Peace of Mind Organizing

Bucket List item: I'm in Real Simple!

9 September 2019

I don’t really have a bucket list, but every now and then I think about making one. If I did make one, I’d probably include: “Be quoted in Real Simple.” And I’d be able to check it off! (Am I the only one who adds items to my task list that I’ve already done, just so I can check it off?)

Last week, I received in the mail a copy of Real Simple Organize Your Home. It’s what they calla “bookazine.” It looks like a magazine, though the paper is thicker and there are no ads. And it’s priced like a book. ($13.99) Among the many articles in this little beauty is “Stop Paper Pileups.” The subhead is, “We consulted our favorite professional organizers to learn how to reduce paper overload once and for all.”

Why am I so excited? Because I’m one on of those favorite professional organizers! Also quoted in the article are Aby Garvey of Simplify 101, Kathy Vines of Clever Girl Organizing, Kathy Jenkins of Come to Order and Jennifer Ford Berry.

The article is actually a reprint. It first appeared in the Early Spring 2018 edition of Secrets of Getting Organized magazine, published by Better Homes and Gardens Special Interest Publications. (I blogged about it at the time.) That article was also syndicated in newspapers nationwide and in fact appeared in my hometown paper, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The entire issue was reprinted for Summer 2019. So this article has really had legs and has been read by a whole lot of people. I couldn’t be happier about that!

If you’re interested in purchasing Real Simple Organize Your Home, it’s on newsstands and bookstores nationwide from now until December 6. You can find the magazine at grocery stores, home centers, big box retailers, drugstores, discount chains, as well as chain and independent booksellers.

Disaster preparedness can bring peace of mind

5 September 2019

Today my thoughts are occupied with concern for my dear friend, Ann, who lives in Charleston, S.C. As I type this, Hurricane Dorian is battering Charleston with the eye of the hurricane literally just off its shores.

As happens whenever natural disasters present themselves (as they do so often these past few years) I think about disaster preparedness, how I could be better prepared and how I can help my clients and blog readers be better prepared.

Today, I came across this blog series from Lisa Witzleben of Unclutter Me in Anchorage, Alaska. The six-part series covers seven different areas of disaster prep. I think her posts offer insightful advice that I haven’t seen elsewhere. You can access all seven posts in her Be Prepared series with this link or click on individual posts with the links below. I encourage you to give them a read.

• Be Prepared: Cash is king!
• Be Prepared: Electronics—how to be ready for a disaster
• Be Prepared: Go Folder—it’s time, let’s go
• Be Prepared: Create a memory tote
• Be Prepared: Taking care of our pets in times of need
• Be Prepared: Who are you going to call?
• Be Prepared: How can social media assist you after a disaster?

Lisa is also the guest on the current episode of Stand Out, the podcast from the National Association of Productivity and Organizing Professionals (NAPO). In the episode she discusses preparedness, so it’s obviously very timely.

Another resource you might check out is the book, Organize for Disaster: Prepare Your Family and Your Home for Natural and Unnatural Disasters, by Judith Kolberg, a veteran organizer who is well known in our industry.

Of course all this information isn’t very helpful during a disaster. But if Hurricane Dorian has inspired you to look into making sure you’re prepared for the next hurricane/tornado/fire/flood/earthquake/what have you, these resources a good place to start. That way, next time a disaster looms, you’ll have more peace of mind.

Organizing a bottom drawer freezer

28 August 2019

My husband, Barry, and I just bought a new refrigerator/freezer. For us that’s a big deal—we tend to hang onto appliances for a long time. (We still have the fridge we bought in 1992 when we bought our house, though it’s just used as a backup.) But we didn’t like the stainless steel refrigerator with a top freezer that we bought when we renovated our kitchen in 2016. It required way too much bending over to use the refrigerator and we pretty much disliked it from the very beginning.

The new refrigerator, an LG with a bottom freezer drawer, was delivered yesterday. Today I had the pleasure of organizing it! I’ve never had a freezer drawer before (nor organized one for a client), so it was a fun challenge.

I have to say, it went very well. It’s helpful that I keep a supply of containers in my home to take with me to client appointments. So I didn’t even have to go shopping for containers.

Here’s what I did:

We had unloaded the freezer contents into our extra freezer and when we did that, I took note of what we had. (In the spirit of full disclosure, I’ll admit that our freezer was an absolute mess. I couldn’t find anything in it. So this was a welcome exercise.) As I unloaded that freezer to take stuff up to the new one today, I sorted the contents. These were our categories. (Obviously, yours might be very different.)

• Meat
• Fish
• Breads
• Coffee
• Nuts and nut flours
• Spices
• Yeast
• Butter

Our freezer came with an automatic ice maker (in the freezer drawer, not the door), but we elected not to use it. One reason is that we don’t have a water line behind the refrigerator. But more importantly, Barry likes very fresh ice and therefore dislikes ice makers. So he’s our ice maker. Works for me.

The freezer drawer has an upper drawer that slides out on top of the lower area. There’s also a movable divider that divides the bottom drawer. So I had zones to work with. I took a look at the categories I had, put them in containers and placed the containers in the freezer. To my delight, the containers I had on hand fit perfectly.

