Monthly Archives: December 2020

New Year?  Resolutions?  Fresh Start?  A great time to get organized.  Office supplies and filing supplies are on sale everywhere!  Get started!  In today’s cyber and digital world, we truly don’t need to keep paper like we used to.  I had a client who insisted on keeping paper documents and tax returns that dated back to 1973.  I couldn’t talk him out of it as he was afraid of the big bad auditor!  So, with respect I organized all his boxes and files into bins safely in his garage.

The important part was moving forward.  I organized all his receipts and supporting documents all year through so when it was time to file, it was easy and quick to package it up for his accountant.  The accountant?  Loved me.  My client?  Sadly, passed away this year.  The bins in his garage entered the teeth of a shredder.  The moral of this story?  We don’t need to keep old paper documents forever.  Don’t leave these for your children to sort through.  Seek the advice of your accountant as to what to keep and what not to keep and how long.  I promise, you don’t need to keep the 1973 documents. 

So, start fresh… clean out… the worn out manila file folders can be replaced with colorful ones that will make you happy when opening that drawer… use a label maker to label the folders so they are consistent and readable… get some new pens and pencils… perhaps fun colorful desk accessories… most important… file the piles and keep up with it all year long!  That is a worthy resolution!  

This year while packing up Christmas, I decided to seriously sort and organize our decorations.  We enjoy a collection of beautiful glass blown ornaments, some which have sentimental value and others that are simply pretty on the tree.  As I carefully packed them away, I labeled the most precious boxes in which they sleep all year with the following:

~ Where or when we found the treasure

~ Which child gets this (you know, when they are cleaning out their parent’s belongings…)

Morbid thought?  No!  Organized preparation!  Our daughter loves to cook, and we have several foodie ornaments.  Our son loves color and unique art and he gets the ornaments that fit his personality. 

Through the years, we will continue to adorn our tree with these baubles, but they are organized, labeled, and when the day comes, our kids will appreciate and continue to enjoy the same joy every Christmas.         

Time to store the decor?  The holidays are such fun and who doesn’t like to take their house apart and decorate for a few short weeks?  It’s the UNdecorating where I come in.  Consider hiring a professional to dismantle the decor, wrap it, pack it, label it, and store it in heat safe, stackable containers and bins.

I recently had the opportunity to dismantle Halloween and Autumn for a client.  There were 28 bins and 5 bagged life-sized characters, this was driven to a spacious storage unit where SURPRISE!  I found over 200 bins of Christmas decor.  Requiring a 24-foot rental truck, extra muscle and weeks of organizing this client was able to see everything she didn’t know she had.  The decor had been improperly wrapped causing damage, mislabeled bins causing confusion, all resulting in many duplicates purchased over the years.

In January, I will return to UNdecorate and this time the task will be done efficiently and properly.  Maybe, just maybe… I can reduce the number of bins to under 200 and next year a pickup truck may be the only transport required.  One can only hope.

Those extra pounds creep up, especially around the holidays.  I’m not talking body fat.  I’m talking clutter.  Find those items you have stashed to “re-gift” and get them ready to wrap.  While you are wrapping, sort through your leftovers… no, not the food, the old, recycled gift wrap, and bows.  Are they crinkled and smooshed?  Look like recycled?  Then recycle them in that big bucket on the side of the house and start fresh.  No one wants a gift in an extra loved gift bag.  Sort through and organize ribbons, seriously?  A 5” ribbon is going to help you? 

This year while opening gifts, have a bag ready for the wrapping and if Aunt Betty wants to flatten, straighten, and save every piece of tissue, wrap and ribbon, let her.  Then send it all home with her.

Ahhh… now that’s better.  You’ve lost the weight!