Destroy the Evidence

I've had these old 4-H ribbons and trophies kicking around for over 30 years. Not once have I needed them to prove how competent I am at such endeavors as baking bread, public speaking, or cross stitch. Because of that, I'm pretty comfortable preserving them with this photo and letting them go the way of many other pieces of useless memorabilia.

The fact is that I barely remember any of the projects that I did to earn most of these awards. That's not surprising since what I do remember is that almost all of them were completed in the final days before the yearly 4-H fair - a skill that I still possess. I prefer to call it working well under pressure.

Given that I put so little effort into the projects and that they certainly don't indicate my worth or skills today, why does it sting so much that the small handful of red ribbons and the one lone white ribbon were all earned in cooking?

Or rather because of my lack of skill in cooking.

Suddenly, I feel the need for a 4-H do-over.

It's a Date!

I have a thing for calendars. Unfortunately, I also have a thing about keeping old calendars. It seems to go hand in hand.

I mean, what if I'm going through a stack of photos and I need to find the date that we went on a certain trip? Or what if I need to recall the date of a medical treatment for a new doctor? I always have my dusty trusty old calendars.

However, the reality is that they are dust collectors and don't really provide the information that I want in an organized manner.

So today I took a few hours and created an Excel calendar that is sort of a perpetual calendar for our family events. I listed the months/days in the first column and then followed that by a general column with birthdays, anniversaries, and important dates that never change. Then I made columns for each year and recorded important information that I might want or need in the future, like vacations, important medical information, fun events that we participated in, and important job related information.

Now it's all nice and organized, and I can let go of the old calendars.

Unfortunately, what it really made me realize is how fun our life used to be and how routine it has become in the past few years. There was one year that we went on at least eight fun vacations or long weekend trips. That was followed by a year that had four trips and then just gradually decreased to almost nothing the past couple of years.

This year is coming to an end, but I'm going to have to see what we can do about that.

I'll just grab my calendar and pencil in some fun.

Five Will Get You Ten

Ever heard the phrase "Five will get you ten?" Loosely, it means that you firmly believe something or that you are willing to bet on something - "Five will get you ten that it rains today since we have a picnic planned."

But I think it should mean something else. In fact, I think it should be stated as "Five will save you ten." As in, taking five minutes now will save you ten minutes later. You know - that whole stitch in time saves nine theory.

How many tasks that would take five minutes or less do you routinely put off? You walk past the dishwasher and think "I'll unload that later." Or you set a bill aside rather than just log into your bank account and schedule it for payment.

In the end, those things end up taking more time than they would have originally just because you put them off. Dishes pile up in the sink because the dishwasher is full of clean dishes to put away. That bill gets piled under other papers on your desk and you have to spend a few extra minutes looking for it a week later.

The other problem with those five minute projects is that they clutter your brain because you want to remember to do them yet they aren't important enough to put on your written list of things to do.

I challenge you to try to take care of those five minute or less projects immediately when you think of them. Empty that dishwasher right away, pay that bill that came in the mail today, fold that stack of towels laying on the dining room table, pick up all the shoes laying around the house and put them away. As you walk past something that needs to be done, ask yourself if it will take five minutes or less and if the answer is yes, then just do it.

Excuse me while I go fix the handle on my popcorn maker. It's been broken for over two years and I can't even tell you how much time I've spent moving that little piece around and trying to keep track of it.

All This Peter Is Just Too Much

That's not something that most husbands hear on a daily basis. And yet, it's what I complained about all day long today.

Recently, Vern has been reading Peter Walsh's book, "Does This Clutter Make My Butt Look Big?" which explores the connection between clutter and weight control.

I've been hearing "Peter says this" and "Peter recommends that" for days now regarding the kitchen. Peter apparently thinks we need to clean out our refrigerator and pantry and get rid of any excess food that we aren't going to use this week.

While I wouldn't say we are going THAT far, we did decide to work together on cleaning out both of our refrigerators and our pantry shelves to rid them of outdated food or food that we simply know we aren't interested in anymore.

Don't let the photos fool you. We DID work together on this; Vern didn't do ALL the work.

Now, if Peter would just come finish my kitchen, I'd be all over him.

Organize Yourself

And then I woke up.

We're working on a major decluttering project in preparation for a large garage sale later this summer. Having moved from a much larger house into a small home, we just have too much stuff. We've had a couple of sales since we moved here, getting rid of the large stuff, but there was a lot of the stuff that we "justified" keeping. The reasons varied from "someone gave it to us" to "we paid a lot of money for it." Sometimes we justified it because we actually did have room for it.

However, after reading Peter Walsh's book, "It's All Too Much" (Vern just finished reading it too), we realize that just because it was a gift, it cost a lot, or we have the physical room for it, it is not always something that we need in our life, especially if it doesn't help us achieve what we want for our lives.

For example, the pile of organizing books.

I had them neatly organized and categorized on our bookshelves. However, after dusting them for the 10,000th time (it's really dusty here in farm country), I'm just frankly sick of them. Not one of them has magically organized my house or even given me the motivation to do the job myself. Not only that, not one of them has even had one bit of information or one new idea that I didn't already know.

So I had to ask myself - WWPD? (What Would Peter Do)

Peter would say "get rid of all of them. . . except mine of course."

And so that's what I'm doing. Some are being sent off to Powells and others are going in the garage sale.

Except for Peter. Peter can stay.

A Stitch (Marker) in Time

My current decluttering project is our master bedroom. In my top dresser drawer is a box of jewelry items that I always end up throwing back into the drawer. Things my mom left me, things that I never wear but that hold some sort of a sentimental value, and things that I've just outgrown from a jewelry standpoint. How much do I really honor these memories by throwing them in a box in the back of my drawer?

