2010-0914 Well...Didn't Go As Planned

This is just a final report that things didn't quite go as planned. While it was tough to get 30 days in of this habit...it has stuck with me. Now when I have a spare 5-10 min I think of what in the apartment is out of place and needs to be put away.

The key learning from this attempt is that you can do anything for 15 min.

2010-0512 Shopping evening

After a quick run to some stores for some needed (and not needed items), I returned home with just enough time to put my new shopping items in their homes. It was quick. Looks like I need to do a lot of work this weekend (also the end of my 30 day trial), and it will be a perfect rainy weekend to get things done!

2010-0511 Good work!

My living room looks refreshed! After 30 min of cleaning and sorting, the living room is dust free and most items are in their rightful places. I still need to purge/sort my wii basket and a few papers here are there. Overall, the room looks good and it feels good to look around. :)

2010-0510 Double Time

Today I'm trying to make up for some of the time missed last week organizing. My first 15 min of organizing consisted of returning unnecessary items on my coat rack to their appropriate homes and hanging up a mirror in my closets.

Then I spent the next 15 min trying to reinstall my home theater receiver. That took way more than 15 min of fiddling with cables. Still not done, but good enough for now.

2010-0509 Happy Mothers Day!

Today is a day to celebrate our lovely mothers! These same ladies that loved us and raised us...probably also spent a lot of time organizing up after us. In honor of all that hard work that my mom did over the years, I spent my day cleaning up after my fur child! I had to vacuum the carpets and floor boards and apply a flea treatment. I also started cleaning the bathroom and folding/sorting laundry. It was good day. Now I need to get back working on the office area, dinning room and living room.

2010-0508 Weekends are the best!

After a super fun play-date with my friend and her dogs, it's time to get home and back to the grind. Today I successfully unpacked and sorted clothes/items from the trip, folded some laundry, and ran the dishwasher. Small steps! But they are worth something.

Now and days when I look around the room, I'm thinking what little thing is out of place or needs to be straightened up in the next 5 min. I want to make it a habit to work on organizing a little each day. If every time I move from room to room I take something with me that belongs in next room, things will end up back in their places!

2010-0507 Friday is FunDay!

Yay for weekend! Today I've got a little road trip for a doggy play date...which means no specific organizing time. A little tidying up here and there, but nothing major. While this is a little slow down in the habit, no point in beating myself up about it. I'll just try harder.

2010-0505 & 0506 Cinco de Mayo & Sandcastles!

As expected, this week is turning out to be hectic. Because of this craziness, I'm afraid I haven't completed a set 15 min of organizing during these past two days. It happens!

It's ok though, I did way more than 15 min during the previous weekend. I'll just do my best to get back into the swing of things.

2010-0504 Looks like a busy week

Well it looks like this week is going to be a busy week! For today's organizational time I organized my mail and work bag. Sometimes, I feel like I'm carrying unnecessary things back and forth from work, it's always a good idea to check and remove the things I won't be needing!

2010-0503 Office Progress

Great start to the week! I was motivated to work on my office. I picked everything up off the floor and vacuumed. Then I wiped down all the surfaces from dust. Next I brought in the tools and set them up on the bottom shelf. I don't think that will be their final resting place. I had thought I'd put them on the top shelf, but they are heavy and while I don't access them often, I don't want to hit my head every time I need them. We'll see how things go as I fill up the shelves, the tools/kits home might change.

2010-0502 Sunshine and Pools

I had hoped that Sunday would be a day of rest and chores...but it mainly became a day of resting. :) The sun was bright and shinning so I was compelled to check out the apartment complex pool. That took up much of the day. But I was able to get some organizing in by putting away laundry, sheets, and dishes. And I squeezed in a few minutes of cleaning by running vacuum cleaner. Not bad considering I thought I wasn't going to get anything done!

2010-0501 Uber Success!

Yep, that's what today was. Uuuuuber successful! I spent way more than 15 min organizing. I finished sorting and relocating the items in the spare room. I didn't do as much purging as I would have liked, but that might have to wait another time. Then I took everything out of the office and sorted into piles in the spare room. The next task will be to purge the office supplies that have been sorted, and find an appropriate home in the office area. This will definitely take a bit of time. But I can do it!

On top of all the morning success, I even cleaned the master bedroom. I bought a glass topper for my dresser and was even motivated to dust the dresser and add the glass topper. It was a great day!

2010-0430 No picts, sorry!

Trying to upload pictures with blogger is a real pain in the butt...so it looks like you'll be getting fewer pictures updates. Or at least fewer pictures at a time. I'll try to post the final results since those should be most interesting. 

For now, here's the progress on the spare room.

