Peace of Mind Organizing

Americans want to receive experiences, not stuff

29 November 2016

One of my refrains around any holiday is urging folks to give the gift of experiences, not stuff. I see how gifts can so easily become clutter, because people tend to resist discarding anything they received as a gift.

So I was really pleased to get an email from SpareFoot about their recent study that found that most people don’t use the gifts they receive and that 81% would rather receive experiences.

Here’s an infographic summarizing the study results:

For the nitty-gritty details, you can read the complete results of the SpareFoot Holiday and New Year Survey conducted by Wakefield Research.

The study comes from SpareFoot.com, the place to find the best deals on self-storage and full-service storage via their blog post, This holiday season, Americans want experiences, not stuff.

The importance of gratitude

26 November 2016

These are tumultuous times for many people in the U.S. I think that no matter what is going on around us, we benefit from focusing on the things that we can be grateful for. My brother, Larry, is visiting me from Brisbane, Australia, and he and I were discussing how science shows that a gratitude practice leads to a longer life. Here’s an article that details some of the benefits of gratitude.

Toward that end, I thought I’d continue my tradition of writing a Thanksgiving post about the things that I am grateful for:

• I get to hang out with my brother for a few weeks. Since Larry and I live thousands of miles apart, it’s a real treat to spend so much time with him.

• I’m an early riser. Our fabulous friend, Jim, is also visiting us so there are four adults, instead of the usual two, in our house. Each morning, I’m the first one up, which gives me time to do my daily genealogy research and try to get a little work done. I’m truly grateful that I’m wired to get up early—I get so much done first thing in the morning.

• Our father’s good health. Our father, Gene, is 86 years old. He has been treated for bladder cancer and is nowcancer free. He takes daily walks and leads an independent life. I’m so grateful he’s doing so well.

• Bix! We brought our standard poodle puppy, Bix, home on December 13, 2015. He just turned one and he is an absolute delight. He’s almost past his naughty stage and basically spends his time making us laugh (and making us throw a toy for him to retrieve). Thanks to Bix, I have new friends and I’m exercising more. (That nine-month period without a dog in 2015 was quite sedentary.) He’s a very good boy.

• Pet health insurance. Bix is a healthy dog, but we’ve had some vet visits and anomalies (like when he had to have eight baby teeth pulled because they didn’t fall out on their own). I’m so grateful that we signed up for amazing pet insurance through Nationwide. We have the Whole Pet with Wellness plan, which reimburses us for 90 percent of our expenses (after the $100 annual deductible was met). We pay about $60 a month for the premium but it has paid off in spades. It is so wonderful that money doesn’t play into our veterinary decisions.

• Our house renovations. We’ve seen some big changes in our 108-year-old house in the past year. Our unfinished basement went from something out of Silence of the Lambs to a pleasant, open and water tight space. I no longer dread doing the laundry down there. And Bix enjoys having an indoor playground. We also have a wonderful new kitchen that is a joy to spend time in. Both those projects were dirty, disruptive and expensive. But they were certainly worth the expense and aggravation!

• My wonderful business and amazing team members. For the last few years, my client work has been primarily leading teams of organizers. We help our clients make swift and transformative changes. My team members are amazing organizers and amazing individuals and I am indeed very grateful for them.

• Friends of many decades standing. I am so lucky to have Thanksgiving dinner every year with the most amazing friends. I’ve watched their kids grow up and we’re now welcoming a new generation. I also am grateful for my buddies from college, whom I see at least once a year, and friends from high school whom I see when I visit family in Walla Walla. Perhaps one of the greatest things about growing older is my ever expanding pool of friends.

• Hamilton. For the last month, I’ve been listening to the soundtrack of the Broadway musical Hamilton non-stop. I’ve read about Hamilton. I’m sort of living and breathing it and, for some reason, it’s incredibly life enhancing. I hope before next year’s Thanksgiving post I will have seen it in person!

There is always so much in life to be grateful for, if we’re looking for it. Sometimes I have to remind myself to step back and take stock of those things. For the rest of the year, I’m going to redouble my efforts to write a daily gratitude list. I know it will help me meet whatever challenges might be ahead.

