General information about this weeks' plan can be found here. The theme for this week is: "A Child In Focus".

This week, we are continuing to think about your personal space, but extending the scope a little...

Group One is for people who cannot move for clutter and need help in completely de-cluttering their homes.

Please pick a group for yourself and stick with it for two months. Once you decide which group you belong to, don't attempt to follow advice for other groups at the same time, as you will have too much to do. If you are not sure which group you should join, start with the lower numbers as they include introductions to the concepts of later groups.

You may sometimes think that you could have achieved more in one week, but don't assume this means that the programme isn't going at your pace. If you find you have achieved everything I mentioned for a particular week, find a way of adapting the same theme somewhere else in your home. We have to go slowly, because you have other things going on in your life and if you have a few days where you feel overwhelmed, you may well decide to ditch the de-clutter programme first. This is why we are going to take it slow.

Also, the key to continued success is to get into the habit of doing it, not to have a de-cluttering frenzy several times a year!

This week, we are going to subdivide the de-cluttering tasks associated with our children into requirements designed to help each child on an individual basis. Remember the "little-by-little" approach and, rather than think about all the tasks associated with your children in one go, consider just one child at a time. If you prefer, you can adapt this plan to suit the needs of an adult. As always, do what you feel you are able - don't try to pressure yourself to achieve objectives in any way. In the end, you will only be fighting yourself, as we will be re-visiting these topics in later cycles and you will find that you can do a little more each time. If you are finding things tough, just try to do one thing. As long as you do more than nothing, you can achieve your goals.

General: Continue to work at stopping more clutter from appearing around your home, by keeping on top of mail as it enters your home, by keeping better control as to what you spend your money on, and by putting everything that has a home back in its correct place.

Let's pick a child's bedroom to de-clutter. If you have more than one child in the bedroom, just deal with the area associated with child - don't worry about the shared areas to start with, as you can look at them if you have time later in the week.

The first thing to do is obviously to sit down with your child and find out what changes (if any) s/he would like to make. If you made some notes about the bedroom in Week One, you could refer to them during your discussion. Regardless of age, most children will already have some idea of how they would like their bedroom to appear. Perhaps the wrong sorts of toys are stored in the bedroom, and it would be better to swap them with the ones in the living areas? Perhaps there are always items lost under the bed, and so it would be useful to use boxes on wheels under there instead? Maybe it would be helpful to give your combined ideas form by drawing a plan of the ideal room together? If the room is in a general mess, though, this needs to be your starting point. As you tidy up, take note of what it is and why it is making the room untidy. Don't worry about the things that are played with and then put away on a daily basis. If washing is constantly lying around, you could hang a laundry bag on the back of the door, for example. Deal with the immediate concern which is to make the room look tidy; don't open wardrobes and drawers unless you are putting something away, as we will deal with individual issues such as what to do with baby clothes, etc. during the second cycle.

Vacuum the floor and then try to ensure it is kept clear at the end of each day. Try to get your child to help with this, but don't force the issue as the habit will not last this way. If you have some extra time this week, think about de-cluttering the surfaces, and perhaps also a wardrobe or drawer if there is time. Alternatively, go through the abovementioned process with another child who shares the room. If you would like any help organising storage, please feel free to come and ask for help onlist. Take your time this week and don't worry about not seeming to do much as you need to ease your child into the idea of de-cluttering the room too. Even if s/he is very enthusiastic, de-cluttering can soon become overwhelming and the habit mustn't seem too much like an obvious chore.

Due to popular demand(!), there will eventually be a children's de-cluttering section on Spiritsense.

As always, I welcome your feedback because it helps me to come up with new ideas and solutions for you.

Good luck everyone, and DO try this at home!

Wendy.