Does clutter have a sound?

        Have you ever thought about what clutter might sound like? I imagine it to be a loud hum, kind of like a machine that won’t turn off. Always there, in the background, irritating you to the point where you just want to scream. Or run out of the house. You can think of clutter as visual noise; as distracting as having a vacuum cleaner running for hours on end. You can’t think when you hear that noise, just as you can’t think when you’re looking at all of that visual noise; clutter. It’s exhausting listening to noise all the time. As humans, we crave silence, if for no other reason than to give ourselves time to think and enjoy the peace. I’ve had clients tell me that after we’ve cleared a space, they just feel so much more at peace, calm, relaxed. It’s as if the noise was turned off in that space.

It's Called "Nesting" for a Reason

When I was asked to write an article about "How to Get Organized Before Baby Comes", little did I know that my husband and I were about to become grandparents again by our son and DIL. We are excited to welcome Audrey Isabel Huseman into our lives sometime in Oct/Nov of this year! 

I thought that this post might help my daughter in law to start thinking of some things she may not have thought about, and hopefully either you, or someone you know can benefit from these little tidbits I've culled from fellow organizers, websites I've researched, and my own advice.

1. First things first - Make an appointment with your Newborn Photographer of choice. This specialty area books up quickly and you don't want to miss this small window of opportunity. My favorite photographer is Shawna Clark. She's in Fairfield and does amazing work. Also, this is a good time to think about how you're going to announce the birth of your little bundle of joy. Even in this day of everything electronic, it's nice to mail something to someone via the good old Postal Service. At Pingg.com you can create your own stylish birth announcement and either send them via email, or you can have them printed and sent to you so you can send some out to family or friends that want to have one to put on the refrigerator for awhile. There's also this site, Tiny Prints as another option. You can pre-address the envelopes and then finish off the announcements when you get all the final details; date of birth, weight, length, etc.

2. Now for the nitty gritty of getting organized before baby comes. One of the things I wished I had done was to prep meals before hand. With my first, I had no idea how exhausted I would be, and most of all, I didn't realize I would not have time to shop, prep and cook meals for my husband and I after the onslaught of casseroles and chili was gone from well meaning family and friends. So if you're worried about that step, do some extra meals to freeze as you're prepping for your meals right now. Also automate your grocery list as best you can. If you're tech savvy, there's lots of apps to use for grocery lists that you can share with others. Grocery iQ is one that is free and can be shared by others. If you're not tech savvy, just make sure you have a magnetic note pad on the frig that you can write your list on, then someone can just take it to the store. My friend and fellow organizer Maureen, also said to keep local restaurant delivery menus nearby as well.

4.  Another of my organizing friends, Margaret, said her best advice to new mother's is this: Don't get too much. Having a bunch of onesies doesn't mean you'll never have to do laundry. It just means that you have a lot more onesies to store. You will most likely be doing laundry at least once a week, so don't worry about having a month's worth of onesies. Besides, we all know baby will grow out of most of them pretty quickly.

Speaking of growing, here's a good tip. Have a box either in the baby's closet, or somewhere convenient so as baby grows out of outfits and you've washed them, you have a convenient place to store them until it's time to put away for a sibling or to a friend or charity. Label the box by size and season; 3-6 months, Summer, 9-12 months, Winter.

5. Keep supplies where you are most likely going to need them. Do you have a two story home? You'll want to have a supply of diaper changing materials upstairs and downstairs. Are you going to be breastfeeding? Then you want to make sure you have breast pads, burp cloths etc., near a comfy chair with gentle lighting for those 2 a.m. feedings. You don't want to have too harsh of lighting as it may wake baby and you up too much and make it hard to get back to sleep! Keep your diaper bag stocked and ready to go at a moments notice. This will make getting out of the house (when you can), much less time consuming.

Here's a link My SweetNest to a super cute blog that talks about nesting and getting organized. She has really good ideas on getting that baby closet and changing table organized.