Can you find the couch yet? (don't know why I can't change the orientation of the pictures)

2010-0430 Reorganize the pantry

Todays task was reorganizing the kitchen pantry. I had some items on the top shelf that I used frequently and some that I didn't use on the bottom more reachable shelf. So I switched them. Much better! Also, I deflated the   air mattress so I could fold it and get it out of the way. A good few minutes of organizing!

2010-0429 Whoops!

This marks my first miss during my organizing goal month. I was really tired and didn't find a way to squeeze in 15 official minutes to organize. It is unfortunate, but does happen. The day just got away from me. While this is a minor set back, I will just try to focus on getting more done this weekend to make up for the miss. In the end, no one is perfect. If I am successful more days than not, then it is still a success!

2010-0429 Bills!

If there is one thing I've learned, it's get organized before the pile get soooo big that you could get lost in it! I'm talking mainly about papers, but if you sort, purge, and store things before they get a life of their own, it's much easier. Today I spent my organizing time working on my bills (finding them, paying them) and balancing my check book. This took much longer than 15 min because I put it off for over two months. :(

I learned my lesson, take care of this stuff every 3 weeks or so to avoid such a pile up. The good news is that once I take care of my bills, find them (in this other giant pile on my dinning room table that is grow) and develop a pathway to my filling cabinet, I can put them away! (The filing cabinet/office will probably take a long time to organize though.) My dinning room should be functional once these tasks are accomplished. I look forward to that day.

2010-0427 Sleepy sorting

Tonights bed time goal was 9:30pm. Because of this, my 15 min or organizing was done rather hastily, but at least it got done. Let's hope for more energy during the next session!

2010-0426 Less thinking, more sorting...

Mondays always seems to be soo busy. Everyday always seems to be soo busy!

While taking a break at work, I Googled articles with good tips on purging. Most articles just said to reevaluate the value of the items, is it worth more to keep them or to have the free space from where the item was? If you let go of items, you make room for new possessions. Easier said than done! Some of the good questions I printed out and will post on my closet door. I think I need to do more research in this area...before I'm convinced it's better to let go.

Today's focus was to sort out a pile of perfumes and lotions to give away and keep. In the organization time, I was able to get through most, however, the smells started to blend together. I saved a few for tomorrow. Once I'm done with those, I'll be ready to store the ones I'm keeping and mail the gift perfumes/lotions to my mom to give away. Also, I ran a load of dishes and towels that will be reading to be put away tomorrow. Good work! Might not have been a full 15 min of organizing, but I started a good purge pile of stuff.

2010-0425 Great weather!

It's amazing how a great weather day makes you feel so much better. It was warm, sunny, breezy and perfect for some pool time. I squeezed in some time to catch some rays.

Today's organizational goal was to squeeze in 3 - 5 minute sessions of organizing. Mission accomplished! I organized folded, sorted and put away two loads of laundry. Then I sorted, refolded, and put in the laundry the clothes on my chair in the closet. Lastly, I washed dishes, dried them, and put them away in the kitchen. Pretty good day!

This upcoming week I'll get back to the spare room and office, the major trouble spots.

2010-0424 Busy Weekend

This weekend my brother is in town, which means I won't have as much time as I'd like to myself to organize. However, I'll do my best to squeeze it in. Todays focus was organizing items that were out of place, but already had a home. I figured this would be an easy way to get some organization in, without requiring too much thought. At least I accomplished my goal of picking up things daily!

2010-0423 Quick Clean Up!

Today it was a speedy 15 min. I moved boxes/stuff out of the way in the spare bedroom and from the 2nd bathroom. Piled more stuff in the office so that my brother would have some more space in the spare room. It feels good to squeak in some organizing.

2010-0423 Getting Organized Tips

While attempting this challenge I like reading about tips/advice that might help me be more successful at completing the challenge. There are numerous resources available in books and online, but one of the ones I enjoyed is another article by Steve Pavlina.


Getting Organized


"Inconvenient storage can easily lead to clutter."


"Disorganized people make life harder by forcing themselves to always make a new decision on where each item should go. Organized people establish systems so that the proper place for each item is obvious; thus, no new decisions have to be made each time."


Now, hopefully I can incorporate the advice I've learned from this article as I tackle my apartment. I like the examples presented in this article because my office seems to be one of my worst problem areas. I just need to get the organizing done!


I also like the book "Does this clutter make my butt look fat?", but haven't been able to finish the book. Maybe that will be part of my next 30-day challenge, read 15 min a day so I can finally finish the book!

2010-0422 Earth Day

Really sleepy today. Finished up last load of laundry, folded, sorted, and stored. Took out the recycling and trash. Pick ups some loose papers around the apartment. Not too much to report.

