My Students’ Blog

Things to Know When You’re Living Alone

By Will Cushman

Moving out may be one of the scariest things a young adult can do. Leaving your parents is a scary step to take. However, we all must take this step eventually, and some succeed more than others. So, what steps can you take to succeed when you are living on your own?

When living alone you need to learn to do chores you have never done before. You will need to shop for groceries, clean your living space, learn handy work skills, organize your space, and manage your time.

“But living alone for the first time doesn’t have to be scary”

How to Build a Routine

The first step to becoming organized is to build a routine. Tell yourself to wake up at 7:00 AM, shower at 7:30 AM, then eat and leave by 8:30 AM. Then, after work you might exercise for an hour, cook dinner, and possibly shower again. With all this going on, you need to find time to do your chores, like dishes, vacuuming, shopping, laundry, ect. The best type of routine to organize your time is through a weekly routine. For example, Sunday would be laundry day, that way you’ll have fresh clothes for the work week. Or, maybe Friday is cleaning day, that way you can enjoy your weekend comfortably. You can find a simple guide to make a routine here. Routines are great, but they’re pointless if you don’t even know how to perform the chores in the routine. 

How to Clean Your Apartment

Surprisingly, many people do not know how to clean their own apartment. Before you start cleaning, you need the right supplies. Some essentials would be a vacuum, duster, toilet brush, rags, and some all purpose cleaners. The first step is to clear all the clutter. If you have laundry on the floor, put it in your hamper. If there are dirty dishes, clean them and put them away. And you should do a garbage sweep, throw away the empty food containers or whatever is lying around. The next step is to start with the kitchen and bathrooms. Make sure to clean the floors, counters, sink, and the rest of your kitchen appliances. Once you’re in the bathrooms, scrub the sink, counters, floors, shower/tub, and toilet. After you make your bed and place things in the right place, it’s time to dust. Finally, after finishing dusting, you can vacuum everything. Yes, cleaning can be a boring and tedious process, but that doesn’t mean you can’t make it fun. Turn some music up or turn on something to watch. Here are some of the best shows you can watch right now on Netflix. If you don’t want to clean as much, all you have to do is clean little bits here and there throughout the week making cleaning day a lot easier.

Living alone for the first time doesn’t have to be scary.

How to do Your Own Laundry

Now that you are living in a clean apartment, you need to keep yourself clean. Starting off, you’ll either need a washing machine or have to go to the laundromat. If you have your own washing machine, there are a few products you need. The most important ones would be laundry detergent, fabric softener, dryer sheets, and hangers. Everyone has their own personal preference, but you might want to look into some of the top rated laundry products. First, you’ll need to separate your laundry into what type of laundry it is, such as underwear, pants, or just shirts. Then separate it by lights and darks. Before loading the washing machine, you should check the pockets to make sure you won’t wash anything important. When washing, a normal cycle on cold or warm water will do just fine most of the time. Hot water should be used for things like bed sheets, because of the body oils in them, and a heavy duty cycle is for bigger articles of clothing like jeans or coats. After you wash your clothes, you can either hang them to dry or put them in the dryer. Lighter fabric and heavier fabrics should be separate if you use your dryer, and make sure to use a dryer sheet to make them smell nicer and reduce static. Once you are all done, you can fold your clothes and put them away.

How to Grocery Shop

Since you are all clean to go out in public, now you can shop for your own groceries. Before going to the grocery store, you should make a grocery list. You should base this list off of your meal plan, or whatever your method is to cook meals. Some easy ways to save money while shopping is to look at the tags price per pound. Normally this will be a smaller number near the edge of the price tag. And, simple enough, don’t shop when you are hungry or tired. When shopping try to stay healthy and stay away from too much snack food. You can get some snack food for lunch or something, but you don’t want to live off of it. When you enter the store, know what you want to buy and have a plan how you will go through the store. Either go to the back of the store and work your way to the front, or get your items in a loop. Finally, be courteous and don’t be afraid to ask for help if you have trouble finding something.

All in all, living alone can be scary, but we all must take that step at some point. If you want to be more successful, however, there are many things you can consider, like your chores, mental well being, and time management. It is important to create connections with your neighbors and community, and it’s equally important to create routines to help with your day-to-day life. Living alone will never be easy, but by developing the right skills, you can put yourself in the position to succeed.