Category Archives: Organization

Sometimes you just need a day

A week ago, my boss told me to pick a day off.  Today was that day.  A Tuesday.  I picked today because my daughter had to have a cavity filled.  (#sadface  #firstone)  Since I’d have to take time off for that anyway, I figured it would be easier to take the whole day.  So……Tuesday it was!

Unfortunately, I had a last-minute meeting thrown in at 7 a.m. for a review committee, so it involved a whole lot of shuffling around for Hubby this a.m.  Add a little bit of early a.m. chaos and some cold weather=brutal.  Happy to report that the world didn’t end, everyone made it to school (eventually) and I made it to my meeting on time with no loss of life or limb.  #winning


To really do the day right, after my meeting I made a breakfast date with one of my oldest BFFs (chronologically speaking).  Followed by a nice long walk with our pup, it was a good, GOOD way to start the day off!

Then I got to work.  A variety of tasks, but I have been extremely motivated by little miss thang, Kathryn Whitaker.  If you haven’t been following her Instagram account and Instastories you’ve missed out.  She is the Catholic Martha Stewart of the blogging world–seriously, if you need some party ideas—she’s crazy good!)  Now.  I DO love this gal, twang and all….she’s even sweet in person, in a wheelchair with a broken patella at the Edel conference (next time girl, we’re gonna hang!), but I do NOT share her attention to detail or focus.  I am a solidly “ish” person—get the task done, but usually no plan, just mayhem until it’s finished and often the finished product is good-ish, but not perfect.  I also tend to get a little scattered when faced with really large projects—shiny objects and all, however…..it all gets done and often it is truly a miracle that it does.  And you know what?  I am ok with that, truly.  It works for me.  So, while I was truly fascinated with Kathryn’s stories and progress as she simplified her house, I felt ZERO envy.  I did, however, feel a motivation that our house DEFINITELY needs a good solid purging and now I have somewhat of a plan in mind.  (music to my Hubby’s ears)  This won’t be accomplished in 10 days, but over the next couple of months.  I also think if I asked Kathryn to be my accountability partner in ANYthing, she’d straight up whip me in shape.  So, I’m a little scared to go that far, but maybe…..just maybe!!   baby steps

Today, I started off small.  One section.  Cleaned out an armoire that is destined to go to a new home in the near future and made a trunkful donation to our church’s thrift store.  This also gave me an additional tool for my mobile office (AKA purse), so I am truly on fire now.  Look out!!!

 

After that, I finished up some smaller to-do tasks, read some of my current book “The Pearl that broke its shell” and hit the bridge for some quick steps to finish up my 10,000 steps.

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The icing on the very productive cake!

 

 

7QTs organizing

Joining in with Kelly and friends to wrap up the week and chat a bit about organizing.

It has been one full week into my promotion and since I have been essentially doing the job for quite some time (now I get compensated for it) I didn’t think it would be much different.  And yet, for some reason—perhaps the cyclical life of my meetings that tend to occur in clusters, or perhaps just a few unfinished projects hanging over my head, I have been mentally scattered and it sucks.

This week I made a few strides in getting my “poop in a group” and it seems to be helping.  Now to let that overflow into my personal life and I’ll really be on to something, right?  In all actuality though, I think we could purge and re-organize ourselves to death, however…..I am seriously thinking of doing the 40 bags in 40 days for Lent this year.  It’s time, people.  It’s time.  (which will probably thrill my purge-happy Hubby)  🙂

So let’s review, shall we?

  1.  A notepad in a folder.   Probably called something else, but perfect for taking notes and holding on to handouts from meetings until they can be filed away.  And I’m not scrambling for something to write on.  Plus, I am just not there (yet) with taking a laptop to meetings.

2.  Folders.  To file handouts for current projects and so easy to just slip into the notebook folder and bring the whole shebang to meetings.  (I have no idea why these pictures all imported upside down, but Mama don’t have time to fix that right now)

3.  Paper calendar.  I don’t know.  It’s pretty and I really like having a paper calendar in case my phone died and the cloud died.  Mostly, we use our apple shared family calendar which has truly SAVED us especially when the kids put in their own activities.  Something about a tactile paper calendar though…..I just can’t do without it.

4.   Pretty pens.  Sometimes I like to get fancy.  And that little bag is from  my Black Friday score at Buckhead Betties.   Necessary?  Nope.  Everyone should have a little pretty going on, though.  

5.  This little journal my Youth group leaders gave us last year is so ADORABLE.  I use it for “deep thoughts”, planning life, blog ideas and just whatever. (I am a sucker for a pretty journal).  However,  I can’t commit to bullet journaling.  Sorry, not sorry.  I mean it looks beautiful and all, but I truly am just not that creative and the thought of organizing a journal for my barely-existent creative side….seriously stressful for me.  Kudos to those who do…..I’ll look at yours and smile.  Just not gonna happen here, though.  

6.  Look how nicely everything lines up in there with my little purse I can just pull out when necessary.  I love order.

7.  And the lovely little bag I scored at Target this week along with some of the other stuff above.  I told Hubs that Dave Ramsey would be proud because I a) paid cash and b) it was only $18 instead of $45, so SCORE!!!  (photobombed by sleeping cat—yes we do wipe the table down before eating!)

Have a great week, everyone!

