than you think.  All you need to do is add a few shelves.  

	Your local home improvement warehouse or Container Store has wonderful shelves and closet organizers of all shapes, colors, materials, sizes, but they can be pricey.
	I found that 2x4" supports and a few 1x12" boards make dandy closet shelves. You don't even have to sand or paint them, just nail them up and use them for extra storage.

Garage storage. 

My local Lowe's has these nifty support pieces you can buy, add 2x4s in any length you want, and you have instant storage shelves -- very strong, efficient, and inexpensive. We lined our garage with shelves, every 20" from floor to ceiling.

For efficient storage, invest in new, matched moving boxes.  You can buy boxes at a moving store -- I use 9"Hx12"Wx18"D -- to store things you really can't toss but don't need in the house. Don't use miscellaneous boxes that don't match -- get new ones all the same size. They stack better and are easier to store.  I store my Christmas decorations, clothes I'm waiting for the kids to grow into, books I can't get rid of but don't have shelf space for, etc. Be sure to seal the box edges with plastic tape to keep out dust, bugs, and critters. (I once found a mother gecko nesting in one of my unsealed boxes.) Only store things you really can't get rid of.

Clothing and Laundry. This is a huge item in terms of space and time.   

	Your clothes. Do you really need to keep 4 different sizes of clothes "just in case" you lose that 20 lbs that's been hanging on since that last baby? Do you really want to devote your precious closet space to things you can't even get on?  If it doesn't fit, give it to someone who will fit it. If you lose that weight someday, these clothes will be out of style by then, anyway -- get new ones.
	Kids' Clothing.  How many different outfits do your kids have?  We had 20+ per child.  How many do your kids actually use?  7-10 a week, at most?  Keep those and give the rest away so someone who really needs them can put them to use. I kept no more than 10 outfits per child. I also kept only the best hand-me-downs from one child to the next.  The rest went to those who needed them worse that we did.
	Men's Socks. Put a huge star next to this one. This is such a big time- and sanity-saver you just won't believe it. Get a laundry basket -- fill it with every single pair of socks your dh owns. Notice that every single pair is different from every single other pair, requiring hours of matching each week in the laundry room. Put all the socks in a garbage bag and give them to charity. Then go to Target or Wal-Mart and buy your husband: 4 pair of MATCHING white, 4 pair of MATCHING black, and 4 pair of MATCHING tan (or whatever combination your dh will use). This way, no matter what white sock you pull out of the dryer, it will match ANY OTHER WHITE sock you pull out next, etc. You simply won't believe how much time this saves. HOURS and HOURS every week. No joke.

	Kids' socks. Same as above -- simplify!  My kids have a few pair of black and a few pair of white socks each (except for the baby -- he only has white), all matching. I mean, socks hardly ever show, anyway. I must have given away a whole sack full of beautifully-colored little socks that I could never match up. I've never missed them. Taming the sock monster has, more than anything else I've tried, brought simplicity and freedom to my life.
	Color code your clothes hangers and laundry baskets. Now before you label me a hopeless obsessive/ compulsive (although I'm guilty as charged), hear me out.  You won't believe how much of a time-saver this one can be.  I threw away all my miscellaneous colored and wire clothes hangers, then and bought plastic tubular hangers from Wal-Mart (about 10/$1, and well worth it) in specific colors: white for me, blue for hubby, navy for my daughter, red for son #1, and green for son #2.  As you hang up the laundry, put each person's clothes on his/her color hanger. When you're ready to put away, it's SO MUCH EASIER for you or a child to grab all the white hangers and go to one closet, etc. than to sort through items one by one deciding where they go. It also makes it possible for me to give this job to my young children. You can also get plastic laundry baskets in the same colors to code which folded clothes go where.
	Stop sorting by color, and start sorting by person.  Obviously, this system won't work for everyone, but when I started doing laundry this way, it set me free!  Here's how I do it: I sort all of each person's dirty laundry into his/her own basket in the laundry room.  Each of us usually has enough laundry to make two loads (and if not,  I throw in a few towels or a sheet -- there's always something right there that needs washing), so I do end up sorting by lights and darks, but no further.  When it's time to do my husband's clothes, for example, I pull out all his darks from his basket and wash them in one load, then all the whites and mediums go in the 2nd load -- all in cold water to avoid accidents. When these loads are done, folding and sorting is easy because everything goes to the same place -- I don't have to shuttle all over the house to finish the job. The next day I might do a load of my daughter's lights, and a load of my darks. Again, everything goes to the same place, so it's so much simpler.  Sheets go in a load, towels in another, white kitchen towels in another by themselves (I usually let these soak overnight in hot water and Oxi-Clean). But I do not sort by colors like I used to: whites, lights, mediums, reds, darks, denims.  (I do usually put reds in a load by themselves because they are just so volatile, but often they can go with other darks like jeans with no harm done.) The advantage I find to this system is that when someone comes to me and wails, "I'm out of clothes!" I only have two loads (at a maximum, and sometimes only one!) to worry about. Before, I had to sort all the laundry into colors, and I might be faced with four or five loads (all at the last minute) before I got finished with all the things that person needed washed.  It may not sound like a big deal, but as I said... it SET ME FREE! I'm never going back to the old way!

Food. I'm still working on this one, but I have a few ideas that have really helped... 

Rotating menus.  I picked out 14 menu items for each meal (B,L,D) that everyone in the family likes, put them on a rotating schedule. Monday mornings, we have apple/rice/cranberry cereal. Monday for lunch is grilled cheese, Monday dinners rotate between enchiladas and meatloaf, every other week, etc. Makes for MUCH simpler shopping, planning, and cooking. The kids also like the predictability. And you can switch whenever the mood takes you.

Once a month cooking. My huge upright freezer has been a great investment.  I don't actually do the "once-a-month" cooking that works so well for some, but I do prepare several meal's worth of food every time I do cook and put extras in the freezer.  It isn't any more trouble to cook a quadruple batch of a meal than a single batch, and it saves a lot of time later.  One great book to get you started is Jill Bond's Dinner's in the Freezer.

Paper!  Ugh. I could go on and on about this one, but I haven't conquered it yet.  Just a couple of tips....

	Kids' artwork/schoolwork. Do you have a scanner on your computer? Scan the artwork/schoolwork you want to keep and store it electronically. Don't have a scanner? The space that electronically-stored artwork will free up may be well worth the cost of an inexpensive scanner. Think about it.
	Bulky school projects. Enjoy them for a week, take a few good pictures for the album, and toss the project. Otherwise they will take over your life.
	Photographs.  We have switched to digital photograhy and scrapbooking.  Not only do I have no more film and developing costs, but three years worth of photos will fit on a single CDROM.  Think about it.

This list, of course, is just to get you started.  I hope it helps!