Peace of Mind Organizing

A peek at Peter Walsh's [IN]PLACE System for Office Max

6 May 2009

Back in early April I was invited to a blogcast that introduced Peter Walsh’s new line of office products to people who blog about organizing and parenting. They sent me product samples. I was wowed.

Office Max had a booth at the NAPO conference and I was able to take another look at this line of products. I really like them. I like their versatility, durability, and the way they integrate with one another. I like that I can make them pretty just by using scrapbook paper as the top sheet of a file. These products were well thought out.

In chatting with the PR person for Office Max I learned how to get the video of the blogcast in which Peter Walsh introduces the products so that I can embed it in my blog.

So here you go. It lasts about 40 minutes and it’s fast-paced and fun.

Work Life Organized Blogcast with Peter Walsh & OfficeMax from Beth Cleveland on Vimeo.

The products are all available in Office Max stores and there’s now a fancy website for them as well.

Fantastic Mother's Day gift ideas

5 May 2009

Traditional Mother’s Day gifts are a recipe for clutter as far as I’m concerned. The thought behind the is great, but since sentiment is attached to them, the recipient doesn’t like to part with them. That can add up to major clutter over the years.

My friend and fabulous organizer Emily Wilska of The Organized Life in San Francisco posted some great ideas on her website for giving the gift of organization for Mother’s Day. She breaks it down by age of the child. Brilliant.

Hope on over and read Organizing Projects for Mother’s Day.

I found out about this via Twitter. I love Twitter. If you do too, you’ll want to follow Emily.

Highlight reel: NAPO 2009 conference

4 May 2009

I don’t know what made me think I’d find time to blog while in Orlando for the 2009 conference of the National Association of Professional Organizers. You’d think by now I’d know that I spend little time in my room there and when I am in my room I’m either chatting or sleeping.

I had a tremendous time there. I thought I’d share a few of the highlights.

• The Tweet Up. At a gathering of conference attendees who tweet, I got to meet in person so many of the organizers I follow on Twitter. Such a great way to kick off the conference. And it really well organized by Scott Roewer of Solutions by Scott.

• The Macintosh session. Speaking of Scott Roewer, he taught my favorite session, “An Apple a Day Keeps Disorganization Away.” I learned so much about being more productive with my Mac. Fabulous.

• Hanging out with my peeps. So much of what is great about the NAPO conference for me takes place outside of the educational sessions. I got to spend some quality time in our suite with my roomie, Geralin Thomas. So wonderful. In addition, I sipped some wine in the suite with Mary Ann Pate, Kathy Waddill, Margaret Lukens, Wendy Davie, Lauren Halagarda, and Scott Roewer. Geralin and I were also fortunate enough to get some quality hanging-out time with outgoing NAPO president, Standolyn Robertson and her charming husband, Jamie, who were staying in the suite next to ours.

• The Expo. I love a good trade show. And a trade show full of organizing tools is about as good as it gets. Favorite booths included those from Office Max, Rubbermaid, Container Store, List Plan It, Ikea, and Xambox.

• Florida! Amazingly enough, I’d never stepped foot into the state of Florida before this conference. Now I get what the fuss is about. While I did nothing remotely touristy (the only time I was outside the hotel/resort was when I went to the Tweet Up and when I was traveling from or to the airport), I enjoyed the sun, the warmth, the palm trees and the screened-in porch outside my room.

If there’s a professional association in your field and you don’t attend its annual conference, I’d encourage you to look into it. The enthusiasm, synergy, and good feelings you can get from hanging out with people who care about what you do is absolutely invaluable.

I was so glad to see eight other members of NAPO St. Louis there. Making the investment in attending conference, in my opinion, shows such a commitment to our businesses. And it makes us better organizers.

Off to Orlando!

28 April 2009

I leave this morning for Orlando to attend the annual conference of the National Association of Professional Organizers. I have to admit that I’m a bit of a conference junkie. I really benefit from the information and energy of a conference full of passionate folks.

This is my fourth NAPO national conference; I started going the first year I was in business and I think that was probably the smartest thing I did for my business that first year. It requires an investment of over $1000 when I add the registration fee to hotel and airfare, but it pays for itself in terms of education, confidence, and connections made. Oh, and then there’s the trade show full of the best and brightest organizing products!

One evening, there will be a “TweetUp” — a meeting NAPO members attending the conference who are Twitter users. Props to Washington, DC-based organizer Scott Roewer for doing an amazing job of organizing the TweetUp,

This year I’m sharing a suite with the fabulous Geralin Thomas of Metropolitan Organizing in Cary, N.C. I’m so excited to get to spend some quality time with her!