 

6. Another helpful tip would be to help others to help you! What????? If it's hard for you to ask for help, or you don't know what to say when someone asks what you need help with, (and you will need help), plan ahead and make a list of things you might need help with or chores you can delegate to others. My friend Connie said, "Believe that people want to be helpful - they really do!" I think that is true as well. Even if it's just a small thing, watching the baby while they nap so you can take a shower, shave your legs, or take a short walk to get some fresh air. When you're in the thick of things with a newborn at home, those small things really become big things and you'll be grateful for any stolen moments you can find.

7. Connie also suggested that you give your baby the tools they need to sleep away from home. I found this to be true for me as well when my children were little. If your child is used to going to sleep to a sound machine, or a certain blanket/stuffed animal, have those items with you when you are away from home visiting friends or family. It will make it much easier on you and them.

8.  Think ahead of how you're going to maintain your current household systems; bill paying, laundry, shopping. You can pay bills in small increments of time (unless you have everything set up for auto pay, which I strongly suggest), keep a running shopping list on the frig of what you are running low on. Someone can just grab the list and do some shopping for you. Also check out Amazon's Pantry grocery delivery system. You can order and have things delivered directly to your door. This will save you many hours that you can spend with baby.

9. Be thoughtful in the things you ask for from friends and family for gifts. It's very enticing to have all of the latest, greatest gadgets and gizmos, but in the end, really think whether those gadgets will help or hinder you. Do you have room to store all of that? Do you REALLY need a wipe warmer? If you're limited on storage space, I beg you to not get anymore than you really have room for.

10. And last, but certainly not least, this time in your life is an absolutely great time to make sure that you have all of your "affairs" in order. This means a living trust, custody arrangements for your child(ren) should anything happen to you and/or your spouse. Make sure your Advanced Care Directive is filed with your personal physician, and that other family members know where your important documents are located. Not a very warm and fuzzy tip, but a step every new parent should think of. Bad things happen to good people, and I'm sure you don't want to burden your family with having to make these decisions for you.

Enjoy that new bundle of joy! If you do everything you can to be organized before baby comes, you can spend more time, talking, singing, and reading to them than worrying about whether you need to buy more diapers.  Remember, 80% of your child's brain growth happens by age 3! First 5 California

Do you have a special tip that you used when you were getting ready for your baby? I'd love to hear it! Leave a comment below please!

Here's Another 10 Things to Toss Today!!

If you missed my last post, I gave you a list of 10 things you could toss today to help you begin your journey to a less cluttered life. As promised, here's another 10 items you can look for in your home to toss or donate to continue on your journey.

Today's list is more focused on paper items. We all still have too much paper coming at us even in this "paper-less" society. If you can get rid of some of it a little at a time, you'll be less "paper-full" than you were before.

1.  Tourist Brochures - This includes that map you picked up in Disneyland, (you know how it's been folded and unfolded so many times it's lost its print in places!), the brochure your sibling gave you about the fabulous cruise they took that they didn't ask you to go on and any other brochure of someplace that you're dreaming of going. GOOGLE those places and get the information delivered to your inbox. If you think you might forget about that wonderful little villa in Italy, make a folder on your computer labeled "Places we want to go" and file all information electronically.

2.  Difficult, time consuming or expensive recipes - Unless you're an expert chef and you really, really enjoy cooking your family dinner from scratch every single night, chances are you're not ever going to make Beef Bourginon and by letting that recipe go, you're releasing that expectation. Remember, you can always google recipes, check on FB for some of those TASTY! videos we all drool over.

 

3.  Invitations from past events - The wedding's over (you attended and had a blast), the baby's been born (super cute and cuddly), and it's now summertime so you can let the Memorial Day picnic invite be recycled. This is such an easy fix, and you can now make room on your frig for the 4th of July BBQ invite your neighbor sent.

4.  Expired coupons - Pizza coupons, drugstore discounts, grocery store clipped coupons, all of them. Check their expiration dates and if they're old, let them go. Oh except for the Bed, Bath & Beyond 20% off coupons. Those suckers never really expire and you can sometimes double them up!!


