I'd apologize for the mess, but...

"Welcome to my home.  I'd apologize for the mess, but it really always looks this way."

I don't like it when people apologize for the state of their home.  (I came over to visit you, not to run some sort of inspection.)  And for heaven's sake, if it's always a housekeeping disaster, why pretend otherwise by apologizing?  I personally have a running fight at home with the gremlins of disorganization--which may actually live inside of me, so that's a bit tricky.

My messy nature is kept in check by Sweetie, aka the Tidy Fairy.  Thank goodness for this.  No telling what the house would look like without her calming, cleaning, clutter-busting presence.

Exhibit A: this is what a well-organized morning looks like.  The bed is made.  The work backpack, important papers, phone and wallet are all arranged and ready to go.  And the book is sitting there because I've asked to borrow it next.

I'm just posting this here as an aspiration for myself.  Like many others, I have goals of improving my overall organization in 2019.  How about you?

Fabriholic: More is more

I have a confession to make: I bought fabric.

Kinda a lot of fabric, actually.

I think I should just come clean and declare it all here, and then make yet another a vigorous pledge to not buy fabric for the rest of 2016.

I knew I had been on a bit of an untethered acquisition mission lately.  I had been stashing my purchases hither and yon--hiding them even from myself, it seems.  But then this happened

June 19-25 Weight Watchers focus

Yup, even Weight Watchers conspired to tell me to clean up my act.  And then Sweetie, who moonlights as the Tidy Fairy at our house, encouraged me to tackle the clutter on display in some parts of my sewing room.  Starting with the flat surface that is supposed to be the guest bed.

It was painful, but I am pleased with the results.  "Current" projects [How does one distinguish between WIP and UFO?  Do you have a method for categorizing?] are now stored in the drawers below the guest bed.  Older projects are punted back to the basement.

And in the process, all this fabric came to light.

FQ overload!!!

All these fat quarters were bought in 2016.  (Hmm, looks like 6 yards to me; ouch.)

This is what 39 yards looks like--Gah!

And all this yardage has walked in the door.  Not all of it purchased, but every inch of it acquired this year.

Drat!  Because, you see, I already have enough.  In fact, if you consider my sewing output, I really have too much.  I'm in no danger of using up my stash--especially at the rate I keep adding to the booty.

we're outta here!

It is with great pleasure, then, that I present the Going Away Pile.  Far from perfect.  Far from complete (in terms of ruthlessly going thru the fabric monstrosity).  But it is a start!

Do you have a stash to die for?  What keeps it under control?

Organizing the T-shirts

My inspiration:

  

Sweetie, aka The Tidy Fairy, discovered this way to fold and stuff her t-shirt drawer about a week ago, and has been raving about it ever since.

I decided to give it a try.  I have been acquiring extra t-shirts lately (one of the hazards of teaching high school: logo t-shirts for sports and clubs), and my drawer is pretty stuffed.

Before: the overstuffed drawer

However, this new t-shirt folding technique requires a deeper drawer than this one.  So I needed another location.  Good thing I have 2 dressers!

Tall dresser with deep drawers.  Narrower than the low dresser, but it might work.  Top drawer was a junk drawer + long johns/hiking clothes catch-all.

Ta-Da!

WOW!  It worked so well that I was able to grab a couple t-shirts from my "running shirts" drawer.  My few camisoles are rolled up and tucked on the side.

Now, I know that organizing my t-shirts doesn't take care of the fact that I have too many of them.  However, I did manage to organize and consolidate my junk + long johns drawer.  So that's a win, too.

Flurries of Filing

First, let me say that I have the best Sweetie in the world.  She moonlights as The Tidy Fairy, generally keeping things neat and clutter-free in our household.  (And this is despite my moonlighting as The Clutter Gremlin, sworn enemy of all that is tidy and organized.)

So it happened that this past weekend ended up being all about organizing my filing system.  (Total honesty: I did almost none of the work here.  Although I did do five loads of laundry.)

Main filing system: this bin of hanging file folders.

Used to be jam-packed

Reference files: this drawer in the credenza

File drawer:  used to be full. of. papers.

The non-filing files: piles of paper on the counter, under the cutting table in the sewing room, in the closet in the guest room, on my dresser.  Well... you get the picture.  I am a master at creating piles.