One of those pieces of jewelry was a silver charm bracelet from when I was a pre-teen. I got a lot of charms for different events in my life or different places we visited. However, I honestly can't remember ever wearing the charm bracelet and, in fact, several charms hadn't even been put on to the bracelet.



Rather than toss the charm bracelet back into the drawer, I disassembled the bracelet and made stitch markers for knitting out of them. I also made markers out of a few pendants from necklaces that I no longer wear but that were special in some way.

Now with every knitting project, I am not only knitting my love and time into the project, but I am also reflecting on treasured memories of my past.

Today I will take some time to knit and use a charm to remind me of my mom who passed away 11 years ago today.

A Little Bit of This and A Whole Lot of That

We had the first little bit of warm weather this week, so we christened our deck by cooking on the grill for the first time! It was a welcome change from cooking in the garage. Especially since Vern takes charge of cooking on the grill. (The white garage in the distance is Vern's shop, and that's my cute little red Jeep.)

Some further progress was made on the kitchen this week. We found out that we needed more structural support for the 12" overhang that will go around our island. The soapstone is very heavy, so we needed something substantial. We decided on some Mission style corbels. It was a mad scramble for them because we wanted to find something that matched the style of our kitchen, but that also was affordable. Affordable being the key because structural corbels in the size that we need are pretty darn expensive. Some of them cost as much as - - - are you sitting down? - - - $1,000 each! Yikes. that was definitely not in the budget.

We were able to find these from Rockler and have them overnighted to us so that we could get them stained and installed before our counters are ready.

Speaking of the soapstone, the great news is that it is being installed on Wednesday! The bad news is that we still won't have a working kitchen for a month or two due to the work that we have left to do and Vern's surgery.

We almost have the beadboard installed around the island. Here's a little peek at it as well as a look at the baseboard we are using around the island.

There will be a small inset bookcase in the area where the clamps are. The soapstone will extend about 12" most of the way around the island.

Here's another view that gives a little more perspective.

This is the view from the former living room/now dining room. There will be a small office in the area where the saw is sitting so that it is easy access from the kitchen but yet separate. You can also see the new door to the deck that we installed this fall. The walls are going to be a neutral tan color, so we're trying to decide on the color for the door. I'm thinking about red to give the room a little punch.

Finally, my "Mission Organization Project of the Day" was actually two projects. I'm working on our family room right now.

Here's a good example of "just because something is neat and tidy and you have room for it, doesn't mean you should keep it."

What the heck was I thinking keeping all of these maps? We had maps for almost every state, several large cities, and many areas of Canada. Do I really think I am going to be driving to Alaska anytime soon? Can I even remember the last time I used a map? And if I did need a map, wouldn't I want a more current map than 2003? Isn't that why we are members of AAA Motor Club? We can get all the free maps we want at any time. For that matter, we have two GPS units - why do I even need a map?

And these . . . .

Do we even have a VCR anymore? I guess we do, but I don't even know where it is, and I'm certain it is not plugged in. Heck, even when we did have one, I couldn't operate the darn thing. We have a DVD recorder and TIVO. I can't imagine I'm ever going to need a VCR tape again in my life.

So it was a pretty easy answer to the question "WWPD?" (What Would Peter Do?) Peter would say pitch them. And so I did.

Welcome to the 21st century.

Is There an AA for Magazines?

Hi, my name is Carla, and I'm a magazinaholic.


There. I've put it out there for the world to see. I have a problem with magazines. I practically stalk the mail carrier each day to see what magazines she has in store for me. I never get to wait in line long enough at the grocery store to look at all the pretty magazines in the aisle. And a hot night out must include a trip to Barnes and Noble so I can fondle the magazine rack.


To be fair, I've cut back. Way back. I used to get about 30 magazines monthly. Yes, you read that right. Thirty. Three-O. Practically one for every day of the month. Lately I've been letting many of my subscriptions expire without renewing. I guess the first step is admitting you have a problem.


Right now, my "problem" is that my house is still overflowing with unread magazines.


I've been reading It's All Too Much. Living A Richer Life with Less Stuff by Peter Walsh. I've read a lot of books on organization (yes, that's another vice of mine, but we'll have to deal with that some other time) but I can honestly say that this is one of the best that I've read. Not only does he get behind the psychology of why we have a hard time parting with certain things, but he gives very clear guidelines about how much to keep and how to determine what is right for you. It's not simply a book about how to organize, but digs much deeper and requires you to focus on the reality of your life and your living space.


Anyway - back to the magazines. His suggestion is to limit your subscriptions to three magazines and to keep no more than two current issues of each. It seems simple enough really, but seeing it in black and white and having the words "you'll never get around to reading those back issues; what are you hoping to find in them; it will be outdated before you ever get around to them" really seemed to drive home the fact that I really never DO get around to reading the old issues. I really don't know what I'm looking for in most of them and that information would be widely available elsewhere anyway. And I really don't want to read about selecting the perfect Christmas tree in May.


Armed with determination, I gathered up all the magazines I could find, and I have to be honest and say that it took me to every room in the house. And the garage. And the car.



Sorting them out was a pretty easy task. I simply sorted them into piles, discarded all but the most recent two issues of each one, and then put the rest in a basket for easy reading.




From now on, all magazines will be contained in this basket. Period. When a new one comes in, the old one goes out, even if it is unread. If I haven't read it in two months, I'm not going to. I won't be tempted to get a larger basket. And I won't be tempted to scatter them through the house so that it just looks like I have them under control.

But I also won't be cutting my subscriptions down to just three magazines either. Let's not get crazy about this. Baby steps, Peter. Baby steps.