5.  Store receipts - Unless you need a receipt for a return, tax purposes or for a business deduction or if it's a big ticket item you want to recall, it's okay to throw them away. Check your credit card statement or keep it until you reconcile your bank statement, then let it go. It's just that easy!


6.  Expired warranties and contracts - We've all found them. The warranty for our digital camera, now long gone. The contract for the pest control professional that we don't use anymore, etc. Why are you keeping these? Recycle them and move on........

7.  Business cards that don't matter anymore - Are you really ever going to call that plumber you met at Home Depot in the bath fixture department? Probably not. Cull through all your business cards and either toss the ones that don't matter anymore or add the ones you do care about to your contact list on your phone. Here's the app I use to track my business cards that I want to retain. ABBYY Business Card Reader

8.  Unsolicited charity solicitations - If you already give to selected charities, then you're well aware that some charities sell their mailing lists to the highest bidder and unbeknownst to you, you are about to start receiving a lot of unsolicited charity solicitations. Now, some people I know try to be proactive by tearing off the return to them section and sending it back in their pre-paid envelope stating to please remove me from your mailing list. That might work, sometimes. You can also simply shred the envelope without opening it. You can also try to be removed from mailing lists by utilizing this option that I posted about awhile ago. 

No More Junk Mail

9.  Bad photos - This is something I will be addressing in a future post as Photo Organizing is going to be a service I will be adding in the near future....stay tuned!  If you're into photos, either prints or digital, this is an area that is groan worthy for many of my clients. Fear not!!!!  It can be conquered with a little persistence and patience.

And now for the only non paper related list item:

10.  Cans of dried up paint - If you've ever painted or have had someone else paint any walls in your home, apartment, whatever, you've got at least one can of paint in your garage or storage area. I'm not saying that you have to get rid of the extra paint that you just used in your guest bath remodel, I'm talking about 10+ year old paint that's NEVER going to be used again. If it's truly old and dried up, you can dispose of it in your normal trash receptacle. If it's in any sort of liquid form, you need to dispose of it responsibly. Most counties or waste management company have information available for paint disposal in your area. Here's some info on disposing of old paint.    Old Paint Disposal

I'd love to hear from you about something you decided to let go of and how it felt to do so. You can comment below. Plus, I'd like to know if anyone's reading this thing!! Give me some love!!

TEN things to TOSS Today!

When people find out what I do for a living, I often get questions like, "What's the weirdest thing you've found in someone's house?" Or comments such as, "You must see a lot of different things that people save." And the answer to the latter is yes, I do see a lot of different things that people keep. But actually, I often see the same types of items in people's homes.

Having my business for a few years now, I've noticed some fairly universal items when I help clients go through the process of decluttering their spaces. Some of these items hide in the backs of closets, cupboards and boxes in garages. Others are right there in your line of sight, but have become such a part of the environment that you don't even notice them. When they are brought out of the closets, cupboards and garage boxes, clients will often say, "I forgot I even had those in here."

When the eyes of a stranger notice that collection of dusty trophies on a spare bedroom shelf, the client may look at them as if they're seeing them for the first time. That's part of my job. . . to make you look at your space with a fresh set of eyes and come up with a vision for your space.

 

That being said, here's a list of TEN things you can TOSS today to get you started on your de-cluttering journey.

 

1. WIRE HANGERS from the dry cleaners! I know, you're thinking, "Why do I have to go through the hassle of transferring the shirts from wire hangers to my other hangers?" The reason is that wire hangers are ugly, and frankly, potentially harmful (remember the movie, "Mommy Dearest?") When I work on a client's closet, that's the first thing I do. Decent hangers these days are fairly inexpensive and uniformity in hangers make your closet pleasing to the eye which may encourage you to maintain your newly organized closet.

2. SHOES that hurt your feet! You know the ones I'm talking about. Why? Why would you assign valuable real estate in your closet to shoes that give you blisters or pinch your toes? Why?