Just one of many piles

The haul: 4 bags of shredded documents.  Full paper recycling bin out at the curb on garbage day.  Empty file folders galore.

My attempt at making shredding look sweet

The payoff: I have actually filed new things this week!  And it was easy.  Amazing what a difference it makes to have labels, and space (lesson learned: never overfill a filing system).

Thanks, Sweetie!  We should do our taxes next...

Reasons to Rid

Putting away the scraps and remains of fabrics I pulled out for sewing aprons.  I have a couple candidates for fabrics to go away.

Maybe the reverse side?

But what I found myself doing instead was casting about for reasons to hold onto these fabrics:  "Maybe if I use the wrong side of the fabric" or "Well, this can be used for making a muslin" or even "Gosh, there must be something that can be done with this!  I should consult so-and-so for ideas."

Egads!  I noticed that I was starting to sound like one of the poor souls on the Hoarders TV show.  Seriously.  I was watching a Hoarders marathon on tv while doing this fabric organizing, and they said the exact words that I have either said out loud or thought to myself while trying to part with my excess.  It is so eye-opening when a person with an obvious addiction issue speaks directly to my inner-hoarder.  I could go there; I could live that life, if I let my hoarding tendencies get out of control.


None of my justifications are reasons to hold onto a fabric.  I have too much.  If I don't love it, why do I clamp so tightly onto it?

Well, I managed to open my heart to sending some fabric away to the universe.

Total for this post:  11 yards

De-stash, baby steps

Fabriholics Anonymous, step 1:  Buy no new fabric in 2014

Step 2:  Use up fabrics that I have on hand.
Made cloth napkins as a Christmas gift with a pink handkerchief print that I have had since my oldest child (now almost 25) was about 12 years old.  Yep, that counts as deep stash.

Step 3:  Find new homes for fabrics that you are not going to use anytime soon.

The first fabrics are out the door.  Gone.  Made excellent use of a medium-size mailing box: how much can I stuff in there?  The raspberry fake fur took up a lot of that box!

 My nieces who do cosplay will be receiving this bounty: the fake fur; pink camo fleece (leftover from the fleece pants I made this year); metallic stretch denim; black pleather; and blaze orange canvas.  Let's hope they can think of things to do with this collection of randomness!  I have seen some of their costumes, so have confidence in their creative craftiness.

I'd like to somehow keep track of what I use up or give away, at least in terms of yardage.
Total for this post:  9 1/4 yards (wow! good start)

Fabriholics Anonymous

I said awhile ago that I may have a fabric addiction.  I even said that an intervention may be necessary.  Well, the blog-o-sphere has provided an answer:

The Elven Garden posted about a 12-step program for Fabriholics, to start on January 1st, 2014.  Step one, buy no new fabric for the first six months of the year.  I got to thinking about that...

1)  It has given me great joy to make aprons for family members from my fabric stash.  Sure, I bought a couple pieces of fabric specifically for this project, but I tried really hard to use what I already had. And it made me happy to use things up.  (What a concept!)

How long I have wanted to make this coat!

Used to have a dress from this fabric; still plenty leftover

2)  I have a lot of garment and home-dec fabrics.  While some of these might be usable in quilts or piecing projects, I either have to start sewing garments again, or start purging.  I glanced through my swatch notebook.  I had an idea from The Sew Weekly in mind: how many weeks' worth of sewing-a-garment-a-week could I manage with my available fabric?  Would I have more than 52 items?  (That's a whole year of sewing a new item every week!  I already have a day job, thank-you-very-much.)



3)  How many UFOs do I have?  How many "projects" do I count (because I have purchased the materials and am holding onto them along with the pattern for that elusive someday) in addition to those UFOs?  Can any of these be disposed of?

4)  And what if I have to move?  Would I really pay to transport all of my fabric?  (Sweetie has said a reasonable short-term goal is to just get all the fabric in the same storage location, rather than spread out over 2 different rooms and the garage attic.)


Ok, I'm taking the plunge: signing on to the Fabriholics Annonymous challenge for 2014.  There are rules.  Not joking around here.

 

GOALS:

- To use the Stash I already have!

- Finish UFOs without distraction by shifting to other new beautiful fabric.

- Stop the insanity of buying fabric when I'm bored or feeling uninspired.

- Save the $$ I spend on stashing. (I have a wedding coming up; maybe some extra cash would come in handy there.)