Here’s a picture of the organized bottom drawer:

The meats are on the right-hand side of the drawer. I re-used an Itso bin that we’d had in the old freezer. (Alas, those bins are no longer sold, but you can see what I’m talking about in this blog post). Around the bin, I placed other meats. We have a Food Saver vacuum sealer, so they’re typically nicely sealed up.

On the left side of the divider, I put the nuts and nut flours in a Tall Shoe Box from the Container Store. In front of that, I placed a medium-sized Multipurpose Bin from the Container Store and put the fish in it. And in front of that, a small Multipurpose Bin fit beautifully. (Here’s a link to the Multipurpose Bin. It really is a versatile container.) The bins fit so nicely, on virtually the first try (I was lucky!), that it made my heart sing. In the small Multipurpose Bin, I placed the coffee and yeast (neither of which are used often—it’s back up decaf for when we have people over). I put the spice bottles in a Linus 3- x 12- x 2-inch shallow drawer organizer and rested them on top of the coffee and yeast. The way the container nestled in there was so satisfying!

Here’s a photo of the top retractable drawer:

In the top drawer, we have the ice situation. We chose to remove the ice bin that came with the freezer because it took up the whole left side of the drawer and we didn’t need such a big bin. I replaced it with a small white plastic storage bin with handles (it’s a new favorite of mine) to store the decanted ice. Barry uses two silicon ice cube trays that make actual cubes. He’ll stack those next to the decanted ice when he’s making ice. (I put them in a Linus 6- x 9- x 2-inch shallow drawer organizer to catch any spills.) There is room behind the two ice containers for frozen goods. I put the bread (and butter) on the right side and put a box of ice cream sandwiches behind the decanted ice on the left side.

I was extremely pleased that we were able to fit everything in and so that it’s easy to find what’s in there. I’m hopeful the containers will allow us to maintain the order—I do not want to go back to the hot mess (okay, cold mess) that was our previous freezer!

Worth repeating (again): Self-care

26 August 2019

I’m passionate about asking people to be kind to themselves and not let guilt about clutter (or anything else) get in the way of living their lives. I wrote this post more than ten years ago and its message remains just as strong today. It’s one of my very favorite posts, so I thought I’d share it again today.

I’m always struck how clutter gets in the way of life. I have many clients who constantly feel an obligation to deal with their clutter. They plan to devote a weekend to decluttering, then they start to feel overwhelmed, so they don’t actually deal with it. (Until they call me.)

So for weeks, months, even years, they decline invitations to do fun stuff on their off hours because they should stay home and “get organized.” They don’t treat themselves to a movie, a vacation, or a bike ride because they feel an obligation to stay home and tackle what’s become for them a giant burden.

It breaks my heart.

I’m a big believer in self-care. Maybe because I don’t have kids and therefore have more free time than many women, I have no qualms about taking time away from the “shoulds” and enjoying myself. It happens that I’m easy to amuse—I’m thrilled to sit in front of a DVD of a favorite TV series and knit. That’s my idea of a great time. And I consider that self-care.

Last Sunday I spent the afternoon with some great women, chatting, laughing and doing crafts. Does my bathroom closet need sorting and purging? Oh yeah. It’ll get done some day. But I don’t let it get in the way of the very important hours in the day where I relax and enjoy myself. Getting together with my “craft sisters” nurtures me. And that’s really important.

If you’re reading organizing blogs because you’re feeling disorganized or frustrated by clutter, please don’t let it take over your life. If necessary, seek help (you can find a great organizer via NAPO’s website), and set aside time to work on your organizing project. The key is to actually do the work, rather than intending to do the work and being paralyzed in the process.

And then, please, find time to take care of yourself, rejuvenate your spirits and do something fun. Your idea of fun might be climb a mountain, like my amazing friend Shannon Wilkinson or it might be to take a bubble bath. Maybe you can make a list of things you’d love to do if you only finished getting organized. Then use the items on your list for rewards for the progress you make.

Don’t let clutter get in the way of life. Chip away at it, 15 minutes at a time. Then focus on some self-care. You’re worth it!

I'm quoted in USA Today (sort of)!

22 August 2019

A couple of months ago, I was interviewed for an article on time management in USA TODAY’s Best Years magazine. Best Years is a newsstand magazine for people over 50. It went on sale on August 22.

I was delighted when the writer emailed me over the weekend that the article was posted to USA Today’s website. If you’re interested in reading it, here’s a link: Make the most of your precious time. In the magazine, the article has a more evocative title: “Got a Minute? Make the most of the time you have by treating it like money.”

If you’re interested in the magazine, you can look for it on the newsstand. Or you can buy it at the link above. Here’s the cover of that particular issue, so you know what you’re looking for:

According to the website description, “USA TODAY’s Best Years magazine has health, fashion, relationships and travel and more for the 50+ crowd.” Sounds interesting!

