Mission Organization

[Sheila]

LBH wow!!!

Glad I'm not the only one tired of piles and dust. Tomorrow I'm meeting with our accountant -- purposely made an early appt so I could get all our stuff together and filed early! Our personal paperwork is finished but the rental house stuff takes ALL day to organize -- utilities, rents, deposits, payments, blah blah blah. I need a better system!

I started organizing photos but got burned out. I don't know what to do about the digital photos, but all our pre-digital photos from 2000-05 are in those ShoeBoxes by Exposures -- it's a really handy storage system. But there is so much more to do! I want to meet those people who scrapbook and ask them how they do it. It's all I can do to get one photo in a frame.

Sold a bunch of stuff on ebay this month, and more to go. Trying to simplify but it is so hard. We bring in more stuff every month than we can get rid of!

Wish I had seen the Oprah episode. Does she show episodes on her site?

I am such deep doo with FBB, I haven't even started any of this stuff.(at least you have 3 little ones TFT. I don't have any defense!) I don't know why. I just dread it and put it off. This is a new low for even me though! I put it off all year. I don't even have an excuse. My Mac travels with me to SoWal, when we go.

Oh yeah, I am also in trouble about my closets too. I am in shambles. I may be on restriction till I get it all done.

So a big ol' GEE, THANKS FOR STATRTING THIS THREAD FOR ME TODAY DD!!! I'm so screwed.

 

[dbuck]

TFT--I don't know if she has the episodes on her website. I've never really looked. I just Tivo them and then pick & choose which ones to watch. She really does have some great shows. This particular one showed a couple in Texas who had the absolute worst clutter EVER! It was affecting their whole lives. Anyhoo, the guy that was helping them said many things that were inspirational, but the one thing that really stuck with me was, when you buy one thing, you have to throw one thing out! Radical concept.

The really hard part is getting to the initial stage of no clutter at all and every room being organized. We tried living by this concept for a while and I do believe it would work. When I bought a new bottle of fingernail polish, I threw one away -- but I had a HARD time doing this with clothes. It is unbelievable how attached we get to things that really mean nothing to us.

 

[DD]

I am such deep doo with FBB, I haven't even started any of this stuff.(at least you have 3 little ones TFT. I don't have any defense!) I don't know why. I just dread it and put it off. This is a new low for even me though! I put it off all year. I don't even have an excuse. My Mac travels with me to SoWal, when we go.

Oh yeah, I am also in trouble about my closets too. I am in shambles. I may be on restriction till I get it all done.

So a big ol' GEE, THANKS FOR STATRTING THIS THREAD FOR ME TODAY DD!!! I'm so screwed.

I do what I can...
Sorry, gttbm. You know I luv ya! Do I need to meet you in sowal to help? :clap_1:

The really hard part is getting to the initial stage of no clutter at all and every room being organized. We tried living by this concept for a while and I do believe it would work. When I bought a new bottle of fingernail polish, I threw one away -- but I had a HARD time doing this with clothes. It is unbelievable how attached we get to things that really mean nothing to us.

That's exactly what this guy said....can't for the life of me remember his name...but he said we get attached just to "stuff".

 

[Camp Creek Kid]

Go through your photos and get rid of the rejects. I used to save every photo, no matter if it was out of focus, bad light, etc. Also, I used to take multiples of the same shot and then get doubles as well so I ended up with 6 or 8 photos of the exact same thing. Also, throw away pictures that no longer mean anything to you. It is difficult at first to throw away photos, but it is absolutely necessary to get the number of photos down to a manageable amount.

Get some photo archival boxes and then decide how to want to organize. You may want to make a box for yourself and for each of your kids, etc. You will just have to divide the photos up and then organize each pile into the box. Label with a photo safe pen. You can organize chronologically or by subject--whichever you feel is less overwhelming. I think its easier to organize by subject.

If you want to do a photo album or scrapbook, select a few photos as you're putting the rest in the archival boxes. You can also do scrapbooks chronologically or by subject. Just of few photo from each event is enough. For instance, a "Christmas" photo album with 2 or 3 photos from each year is manageable.

One neat thing is doing a photo journal. This is like scrapbooking but without all the foo foo sickers, etc. (no offense to any scrapbookers). You put your photos on your archival paper (using photo tape or stickers) and then write a journal entry beside the photo(s) describing the event.

The key to organizing photos is to get rid of as many as you can. Put most of them in a photo box, and if you want, put a few in a photo album/scrapbook.

 

[DD]

CCK!!! Thank you!! Love this! Will start when the shredding is done. I'm up to three garbage bags full of shred!! I feel so liberated!!

 

[iwishiwasthere]

Bowing smiles to you ladies:clap_1: :clap_1: .....I was inpsired to clean 1 drawer.

I found a ruler from my nephew that I taught 20 years ago!

And a very sweet letter written from my eldest child when she was in middle school. Too bad I misplaced it when I needed to know she was a good kid.

Maybe another drawer the next hour. I am worn out!

 

[iwishiwasthere]

:clap_1: :clap_1: Another cabinet cleaned....found the book to the video camera:clap_1: Had no idea where it was!!

 

[DD]

Bowing smiles to you ladies:clap_1: :clap_1: .....I was inpsired to clean 1 drawer.

I found a ruler from my nephew that I taught 20 years ago!

And a very sweet letter written from my eldest child when she was in middle school. Too bad I misplaced it when I needed to know she was a good kid.

Maybe another drawer the next hour. I am worn out!

:clap_1: :clap_1: Another cabinet cleaned....found the book to the video camera:clap_1: Had no idea where it was!!

:clap_1: :clap_1: :clap_1:
iwish--i too found a letter to me from my son that made me feel better. written about 6 years ago.
shredding's DONE!! Yippee!!
Now on to the pix. Oh man, this is gonna take a while. But, I will be hap, hap, happy when it's done. Wish me luck girls!

 

[iwishiwasthere]

:clap_1: :clap_1: :clap_1:
iwish--i too found a letter to me from my son that made me feel better. written about 6 years ago.
shredding's DONE!! Yippee!!
Now on to the pix. Oh man, this is gonna take a while. But, I will be hap, hap, happy when it's done. Wish me luck girls!

Finding treasures like old letters keep me hunting for more. My biggest problem is we have lived in this house for 18 years and have TONS of storage space. My next weekend I can get Mr. iwiwt to help. The upstairs needs its own dumpster!

 

[DD]

Finding treasures like old letters keep me hunting for more. My biggest problem is we have lived in this house for 18 years and have TONS of storage space. My next weekend I can get Mr. iwiwt to help. The upstairs needs its own dumpster!

I feel your pain. It's just the two of us with lots of storage too. Well, we used to have storage, now we have stuff. Anyway, I've found LOTS of cards I need to send to all my friends. I need Kimmi's address BAD, because I have the PERFECT card for her!! Kimmi, if you get a pm from me, FTLOG answer it!!
I've cleaned out a drawer too that had cards, old bills, tons of address labels, snips of paper with passwords, dog registration papers, etc. I'm loving this!