- Destash the fabrics that I realize I am never going to use.

FABRIC DIET RULES:

1) No fabric purchases for 6 months beginning January 1, 2014.   

2) At 6 months reevaluate status and decide whether to keep going for full year.  Evaluation July 1, 2014.

3) Create a UFO list and complete them!

4) Exceptions

• Backing: purchasing a backing to finish a quilt top is permissible.  However, attempting to use fabric in your possession for a backing is preferable.
• Books and Magazine purchases are allowed as they are not fabric.  Notions acceptable too.
• Swap Mama Fabric: if hosting a swap you are permitted to by fabric to execute swap duties, but you may not join a swap simply for the sake of being able to buy fabric!
• Quilts for Publication: if you are making a quilt for a publication and need certain fabric to execute it correctly then that is a major exception - who can blame you?

Modifications?  Well, since I am committing to sewing some garments and home-decor items in addition to quilty projects, I think the "backing" exception might go for "lining" as well.


I wanna have less fabric.  I am looking forward to both starting some new projects, and finishing some UFOs in 2014. 

Feel free to join in: the more the merrier!

Media Diet

I listened to portions of the book "The Four Hour Work Week" by Timothy Ferriss recently on a car trip.  Don't really know why I picked it out--just in self-help gotta-get-more-organized mode, I guess.

Several of the author's suggestions were familiar: along the lines of "Eat That Frog", get your most important tasks out of the way first.  But he also advocates eliminating ALL time-wasting activity, and severely limiting contacts.  The "severely limiting contacts" is what got me started on my recent unsubscribe mission.  He weans his colleagues and business associates off of the expectation of rapid email responses, in order to only have to check and respond to email once or twice a week.

Guess what he has to say about social media, blogs, and the internet?  Exactly: they are time-wasters.  (After all, his premise is that, without all these constant distractions and non-essential non-work-related activities, you could get your job done in only four hours a week.)

Well, the advice gets more strident: go on a media diet for a week.  This means don't spend time keeping up with the news on television or radio or internet.  In fact, avoid any and all media, unless it is critical to getting your work done.

This intrigues me.  As an adult with ADD, I often get sucked into the internet vortex, horribly distracted and off-task, even when I start with something as innocuous and simple as checking the weather before getting dressed for the day.

Maybe there is a lesson hidden here: severely limiting the inputs to my brain can be a helpful thing.  I know I love being exposed to a daily dose of new and interesting (and often nerdy) ideas by listening to NPR, but is this really causing me too much distraction?  Would I be more productive--or at least have an easier time focusing and feeling less stressed--if I severely cut back my media exposure?



My Social Experiment: we'll see how this plays out over the next week.  (Disclaimer: in looking for images to accompany this posting, I spent about 30 minutes actually reading and digesting other ideas on media diets, including a blog post that resonated with me.  But it also took 30 minutes away from what I wanted to do with my time this evening.  Damn.)

Unsubscribe

Sometimes I feel like I just discovered fire.  Or invented the wheel. 

Today I am proud of myself--even though what I have done is so simple that a *facepalm* might be the appropriate gesture (why, oh why hadn't I thought of that before?)

Unsubscribe

Yep, I just discovered that most of the annoying email newsletters and endless sales pitches from retailers and "educational partners" have a link on the bottom marked unsubscribe.  And that this magical button has the power to transform my email inbox.

Who knew? 

I was too busy slogging through the daily pack of emails, hitting delete before even opening over two-thirds of what came my way.  And it seemed that the influx was getting heavier over time.  Since when does Store M have a daily deal so awesome that it needs a daily email?  And how about C Online University, where I can finish my Master's degree program?  Do I really need to hear about every opportunity?  In a word: NO.

Do I feel sorry for the site that greeted my efforts to unsubscribe from their annoying emails with a sad graphic?  Not at all.

My gain: freedom from hundreds of artery-clogging, bank-balance-depleting, time-wasting emails a week.

Clean Sweep, volume 2

The paper recycling bin runneth over

Been working away in my classroom, bit by bit.  Made a lot of joint progress over 4th of July weekend--with the help of my oh-so-tidy-and-organized Sweetie.  Since then, I have been spending about an hour and a half each weekday SORTing and TOSSing.  Getting curriculum materials put into file drawers.  With labels.


