Every family needs a Home Command Center, a hub of information to keep everyone organized and all important papers and info in one place. Usually a command center is somewhere in the home where the entire family frequents, so making it eye-catching and fun for your family is important as well. We’ve compiled some tips and tricks and DIY command center ideas that will work for your family specifically.
Family Command Center Ideas
What will your family use the command center for?
Figure out all the info and items that your family needs to stay organized. (For our family, we needed: calendar, white board, clock, writing utensils and post-its, organizing containers, address book, dump spot-for all the random stuff we need to hold onto, mail spot, charging station, and keys)
Where should you put a command center in the home?
Find a location that is central for your family, easily accessible by everyone. You might use a cabinet above a counter that has already started accumulating your dump items, or a piece of furniture devoted just to keeping your family organized.
We used an old secretarial fold up desk that we refinished. I loved the many organizers and drawers to keep things separated, and my favorite part was that I could close up the clutter and keep the area neat.
Maybe a wall in your kitchen with some hanging baskets would fit your family. It doesn’t need to be elaborate, just what works for your family.
Plan out your command center first.
Draw out your plans. Before you begin nailing holes into your walls, get it down on paper. You can erase and re-draw as many times as you need to get your configuration right.
Put up your home command center–temporarily.
For wall-hanging items, cut out paper the size of the items to try out different locations and configurations. (the first time I set all the pieces up, I realized that I put my calendar too high that my kids couldn’t reach to write things on, and my white board was blocked.) It took multiple tries before I got the configuration that would work smoothly with our family.
Make your Family Command Center Unique to Your Family.
Spruce up the space with things that will inspire and uplift your family (ie. quotes, family pictures, plants, decor, clock, etc.) Don’t go overboard, remember the point of the area is to keep your family organized, not to get famous on Pinterest!
Time to test your Command Center Ideas!
Make sure it is something that your family will love and utilize. Be a little flexible, you might find that by moving some things around, it just seems to flow better, or some areas are more important than others and need to be easily accessible.
Enjoy your new space and hopefully keep your family a little more organized at the same time.
What things do you include in your family’s Command Center?
My goal is to get organized. This is a great idea!
I love this idea! I am planning to build a home command in our house. This is really helpful!
I love the idea of having a Family Command Center. I bet my whole family would enjoy having something like this set up in our home.
I really need to set one of these up in my home. It would help keep us so much better organized!
These are great ideas! I just started redoing mind and hope I get it the way I like it before school starts again in the fall!
My Mom and Dad have one of those desks. I love the whole centralized system like you have. A place where everyone knows exactly where to look for what they need. Great ideas and a wonderful post!
I need to make a command center. One thing I would add is a chore list of some sort for the kids. I don’t know how many times I have to remind the kids to do their chores.
I think this is a perfect center for doing homework and writing bills. I love your desk so much and think it is really pretty.
I love my command center. It is such an easy way to leave reminders for the kids. I have a basket for each kid on it. They know to check it every morning.
I need to make a command center. I would have a large calendar I could write appointments on so the whole family can see it.
This speaks to me! We don’t have a good spot for a centralized command center, but a closet! I am hoping to make this in my next home! Thanks for such a beautiful post!
This is an amazing idea- I need a command center to better organize my family!
I desperately need a command center to keep track of who needs what and who needs to be where. I have three kids in two different schools and three different sports/activities. I frequently forget about dinner.
I could use a little more organization! We have a sort of command center, but our is more of a place to drop everything as we come in!
I love this idea. A “command center” like this would be perfect for my family We are in and out all the time.
Those are great ideas. I need one spot that’s the hub of my house.
I love the idea behind this. Every family should have a centralized organizational system like this!