2010-0421 Exhausted

Today I planned out three small areas I wanted to work on during my organizing time. Then reality set in and I was exhausted and fell asleep at 8:30pm....This put a slight damper on my goals for the evening. So I readjusted my expectations, being that I just wanted to make sure that I did the 15 min of organizing. I put some things away in the kitchen and from the laundry room. It seems that most days I tend to expect too much from the organizing sessions. Maybe I should just pick one box or one small area per day to focus on so I can feel a sense of accomplishment. :)

2010-0420 Brownies & Organizing

Today I decided to make some brownies....yummy. It was a lovely aroma in the background while I did some organizing. In the spare room I shuffled some boxes & stuff around so that I can put the air mattress on the floor for my brother to sleep on. I feel like that was good progress. I put away some miscellaneous items from the second bathroom. Then gathers some tools and put them in a box. Lastly I put all the folded laundry away. I think it was a rather productive session. I'm happy with the results! I think the brownie smell helped.

2010-0419 Blogging can be hazardous to organizing...

As you can see from my previous post I spent too much time uploading pictures of the lack of progress. Because of this, the organizing today was abbreviated. I picked some items that were scattered around the apartment and put them back in their places. I need to organize mys ports equipment...that will be my next task.

2010-0419 The Disaster Progress!

Today I thought I would share pictures that I've taken of the apartment as the unpacking has progressed. These first few are from the first weekend I moved in.

 

The living room during dresser construction.

                                         

The dinning room.

                                        

                                          

The master bedroom.

                                            

The master bathroom.

                                             

                                            

                                           

The spare room (the focus of these 30 days!).

Here are the more recent pictures of the apartment after some unpacking had begun.

                                                         

                                                  

The spare room closet in disarray, spare room pictures. Can you find the couch?

                                                        

                                                         

The office...it's a huge disaster.

                                                         

The dinning room looking a little better.

                                                        

                                                         

The master bedroom closet needs some work.

So those are all my pictures for today. I'll add more current ones soon, however it takes forever to upload and line up pictures to this blog! Geez!! I give up on lining the pictures up, sorry.

2010-0418 !!!!

I like exclamation points!!! So get used to them. :)

2010-0418 I tried!

Today's 15 min organizational task was to hang up my coat hanger. All was going well...I measured the spots for the screws, put the anchors in, put the screws in... And then it all went wrong. I couldn't get the right screw to stay in, the anchors fell out, anchors wouldn't come off the back of the screw. I was finally able to get it all together...but one side is kinda loose which leads to the nice angle...I even used a level to make sure it was level when I was drilling the holes!

Oh well, it will have to do until it falls out. For now it gets my coats off of the back of the dinning room chairs. I just have to make sure I don't hang anything too heavy on it.  

I hope my boyfriend can fix it when he visits!

*Coming soon - before-ish pictures of my disaster. We'll see how it changes throughout the development of this habit.

2010-0417 Weekends are busy too!

I don't even remeber exactly what I organized today. I did put away all groceries and buy a bin for decorations.

I thought I'd have more time since it's the weekend, but it seems that the day gets filled up quickly! I guess baby steps towards a goal are still steps in the right direction. Here's to a better tomorrow.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

2010-0416 Busy Days!

Not much to report for today. It was more of a fast 15 min organization today since it was 11 pm before I got home. Lesson learned from today: get the organizing done earlier in the day before I run out of time!

2010-0415 Tax Day

Today is Tax day! Good thing I procrastinated on my taxes, but managed to finish them up last week.  :)

As for organizing, I spent todays time again working on the spare room. Motivation was a bit low, but at least I did it. The hardest part is getting started...and deciding on where things go. Was I successful today? Well I shuffled some things around and put a handful of things away. It was something, but not much to write about.

Here's hoping tomorrow is more productive!

2010-0414 Love it!

I love this pink theme for this blog! Pink makes me happy!

2010-0414 De-cluttering

I just finished reading this interesting article by Steve Pavlina on the 30-day trial to develop new habits.

30 Days to Success

I thought I'd give it a try because "30-days seems MUCH easier than a lifetime!" (Well said Stephanie!).  The nice part of this trial is that it is a low-commitment trial. I can pick a habit, put forth the effort to do it every day for 30 days, and then re-evaluate at the end of the trial. If I like the results, I can keep the habit my life. If I'm ok with the results, I can modify the habit for my daily routine. And if I don't like it, I can stop after 30 days! Steve Pavlina gives some good examples in his article.

For this first attempt the habit I am working on is to spend 15 min de-cluttering my apartment every day.  Why? Because I just moved and my apartment is a disaster. The idea of organizing the whole apartment is overwhelming! But, 15 min at a time, I can handle that. In order to make sure I keep this up, I will try to blog about my progress (but probably not daily! daily blogging is not the habit I'm working on this month). 

Today I worked on my spare bedroom. I put some items away in the closet and moved items to other rooms (the rooms where those items belong). Success for today!