I swear, sometimes even the most basic accomplishments (files with LABELS!) seem to me like discovering fire.  Or inventing the wheel.  Sheesh.


But today...

Today was the last big push.  Final weekend day of the month of July.  And the deadline for getting the classroom tidy is July 31st.  Starting in August, it's time to start thinking about new classes I will teach in the next year.  (No time to process the past while I am planning the future.)

This is the stuff that goes away (not including trash)

TEN hours.  On a sunny July Sunday.  When the pool, and the garden, and the hiking trails all beckoned.  Ten hours in my classroom!  God Bless Sweetie.  She stayed with me, worked her fingers to the bone labeling and sorting and tossing.  And, most of all, kept me on task and focused on the parts that only I could do.  (Like the giant tote with mixed materials and notes from every math conference I have attended since 2001.  Gad zooks!  Did NOT want to go thru that tote.  But I did.)

The results

 The above pictures show just a bit of the excess baggage I was hiding in my cupboards (and drawers, and file cabinets, and boxes-shoved-in-corners).  We estimated 200 pounds of office paper are in that blue recycle bin.  (Wonder who gets to dump that out...)

 Oh my goodness.  So much room in those cupboards!

 I can find things!!! The file cabinets are equally lovely (although nowhere near as photogenic).

In Summary

I chose this photo to describe the transformation.  At the beginning of the total CLEAN SWEEP this summer, my paperclip storage was empty.  I had even asked a colleague for more paperclips, because I was totally out.  I had no idea that my paperclips were all being used up holding together USELESS bits of paper.  Ditto for my file folders, hanging file holders, 3-ring binders, notebook dividers, etc.  I have an excess of basic office supplies now, because they are not needed to contain or corral JUNK.

Flylady quote that seems most appropriate to the occasion:
"You cannot organize clutter.  You can only get rid of it."

Thank you, Sweetie!  I am years younger and pounds slimmer because of this.

Clean Sweep, volume 1

The annual "clean my classroom over the summer" has taken on a new look this year.  Sweetie talked me into letting her help.  She is an expert organizer, and very tender with the easily-bruised feelings that come up when letting go of clutter.

I was very resistant to having help with this project.  I finally had to get out my journal and ask myself what was so scary about enlisting a helper.  A couple things came up:

• It's my mess, my doing, and should thus be my responsibility.
• Accepting help means I am a failure at organizing.  (Just to be clear: NOT TRUE)
• I can pretend the mess is not really as bad as it is, as long as no one else sees it.

Well, a therapeutic hour of journal time later, and I was ready to tackle the mess.  With help.

My mess.

First order of business: empty everything out.  Really??  Everything?!?  Talk about resistance.  "I just cleaned that cupboard out last summer, it's not a priority."  "This drawer is working for me, why do I need to empty it out?"

Just like on the tv show Clean Sweep, we spent time taking everything out.  I always wondered how long that process takes (on tv, it is a brief montage, usually with catchy music playing).  Well, for this room: 1 hour.

The key to this process taking only an hour was to not try and do any sorting, or make any decisions about what to keep or what to toss.  Also, I had to keep the judgments at bay, or I would have been an emotional wreck from continually beating myself up for letting the space get so cluttered.

I was reminded by my darling Sweetie that 90% of everyone has some form of mess like this, somewhere in their life.  I am not alone.  And in fact, by confronting my mess head-on and without fear, I am actually going to make things better.  Not just a little bit.  A LOT.

After the haul-out, we spent some time looking for "low-hanging fruit" -- items that are easy to categorize as keep or toss.  Not as easy as I would have hoped, and I quickly became frustrated.

I have been listening to an audio course: Get Organized the Clear & Simple Way by Marla Dee.  She breaks the "do it" phase of organizing  (after "see it" and "map it" have been accomplished) into steps, starting with SORT. 

So that's what I have been doing the past couple days, working on my own without assistance:  SORT. 

Just sort things into like categories, with bold labels on each category.  Don't make decisions about keep or toss (that's why I can be trusted to do this step on my own), just sort. 

Today's success: in just over an hour, I was able to sort my way through this entire stack of papers.  (And believe me, at least 50% of the stacks of papers in my room are mish-mash miscellaneous, in desperate need of sorting.)