The key to finishing my big knitting project

17 November 2016

On Monday, I reposted a 2009 post about the patchwork quilt I started knitting ten years ago. It took me two years to finish knitting the 63 squares. A year later, with the help of friends, I figured out a pretty layout for the squares and seamed them together. (I used only 48 of the 63 squares.) I started a knitting a binding around the edge. And that’s where the project stalled.

I bet I hadn’t touched the afghan since 2010. That’s when I placed it in a bag and put it in the closet because (a) knitting the applied i-cord binding was unbearably tedious and (b) I didn’t even know what I was going to do with the afghan when I was finished.

All that changed about a month ago. My knitting group now meets at the City Sewing Room a wonderful place for people who sew to use sewing machines (and other sewing accoutrements) and get advice. You can also have alterations and special projects sewn for you there. On October 19 when I was there, I saw that Anne, the owner, was sewing a flannel backing to a knitted baby blanket. My antennae immediately went up.

With the encouragement of my crafty friends who were there—and who helped me lay the afghan out way back in 2009—I talked with Anne about the possibility of her sewing a flannel backing on my much larger afghan. She said that wouldn’t be a problem. When I lamented that I still needed to finish knitting the binding, she mentioned that she could sew a flannel binding on. Sold! In no time, I ripped out the binding I’d already knitted. It felt great.

Two weeks later, I’d purchased and washed flannel and brought it to Anne, along with the clean and blocked afghan. I now have a beautiful, cozy afghan I can sleep under in bed or lie under on the couch. Last evening I used it as a lap blanket.

Here are a couple of photos. It feels like a miracle.

I got to thinking about how this happened and realized the key:

Impossible projects become possible when you enlist the help of experts.

For me, binding that afghan and then figuring out how to make is useful (it’s wool and too itchy to use without some sort of backing) was an insurmountable hurdle. For Anne, it was no big deal, just a few hours work.

The same is true for clutter or all sorts of other projects. My team and I come in and, in a few hours, help clients transform spaces in their home that had felt impossible to tackle on their own.

I am so happy to have this project completed and so glad I found an expert to help me. And I’m very grateful to Anne and my craft sisters for helping me make it happen!

Worth repeating: Finishing is tough (in knitting and organizing)

14 November 2016

This post was originally published on July 9, 2009. It came to mind because this weekend, when the afghan in question was actually finished. That’s right, seven years later. Check back on Thursday for a post about that, complete with photos of the finished blanket. And don’t let the seven year delay detract from the message of this post!

It’s the rare knitter who enjoys the finishing aspects of their knitting projects. That’s the weaving in of ends, the blocking (soaking or steaming the knit fabric to size), the seaming.

Finishing is the bane of existence for most knitters. And it seems to be real problem for folks who are tackling organizing projects as well. (I count myself in both groups.) I can think of a few reasons:

• Fear of screwing up the finishing and rendering all the prior work wasted
• Fear of discovering I made a mistake in the process and will have to start over
• The tedium of the final tasks (whether it be seaming a sweater or shlepping donations to charity)
• Not knowing how to finish
• The threat of being disappointed in the final result

But the flip side of the coin is the thrill when a project that has gone well is finished. And the time freed up to work on something else (another knitting project, another organizing project, or maybe just something fun).

I’m experiencing the combined tedium and joy of finishing a giant knitting project. As I’ve blogged about before, I started knitting Barbara Walker’s Learn-To-Knit Afghan back in early 2006. It’s comprised of 63 8×8-inch squares, each knit in a different stitch pattern. By the time you’ve finished it, you’ve tasted many different types of knitting.

I got about 48 of the squares done, hit a wall in the Lace section, then put the project down. I picked it up again about a year later when I participated in the Ravelympics, where my goal was to finish the Lace section during the days of the summer Olympics. I actually finished the rest of the squares in that time.

For more than 10 months, those finished squares sat in a stack waiting for me to do something with them. The next step was to lay them out, so that I could seam them into a blanket. I had absolutely no idea how to go about doing that well and lacked the confidence to do it myself. I didn’t want a poor layout to result in an ugly blanket. Plus, I was a little afraid that the seaming itself would be difficult or just plain unenjoyable.

