old job old news

so about that gal from the picnic. she used to be a teacher. she isn't one now. she may or may not be one again. a big source of her paper clutter is her old teaching stuff - lesson plans, quizzes, tests, good ideas, etc.

as a former teacher myself, i know how hard it is to toss this stuff. you spent hours and hours creating it. the same is true for most anything you've created. it's hard to separate all the time and energy you put into it from the actual product. forget about the usefulness of that product to you now or how much space it takes up in your current life. it was hard, hard work to create it and if you toss it you feel like you're devaluing all that effort.

what to do? well, i recommend taking a trip through it all. the picnic gal knew she had everything in there from an entire unit on to kill a mockingbird to grammar lessons for different grade levels. my guess was that she also had random copies of handouts, some student work and some not-so-great lessons that she used on those incredibly tired days after parent conferences the night before. purging all this excess would certainly give her (and her husband, don't forget about that guy) more space.

having been away from it for a while she would now have a more objective eye to consider her work. she should ask herself with each piece of paper, "how would i grade this"? no reason to keep work that has a bad grade. even if she went back to teaching, she'd be unhappy using it. as an added bonus, if she actually did go back to teaching and taught the same books again she could pull an organized file on each novel she'd taught before. that file would only contain the creme de la creme - her best work - which she could use as building blocks for future.

when i stopped teaching, i must admit i did this and hung on to my creme de la creme for a while. eventually i wanted to use the space for my current life more than i wanted to keep old lesson plans that reminded me of a past life.

tip time! move it on

selling your stuff is a great way to spend a rainy weekend and make you feel a sense of accomplishment. right now, look around your house or apartment until you spot something that has lost its luster for you.

for me, it's this unusual display case that we purchased to use as a night stand for my husband. we bought it when we lived in a different house. it was actually perfect there. the top held some of his "special" work memorabilia that didn't really work elsewhere in our house. the bottom hid regular night stand stuff. all was good. then, we moved and the display case didn't fit in our new bedroom. so we tried it as an entry hall table, a sofa table and a side board in the dining room. in each of those cases, though, we actually had another piece of furniture that better served the purpose. so, our sweet little display cabinet became a giant piece of clutter in our tiny home.

once you've found your "thing", take a quick picture of it and post it right up on
craigslist. price it to sell and someone else will want to give it a good home. since it's raining all weekend, you'll be home to show it to her. once it's gone, you'll have cash and space. there's nothing like that feeling of catharsis that comes with walking into a room that used to have something that didn't belong.

in your effort to take back your space, selling just one thing is a great place to begin. just be careful, you may gain so much momentum that you'll become

tip time! verticalize (is that a word?)

what is the number-one thing you can do to make a difference in your home office?

contain, contain, contain . . . home offices often get bogged down with all manner of mail and bills and school work and kids art. it becomes impossible to find anything. a great way to get it under control (and still have a work surface) is to create vertical piles by using standing magazine holders. label one for each member of the household and toss in paper that applies to that person: the current little league schedule (toss last season in the recycle bin), the book club choices, the address list you've been meaning to enter into your computer. this gives everything an easy to find home (and you'll probably be able to get rid of lots of stuff along the way). later, when you're on the hunt for sydney's birthday list just pull down her magazine file and search one pile in one place.

don't forget . . . while it may be tempting to choose a different color box for each person, your best bet is to keep all of your containers in the same color family. this will reduce visual clutter in your tidy new office. (see post from september 8, 2007 for more on this idea)

tip time! *and* where in the world are the sprucegirls...

all rolled into one! this week the sprucegirls helped a busy family get their house ready for a party. toys were corralled, the mail sorting station was tamed, and all horizontal surfaces were weeded of errant items. the house is now looking very festive and ready for its close-up.

you can perform the same disappearing act for your own party-pooping piles--with a little strategy and prioritization. your job here is to make things look good. don't get bogged down in details that won't give your house visual party-bang--alphabetized cds are great, but not the best use of your time in this mission. focus on the obvious: the surfaces. the idea behind this tip is to think like a party guest--take a good look at your house like you're seeing it for the first time. go out the front door and come in like a guest even, and focus on the trouble spots that catch your eye.

next, do a sweep and gather. take a laundry basket with you and pluck all the visible items not invited to the party. now this is the important part: sort and distribute them *immediately*. seriously. no party until that basket is empty. it'll go quicker than you think--don't linger over each item, just hunker down and dispatch them to their homes.

lastly, make sure categories that do live out, haven't grown to un-party-esque proportions. if the kids have a basket of toys in the kitchen, make sure *all* the toys fit in the basket. you might not notice the overflow on a daily basis, but your guests will. the same goes for mail. nothing kills the fun mood like a pile of bills. neaten and contain your everyday paper, thin out your message board area--the less that's out, the better.

now make a few pigs-in-a-blanket and party already!

tip time! the rule of seven...

this tip mines the history vault. benjamin franklin may just be the genesis of this idea by commenting that fish and houseguests stink after three days. what does that have to do with organizing, you ask? simple. ol' ben had a deadline in mind, and no matter that fish and guests seemed like different problems altogether, he knew that one deadline kept his life simpler.

we take this approach to paper archives that have a habit of building up in filing cabinets. we've seen some magazines advocate for a complicated system of different deadlines depending on the type of paper--frankly, it makes our heads spin. so our solution? seven years. keep your paper trail for seven years. at the start of every new year, pull all of last year's paper, tuck it into sturdy envelopes and (this is important) add seven. this becomes your destroy date. write it clearly on the envelopes, and when the date rolls around, the paper heads to the shredder. simple.


oh, and ben may have said a little something about death and taxes too--and that's our one exception to the seven year rule: taxes stay forever.

tip time! easy on the eyes...

quick--what's your favorite color? if you can answer that, you're well on your way to a streamlined and clutter-free house. often, even our best organizational intentions are tripped up by that spice of life: variety. our eyes are smart. it's not just things piled out of place that we perceive as clutter--we're constantly playing the "one of these things is not like the other..." game, whether we realize it or not.

this holds true with the storage containers we select as well as the decor we choose to display. too many colors or patterns, and our eyes give up--without cohesion, anything can become exhausting visual clutter. defy this phenomenon by embracing uniformity. one key color will make a landscape of unique objects, read as a clean, inspired design choice. make that favorite color your best friend when selecting items for your home, and you'll be--and LOOK--organized.

tip time! stop clutter at the source...

it's labor day weekend! that means picnics, roadtrips and days at the beach--and lest we not forget that most sacred american tradition: the labor day sale. everything from mattresses to tires, at slashed prices. what's a bargain lover with a matching desire for an organized home, to do?

here are some spruce hints for savvy shopping (and it begins way before you swipe that card...):

-ask yourself, if you would you pay double. if not, perhaps you don't really want it in your home, and you've been tricked by the thrill of the "bargain".

-challenge yourself to name three instances when you'd wear a piece of clothing, or imagine three ways you'd use an item-- before you buy. make sure the utility matches the price.

-if the goods have passed the above requirements, then decide which item the new treasure is going to replace. swap them, new for old, immediately when you get home.

-and watch out for bulk deals: 10/$1 spiral notebooks seem great, if you can imagine where you're going to put the other 9 in waiting. if you don't have space, it's not a steal.

shopping and organization aren't mutually exclusive, as long as you buy thoughtfully with an item's home in mind.