There you have it: on my way to a cleaner classroom.  And I'm pretty sure that this year, it's gonna get WAAAAY cleaner than it ever has been before.

You are not behind

A quote from Flylady (organizing and decluttering guru extraordinaire):

"You are not behind.  Just jump in where you are." 

I need this reminder.  My house somehow got cluttered and untidy during the spring (what a whirlwind spring it was).  I feel an urgent need to get it all straightened up at once, and yet I know that is a recipe for disaster (or burn-out).

 Just one example of the many piles that have formed around my house.  This one is in my sewing room, and flaunts the reminder sign hanging nearby, which gives me Peter Walsh's rules for maintaining a clutter-free space.

Rule 1?  Keep flat surfaces clear.  (Oops.  Fail.)

Ok, deep breaths.  Set your timer for 15-minute increments, and just jump in.  After all, I am not behind...

Clean Sweep

Finally found the mojo to go do some tidying in my classroom.  On a sunny weekend with absolutely perfect spring weather... (What is wrong with me?  Other than severe tree allergies?)

My inspiration was the ability to blog the before and after photos.  So motivating to document progress in the cleanliness arena.

The view from my desk: BEFORE

Love the drama of an impressive: AFTER

My serious tidy issue is clearly *paperwork*.  I get unsightly paperwork buildup in all areas of my life.  Sometimes it just takes a big shovel to get things moving.

The credenza area to the left of my desk has been a huge pile for so long, I hardly dared to dream of it as usable space.  I couldn't even close the cupboard underneath because of the amount of miscellaneous crap on the floor, also.  The AFTER is so much more *spacious*.

Oh, I can even pile things on the floor, can't I!  No wonder I was starting to feel claustrophobic: my chair could hardly move back from my desk without me tripping over the stuff.  Note that there is still an auxiliary filing system (AKA pile?) in evidence.  Well, I'm going for better here, not perfect.

My favorite part of the transformation: underneath my desk!  No one could see it but me, but I managed to really clutter up my personal space with student papers.  Ugh.  No more.  I have reclaimed my own space!  I am worth it!!

 

 You can see that the clean sweep of the desk area didn't extend too far onto the counter.  Didn't touch the in-box.  Didn't address the student notebooks that overtake one whole wall of counter space.  Still better, though.

Saved for yet another weekend: underneath the materials table.  The paperwork dragons breathe smoke and fire over there... It's scary!

I feel cleaner.  Lighter.  Looking forward to a new energy in my classroom come Monday morning.

Declutter Challenge

Found a blog, The Organised Housewife (she's Australian, thus the s where I would put a z), that has a "Declutter 52 Things in 52 Weeks" challenge.  I was intrigued!

My new year's resolution is a bit stalled: I have a long-ish list of things that have "come in" to my life, with no balancing outs.  I had thought it would be a simple matter to match in with out: a new spatula means I need to get rid of an old spatula.

Not so simple.  The January quilting retreat resulted in a load of swag coming home with me.

Magazine, charm pack, notepads, sewing gadgets, tote bag (to carry all the stuff home), socks, gloves, nicknacks, etc.--total count of items in for just this event was 20--aack!

I gave away some of the retreat items immediately: a book on sewing with knits for small children, for example.  I have offset some of the new by discarding old: got rid of three quilt calendars, knowing I have enough projects and ideas within magazines and books.

So, this is where the Declutter 52 Things comes in and rescues me.  She talks about the places where clutter breeds and lurks:  under sinks, in laundry rooms, in the back of the linen closet, in those filled-up drawers that I never open.  Yes, I have to go back to scouring around the edges for things to get rid of. 

First candidate:

Ummm, yeah.  About those drawers that I never open...

Oh, wait: there's actually two of that sort of drawer in this particular dresser.  They are both filled with beading/jewelry-making supplies, some papercrafting tools (I see a decorative punch on top), and miscellaneous "craft" stuff.

To be completely honest, there's another drawer in the living room that also belongs with this stuff.  Call it overflow?

So, this is my next declutter project.  I wouldn't let Sweetie throw anything away last time she tidied in this room, so she just tried to categorize and corral (thus the plastic bins and containers to hold like items).

But, as I have learned from FlyLady: you can't organize clutter--you can only get rid of it!

There must be at least 20 items in here that need to go away. 
Setting a timer helps: 15 minutes at a time.  I can do anything for 15 minutes.