Finally, last month, I sought the help I needed to get past that barrier. I took all 63 squares with me to Michigan on my R&R trip with my crafty girlfriends. And I got some of them to help me layout the afghan. They weren’t daunted at all.

Here’s a photo of the laying out process. It was like putting together a puzzle!

I decided to seam only 48 of the 63 squares, to make a smaller blanket to use on the couch. Once those squares were selected and laid out, I started seaming. I had six columns and eight rows. I started seaming columns, then I sewed columns together.

Here are two of the first squares seamed together:

Here’s a photo of the first column:

And the first pair of columns seamed together:

And the whole thing seamed together:

The next step is weaving in all those ends. Then I’m going to put an applied i-cord border around it. Then I’ll back it with soft fabric, so it’s cozy for using on the couch. And when I’m finished, you can count on my posting a photo!

A finishing job this big somehow seems more than finishing. I’m kind of glad I didn’t consider the enormity of what would have to be done after I’d completed the squares.

This is a great metaphor for all projects, isn’t it? Do it one square at a time. When you’re finished with all the squares, do the next task. Ask for help if you get stymied. Finish that task and then the next. Keep plugging away (even if you take months-long breaks!) and eventually you’ll finish. And, trust me, that’s a thrill and a half.

The blog's 10th anniversary!

10 November 2016

Ten years ago today, I published my first blog post, called What is organized? It feels like I’ve been blogging forever, but at the same time, those ten years went by quickly!

Since that day, I’ve written 1,155 blog posts. They’re of varying lengths, but I’d say they average 450 words. That’s 517,500 words. The equivalent of four or five books.

That’s interesting—I would have said I didn’t have time over the past ten years to write five organizing books. But clearly I did. That right there, ladies and gentlemen, is the value of doing things a little at a time.

I took a glance at my Google Analytics to see what my most popular blog post is. Hands down, it’s the one called Are you interested in becoming a professional organizer? with 120,000 page views since I wrote in in 2011 (including a staggering 54,000 page views in the last year alone). Clearly plenty of people are interested in becoming professional organizers.

I want to thank the readers of this blog. I appreciate your encouragement and kind words. If you have topics you’d like to see me cover on this blog, please post a comment or send me an email.

In the meantime, I’ll keep trying to publish those two blog posts a week (Mondays and Thursdays). And if you have any interest in genealogy, please check out my other blog, Organize Your Family History, where I try to post Tuesdays and Fridays.

Photo by CJ Sorg: via Flickr. Used under Creative Commons License.

Making my desk day productive

3 November 2016

My client schedule is light this week and I had high hopes for getting a lot done. I dusted off my important tasks so they were front and center along the urgent stuff. Yet, the last couple of days got away from me. Part of the problem is my obsession with Hamilton and the distraction of the coming election.

I know that my morning hours tend to be more productive than the afternoon. So last night I determined that I would go to bed earlier than usual so I could get up earlier than usual, thus expanding the morning hours.

Well, it’s worked like a charm. I got up at 5:30 and immediately set to putting together a robust task list, one I truly hope to finish today. I wrote my list in Evernote (in a note with today’s date as the title). Then, I selected the items to get done in the coming hour. This is a technique I learned from time management guru Mark Forster. He calls it The Next Hour of Your Life and it’s been working well for me. At the end of each hour, I create another mini-list, extracting tasks from the main list. Most hours I’ve had a little extra time after I finish the hour’s tasks. Then I take a little break.

It’s 10:45 am. My hour-by-hour list started at 6:45. That first hour, I worked on important tasks that I’d been putting off—ones that have no external deadline. Four hours later, I have checked 15 things off my list. I intend to do another 5 to 10 before noon. Then I can coast this afternoon.

This feels great! It’s not the sheer number of tasks that thrills me; it’s the fact that I started the ball rolling on some important projects that now feel viable.