Worth repeating (again): Using my early-morning time

13 August 2019

I originally ran this post in 2016, but I wanted to run it again because just yesterday on our podcast my co-host Shannon Wilkinson and I were talking about setting yourself for success. That’s what this three-year-old blog post is all about! If you’re interested in hearing us talk about that topic, the episode will drop on Thursday, August 15. Go to the Getting to Good Enough website (or wherever you get your podcasts) that day or after to give it a listen.

I’m a morning person. I know that I’m most productive in the morning. Especially first thing in the morning. My brain is turned on and I can be pretty focused when everyone else in the house is asleep. (And by everyone else, I mean my husband and dog.)

I’ve learned that if I want to get something done I should do it during this precious early-morning time. For me, this is especially true of blogging. It’s easier for me to blog first thing in the morning than later in the day. I have trouble sitting down and focusing on blogging in the afternoon or evening. So I know that if I want to blog consistently, I am best off doing it in the morning.

Recently, I’ve turned that early-morning focus to doing genealogy research. (I blogged about this very thing on Organize Your Family History recently.) I had not been taking the time to do genealogy research, which was really disappointing me. Now that I’m doing it first thing, I’m really enjoying it and making progress. Of course that makes blogging the second thing I do in the morning, but that’s working out too.

I started to think about the things I can do to make it easier for me to do important things first thing, even on days where I have early client appointments. I’d prefer not to have to get up earlier, so I try to do routine things the night before instead of taking precious morning-brain time in the morning. These things include:

• Loading my car with supplies
• Deciding what I’m going to wear and even putting out the clothes
• Making lunch or gathering snacks
• Clearing off my desk so it’s easy for me to get right to work
• Making a short task list for the next day so that I’m reminded of what I want to get done first thing (instead of mindlessly going to email or Facebook)

Just doing these easy things the afternoon or evening before can allow me to harness the power of my early-morning brain. If you’re a morning person and you have something you’re having trouble getting done, you might give it a try.

If you’re an evening person—which is okay too, of course—you might try switching this up for your schedule. If you know your peak time, work around that. If you’re on your game at 9 pm try to make sure the mindless before-bed stuff is done so that you can really get into your flow at 9 and nothing gets in your way.

Is there something you’ve been wanting to accomplish regularly that keeps going undone? Try doing it before everything else.

Review of the Epson FastFoto FF-680W photo scanner

8 August 2019

As I mentioned in a post earlier this week, I’ve been organizing and scanning my photos from the 80s and 90s, primarily. The project was prompted by the discovery of a cache of photos in a closet and given a little urgency by the offer of a loan of an Epson FastFoto FF-680W photo scanner in exchange for a review.

I’ve now scanned hundreds of photos with this handy little scanner. It’s a sheet-fed scanner (like a fax machine), so it handles prints only. The photos I was scanning were relatively new and were not fragile, so I had no hesitation to put them in the sheet feeder. Based on my experience, though, I think I’d be comfortable putting old photos in the sheet feeder, as long as they weren’t crumbly or torn. The scanner does come with a carrier sheet for more delicate photos, though I didn’t try it.

The scanner has software that allows for easy organization of the digital photos, assuming you’ve already taken the time to organize the prints. As I explained in my previous post, I went through my photos and grouped them into categories that made sense to me. The software is set up so that you can assign a year (or a decade), a month (or a season), and a description to each batch. The description becomes the folder name and the year, month and description, followed by a number become the file names for each photo in the batch, which are numbered sequentially.

Here’s a photo of the screen where you make those selections:

It’s quite simple. If you finish a batch and later find photos that belong in that folder, it’s easy to just make the same selections and they’ll be added to the folder.

Once I got past the idea that I needed to name every photo (again, see my previous blog post), the process went quickly. The scanner is well named. It’s really fast!

Please note that the photos should be inserted face up, so that they the rollers do not come in contact with the photo. Inserting photos face down might result in scratching. Photos should also be inserted in a landscape orientation. When I scanned the photos, I inserted them improperly and risked scratching. Thankfully, my photos weren’t scratched. I had originally posted a video of the process to show the speed of scanning but have removed it so as not to be demonstrating improper insertion of the photos.

I was scanning old snapshots at 300 dpi, so it’s a bit hard to evaluate the quality of the scanned photos. I did use the auto enhancement setting so that I would get a duplicate, enhanced version of any photos that started out sub-standard. These photos were color corrected and red eye was eliminated. Pretty cool.

I choose to store my photos on my hard drive, but the software allows you to upload your photos to Dropbox or Google drive with a click. There’s also a sharing button for easy sharing via Facebook or email. I chose to store the folders in my folder structure on my Mac, but there is an option for saving it to the Photos app.

At $529, this isn’t a scanner for the casual or infrequent user. But if you have a lot of photos to scan, it might be something to consider. It’s fast, easy to use and virtually trouble free.

The Epson FastFoto scanner made a project I’d been putting off really easy. I had no trouble organizing my prints—I broke that project into little pieces and really enjoyed looking at a the photos—but I had really dragged my feet doing the scanning. That’s a shame, because it turned out to be a breeze!