5 Faves of this week

What?  Two posts in two days?  Don’t get used to it, people.  The cheer schedule changed a bit and by some strange twist of fate I have my laptop all to myself, so Imma gonna go with it!

Linking it up with Hallie @ Moxie Wife via Grace @ Camp Patton.  Confused?  Don’t be.  It’s all good.  Link to either and you get lots of goodies!

Here’s mine:

1.  My Pinterest food boards coming through for dessert for work luncheon tomorrow.   We chose these, my awesome 11 yo made them and we all had a little bitty taste test.  You know.  Just to be sure and all.  We were out of sprinkles (travesty) but it didn’t seem to hurt these dense and super sweet little babies.

original post from HERE

original post from HERE

2.  Evernote and recipes.  Totally saved dinner tonight.  Or created dinner tonight.  Either way you look at it.  Awesome!!

fresh off my phone, yo!

fresh off my phone, yo!

3. More foodish items.  Do you like chai tea?  I do.  My friend told me about this new Tazo flavor and I had a cup this evening for a little pick me up to make it through the evening.  Yum.  Like a spicy chocolate milk.  It’s still 90 degrees here, so I drank mine on iced almond milk…you can make it hot if you prefer.

yes, please!

yes, please!

4.  This dude.  Ah, that we were all so completely confident to sleep so completely and blissfully aware of the mulch hanging from our rear ends.

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5.  This dude.  So completely confident in himself that he wore his sister’s headband in his hair like this ALL.  DAY.  LONG.  to school.  Then he was inspired by this the ‘do to seek a new cut….scheduled for Saturday.  Love him and his manly poser poses.

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Now go on and check out all the other fun faves for the week!

 

 

Time flies

School is back in and HOLEEEEE. CRAP.  Summer done washed away my memories of how freakin’ busy the fall is.  Lord, have mercy.

We are starting to hit our rhythm now that we are done with Labor Day’s brief respite and it’s starting to come back to me.  Plan.  Plan.  Planplanplanplanplan.  Ahead.  The planner aheader gets the easier night.   Truth.  Young mamas, take note.

Last night I had the amazing GRACE of our 16 yo son calling me at work to see what he could do to help with dinner.  Be still my heart.  The boy got those meatballs simmering and then whipped up the awesomely hugemongous spinach salad to go with the Angel hair past and meatballs.  WinNING!!!  He also chauffeured me to me grandmother’s to pick up some family tree papers to add to our 11 yo’s family tree project .  A sweet treat.

Then taking our almost 14 yo to his French horn practice we had a raucous discussion on men’s hairdos (the  boy is FINALLY going short–fingers crossed and double crossed, I think the Bieber look is on the way out!!) and somehow we were rolling on a drag queen discussion–don’t even ask–and Mama made a huge funny because that kid was almost hyperventilating he was laughing so much.  Mark another “W” in the column.  A banner evening.  Topped off only by waiting for the horn prodigy for a mere 30 minutes in which I was able to read, get caught up on some emails and do a chapter in my study with my awesome friend.

Tonight I got a great walk in while our youngest was at cheer practice and came home to chicken and dumplings in the crock pot which EVERYONE loved….seriously, do you know how hard it is to find a meal that they ALL love???!!!!?  Insanity.  Hubs and the 16 yo enjoyed watching the World Cup Qualifying Final with the US and Mexico, I kicked the 13 yo off the computer and made time to blog.

I should stop while I’m ahead.  It’s only Tuesday.

Closet Re-do #1

We live in an older house…70’s ranch-y style.  It’s truly perfect for us, not too big (because I don’t have a maid ya’ll, just 4 kids and sometimes we have to go behind them) and when we bought it, it was move-in ready–my favorite kind of house to buy.  Semi-sorta updated, at least no orange/green/yellow in the kitchen and an assortment of neutral colors, which are perfect for US.  Anywhoooo, the down side is that apparently in the last 20 some years we (collectively as Americans) have garnered a lot of “stuff” and “need” more closet space than was available back in the 70’s.  Our current list of to-do’s is for us (and I really mean my Hubby) to finally deal with the bedroom closets.  We started with the boys closet, mainly because they are boys and if it got goofed up they really aren’t going to care so much (the girls will be next and we will save the most important–ours–for last).

For the boys, their dresser (in the closet to save space) houses the majority of the clothing, but they have a fair amount that gets hung.  The clothes that get hung knock all their miscellanea on top of their dresser over and behind and creates a chronic MESS.  The top of the closet was just a shelf and tons of dead space.  We wanted to give them some more storage and maximize that dead space.  We opted on cubbies and worked around the brace in the middle of the shelf.  We are pleased with the outcome and hopefully these fellas can manage keeping their stuff in one spot and not lose chargers, memory sticks and all that other stuff.    Without further blah blah, here’s the pics and once we finish the girl’s I’ll post that, too.  I know, you can hardly wait.  Try and contain yourself. 😉

Empty closet BEFORE

Empty closet BEFORE

 

New cubes

New cubes

 

Maximizing the dead space on the shelf

Maximizing the dead space on the shelf

well, we had to put the closet stuff somewhere...

well, we had to put the closet stuff somewhere…

 

side by side view of the B&A

side by side view of the B&A

 

AFTER....hear the angels sing???  I do!!!

AFTER….hear the angels sing??? I do!!!

 

A useful shelf space now!

A useful shelf space now!