I think the key to my success today is threefold:

• I’m working during my peak productivity hours
• I have a solid list from which to work so that I know what to do next
• I’m using one-hour chunks to give me mini-deadlines and apply a little urgency

I’ll definitely try this again the next time I have a whole day at my desk. Of course, I can do it when I have smaller chunks of time as well!

ETA: It’s now 2:45 and I’ve crossed all 23 items off my list. I’m calling it a day and taking my dog for a play date. It feels great!

This week's life enhancement: Hamilton

31 October 2016

Can't wait to hold this Playbill in my hand!

On Friday, October 21 I watched the PBS documentary about the smash Broadway musical, Hamilton. Of course, I was aware of the phenomenon Hamilton—it won a bazillion Tony awards and made news because tickets are impossible to get. But I had never listened to the music. I knew a lot of it was hip-hop and I did not have much of an appreciation for hip-hop, so I hadn’t bothered.

Silly me.

I’m so glad I watched that documentary to see what all the fuss was about. I immediately downloaded the 46-song original broadway cast soundtrack from iTunes and have pretty much been listening to it non-stop since. Well, not quite non-stop, because I have taken breaks to watch the 90-minute documentary three more times and pretty much every Hamilton-related YouTube video I can find. In one video, I heard First Lady Michelle Obama call Hamilton “the best piece of art in any form that I have ever seen in my life.”

The reason I bring it up here is to encourage you to watch the documentary or listen to the soundtrack if you haven’t already. Its brilliance is inspirational. And it’s so enjoyable. The documentary is freely available to watch online, but only until November 18. So don’t delay.

To make it easy for you to become a Hamilphile, I offer these links. (Just a selection of the many opportunities there are to hear/watch/read about Hamilton.)

• The PBS documentary, Hamilton’s America. Expires November 18!

• This riveting video of Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda performing the opening song from the musical (before it was a musical) at the White House. I’ve watch it roughly a bazillion times.

• Hamilton: The Revolution by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jeremy McCarter, about the creation of the play. It includes lyrics from all the songs, annotated by Miranda, as well as great photos. I downloaded the Kindle version from my library and read it on my iPad mini (it’s not compatible with the Kindle Paperwhite). I’m really enjoying it.

• Of course I want to read the Alexander Hamilton biography by James Chernow which inspired Lin-Manuel Miranda to create the show. I’ve placed a hold on it at the library and look forward to reading it when it becomes available.

• It’s hard to find video of the actual play, but the song “Yorktown” was performed at this year’s Tony awards. I keeping watching the video.

• I’m also repeatedly watching the Broadway episode of James Corden’s Carpool Karaoke, with Lin-Manuel Miranda in the front seat (and three other Broadway stars in the back seat).

I now, of course, really want to see the musical on stage, though I don’t think I’m prepared to shell out hundreds of dollars per ticket. Hamilton is playing on Broadway, of course, and there’s also a production in Chicago. Next year there will be a touring show, which is supposed to come to St. Louis. I don’t want to wait that long. So I’m entering the ticket lottery each day for two of the limited number of $10 tickets available for the Chicago performance. Chicago is about a five-hour drive from St. Louis and the same-day tickets for the 7:30 performance don’t become available until 2 pm, so I’d be cutting it close. But every day I’m available I enter. I’m determined that it’s doable.

If you’re obsessed too, please tell me: Have I missed any videos, books or articles? Let me know in the comments!

ETA: On April 20, 2017 I saw Hamilton performed in Chicago! I bit the bullet earlier this year and bought (great) tickets. It was an incredible production and didn’t disappoint. I hope to see it again some day!

ETA: On September 30, 2017 I saw it in Chicago again! My niece was visiting from Australia and wanted to see it. Who was I to say no?

ETA: On April 18, 2018 I saw it for a third time! The touring company had come to St. Louis and I couldn’t stand not seeing it when it was being performed 2.5 miles from my home. So I bought a ticket for an amazing tenth-row-center seat just two days before the performance for a (relatively) paltry $150. The show still amazes and delights me. I’d see it again in a heartbeat.

ETA: On September 1, 2019 I saw it in Chicago again! This time I (finally) won the ticket lottery and saw it from the second row for only $10. It was amazing from that vantage point!! Can’t wait to see it again.