I’m hoping to blog while I’m in Orlando. I just re-read a post I wrote from last year’s conference in Reno and it’s made me all the more excited for this year’s conference!

It's amazing what you can do in a half hour (or less)

27 April 2009

As part of the preparations for Declutter Happy Hour, the four-week teleclass I started offering with Shannon Wilkinson last month, I’ve been doing a lot of small decluttering projects around the house.

In our teleclass, we offer students 30 minutes of decluttering time right in the middle of class. Lest that seem like too little time to actually accomplish anything, I took on some 15-minute projects to reassure myself. I took before-and-after photos, so I could share then with potential participants. If I can do this much in 15 minutes, think of what you can do in 30 minutes! (For a look at a couple of sets of 15-minute before-and-after pictures, as well as some 30-minutes projects done by class participants, see the Cheers page on our Declutter Happy Hour website.)

We didn’t want to litter our Cheers page with my projects, so I thought I’d share some more of my photos here. Because who doesn’t like before and after photos?

I have a desk I call the “household desk” that’s a landing place for random paper, primarily. Our, cat, Joe eats on the household desk. Things can get ugly pretty quickly if I don’t stay on top of it.

In fifteen minutes I went through all the paper, threw away some and put the rest of the stuff away:

The top right-hand drawer of that same desk holds random office-supply items, return address labels, stamps, etc. It needed some serious cleaning out, as indicated by the fact it wasn’t easy to open and close. Here’s the before shot:

In only fifteen minutes it was transformed into a much more usable drawer.

During the 30-minute decluttering portion of Declutter Happy Hour, Shannon and I stay on the line in case any participants have any questions. During that time in the third session, I decided to tackle this crazy messy area of my office.

Cleaning it up took only 25 minutes and I was chatting with Shannon while I was doing it.

If it takes so little time to clear up a mess like that, why do I let it get that way? It’s a question for the ages.

The beauty of Declutter Happy Hour is that it prompts you to set aside two full hours (a half hour in each class) for hands-on decluttering. Prior to the decluttering, you get tips and advice from me and some awesome emotion-clearing exercises from Shannon. Ready to give it a try? Get more information and sign up here. The May session starts May 7.

Why I'm loving Twitter

24 April 2009

I posted back in December that I was enjoying Twitter. I’ve been on it now for five and a half months and I’ll admit it, I’m hooked. I don’t spend a ton of time with it, so there are many tweets I miss, but when I do have the chance to tune into my Twitter stream, good things often happen.

Here are five reasons I love Twitter:

• I learn stuff. I follow smart people. And they share great resources. My blog reading has changed since I started Twitter. Rather than reading certain blogs regularly in my limited time for it, I read specific posts recommended by people I follow. And I’m exposed to lots of things I wouldn’t otherwise see.

• It can bring me good customer service. Earlier this week, I tweeted about some excellent customer service I received from Charter Communication’s cable TV repair division. I was just expressing appreciation, since Charter gets such a bad rap (often deservedly). After that tweet, I was followed by a Charter customer care guy which resulted in a conversation that led me to my receiving a second-generation Moxi DVR two days later, something I’d been led to believe wasn’t available in St. Louis. I’m delighted because I love Moxi and hated the other DVR that had replaced my old Moxi when it died.

• I get to know people I don’t know. The smart people I follow often combine personality and info in clever posts that allow me to get to know them better. That’s very cool. I may or may not ever meet them personally, but I feel a little enriched by getting to know what feels like their true selves. When someone posts about a favorite song, or a less-than-favorite food, I’m gleaning a little info. I especially love learning what makes people laugh.

• It can drive traffic to my blog. When I post something on my blog that I think might be of special interest, I’ll post a link to it on Twitter. That invariably leads to hits on my blog. I try not to abuse this.

• It makes me laugh. Case in point: this link, posted by Unclutterer’s Erin Doland this morning. ‘Nuff said.

If you’re not on Twitter, or you’re on it but ignoring it, I encourage to give it a try and give it some time. Follow some cool people. Feel free to follow me, if you’d like. I give it a hearty thumbs up!

Why not lighten the load?

22 April 2009

Over at the wonderful blog, Unclutterer last week, guest blogger Gregory Go offered up a guest post on the Seven Benefits of Decluttering. If you had any doubt of the benefits of lightening the load and letting go of excess (and they include financial benefits!), hurry on over there and check it out.

Another valuable blog post on decluttering, though it’s a couple of years old, is at Leo Babauta’s popular blog, Zen Habits. The post is called Zen Mind: How to Declutter.

If you could use a little help and support for decluttering, check out Declutter Happy Hour, the four-week teleclass I’m offering with life coach Shannon Wilkinson. We’re now accepting enrollment for the May session (four Thursdays in May). Early bird pricing starts today!