New Year's Resolution: 2013

Charlotte, the fabulously fake tree

It all started on December 26th.  Youngest Daughter came by the house and asked me, "So how was your Boxing Day, Mother?" 

Now, although Wikipedia describes Boxing Day as a shopping day, in our house we have always treated it as a day to box up unneeded items for giving away to charity.  Which is not what I had done on December 26th, but it was what I resolved to do starting the very next day.

So, as I  put away my Christmas gifts, I looked for items to box up.  It seemed only natural to part with items in the same general category as the new gifts: new pajamas and gloves = box up old pajamas and excess gloves (how many pairs does one need, anyway?)  Cute new earrings = what old earrings do I never really wear?

In this manner I managed to find at least one item to give away for every new thing I received.  And thus was born my New Year's Resolution for 2013: for every new item that comes into my life, one old item needs to move out.

 

 I tried to keep up with this mindset during the final week of 2012, but ran  into difficulty when I went to fabric clearance sales at two local quilt shops.  Bought about 8 yards of fabric--mostly to start a t-shirt quilt for Youngest Daughter.  Sweetie reasoned, "since the fabric is to be used to make a quilt that you are giving away as a gift, you shouldn't have to offset it coming into the house."  Yesss, but... what if it takes me 3 years to make this quilt?  What if I start using this mindset to justify acquiring lots of stuff fabric?  (I know me: the year I took The Compact to buy nothing new, I had to restrict myself from Goodwill shopping, as I veered away from the intent of the pledge into massive used buying.)

Well, the question of the fabric purchases remains unresolved.  Technically, the purchase was in 2012, but I really feel like this Resolution started on Boxing Day.  So I'll be looking for something to part with, to at least assuage my fabric-hoarding shopping guilt.

Here's to a 2013 that continues the 2012 journey: have less stuff!

Untidy build-up

"Life is 70% maintenance."  --Robert Downey, Jr.

Well, the Tidy Fairy has been too scared to visit my sewing room recently, so the room reverted to its wild and untamed state over the past month or so.  I can sure put on a mess! There was untidy build-up everywhere.  No wonder I haven't wanted to go in and sew.  Even my cutting and ironing surfaces had been buried, to say nothing of the available floor space.  There was just barely room for the dogs (who sleep in there most nights).

Didn't take any "before" photos, but I thought I'd celebrate the Day of Tidy that I spent excavating.

The problem corner of my sewing room now contains a 10-drawer organizer.  I brought this in from the garage to replace two boxes of WIP materials that had become unmanageable.  All the little bits and pieces of an ongoing project (or several ongoing projects, as the case may be) were too hard to keep track of.  Now... the two "red" drawers contain the pieces for my red/black/pink baby-quilt-to-be.  And likewise with the other eight drawers. 

So, the shelf that usually holds "the projects" can now hold the big pieces that go with those projects, and all the smaller pieces are safely tucked away.  (See the backing fabric I picked out for the stack-n-whack?  It's on the bottom of the pile.)


Things that got put away: all the fabric I have bought recently (including my sale purchase for the t-shirt quilt); scraps from the 1930's reproduction quilt I finished over the summer; knitting needles and supplies (from our move last October!); and a couple summer-ish projects that just aren't getting done any time soon (sorry, Oakie).

Classroom declutter update

I've been working steadily in my classroom, a few hours a day. It seems a little embarrassing--both that I have so much paperwork buildup, and that it is taking me so long to clear it out.  But I am choosing to celebrate the fact that I'm doing something about it. 

The focus of the decluttering for the past week has been my statistics materials.  I taught AP statistics for 5 years, then switched over to teaching a dual-credit (high school and community college) version of the class for the past 3 years.  I have full sets of handouts, tests, notes, and homework for each course.  There is some overlap, but I never really integrated the old into the new.

Before.  All this is stats-related.  The goal was to get everything down to one bin and two binders.  I can hardly believe I have so much stats material.

After.  Two bins (one of the binders is tucked into the back of the right-hand bin).  I'm saving quite a bit of the older AP materials, but maybe I should re-think this after one more year.  A more-organized year, to be sure.

And, of course, all the excess materials have to go somewhere.  Newly emptied-out file folders on the left, recycle bin on the right.

Oh my, does this feel good!