                   

3. PLASTIC CUPS with old company logos, sports team logos, fast food logos, etc. If you need plastic cups for outside by the pool, pick up a pack of inexpensive cups from the grocery store.   

 

4. OLD TROPHIES from your childhood, or your kids. We all know you're a winner, so why are you keeping that dusty old baseball trophy from the 70's? These can often be donated to a local charity that specializes in refurbishing them for events such as the Special Olympics.

 

 

 

5. PAPERBACK BOOKS that you will never reread. Check with your local library to see if they accept gently used paperback books for their "Friends of the Library" book sale. Let someone else delve into the world of Harry Potter and Hogwarts!

 

6. GREETING CARDS - - I know, I know! Being a paper craft enthusiast, I've created and given many, many handmade greeting cards and this is a sticky subject for me also. I've given myself permission to keep a few really, really special cards such as the ones from my children with their beginning handwriting skills, and a few special wedding anniversary cards. The memory of the day, or holiday does not live in the card, it lives in your own memory of that day. Getting rid of the card is not getting rid of the memory. Keeping it in a drawer is not honoring that memory.

 

7. JUNK MAIL!!! Seriously, do I even need to say anything about this? Throw. It. Away. If possible, don't even let it make it into your house to sit on your counter or table. I've seen way too many paper grocery bags full of insurance offers, credit card offers, seed catalogs, Valpak coupons, and drug store advertisements. THROW IT IN THE RECYCLING BIN IMMEDIATELY!!! Here's a link to my post about getting off some of the mailing lists.

No More Junk Mail

 

                                      

 

8. MANUALS to items you don't own anymore. And while you're at it, toss the cords to electrical items you don't own anymore also. I can't tell you how many cords I've sent off to E-Waste heaven!

 

9. FLORIST VASES - Really!! Unless you buy yourself fresh flowers on a weekly basis, what are the odds that you need to keep 7-10 plain, ugly glass vases. Free that space above your refrigerator, (cause that's where I usually find them!) Where do you keep yours?

 

10. COOKBOOKS you never use. In today's era of Pinterest, YUMMY! posts on Facebook, and all the other apps and places you can find amazing recipes, why are you assigning valuable space to those big, heavy cookbooks?

 

There's my top 10 items I recommend you start with. If you can pick just a few of these in the beginning of your journey, I think you'll find that it won't be as hard as you think. In my next post, I'll give you another 10 items that you can let go of as well.

 

What items are the hardest for you to let go of, and why? Leave a comment below and let's see if we have more in common than we thought. Who knows, your item(s) might show up in my next post as well!! Good luck and Happy Purging!

 



Confidence Crisis I know it's been a long time since my last entry, but life has been so full lately, and I'll share some of that fullness with you at another time. I saw this article written by a fellow NAPO-SFBA member and I wanted to share it with my readers because I think it is such a good reminder of how we sometimes let ourselves get in our own way and prevent ourselves from achieving what we most want in life and our business. Please leave a comment if this resonates with you, I'd love to have an open discussion about why we do this to ourselves.  Thanks Lisa Montanaro for putting the words together!   Having a Confidence Crisis? The 3 Blocks to Success If you ask most people want they want for their career, business or life, often the word Success comes up at some point. Indeed, many of us want to be successful. So what stops some people from being successful but not others? A whole host of things. It is often said that success leaves footprints. I do believe that there are certain patterns that successful people follow -- taking action, being focused, making bold but calculated risks, finding a support system, and staying positive to name a few. But there are also some serious saboteurs that often get in the way of success. They cause (and are often caused by) doubt, fear, lack of confidence, and negativity. They come disguised as 3 blocks that try to stop you from moving forward and being successful. 1. The Perfection Trap The Perfection Trap is what causes you to second guess yourself at every turn. It is often disguised as a strength ("I have such high standards."), but in reality can be a manifestation of procrastination, lack of confidence, or fear of failure or success. The Perfection Trap is in some ways the Great Western disease: "I'll be happy when I …" (fill in the blank!). Many people wait until everything is "perfect" to move forward with their ideas, insights, strategies, interests and passions. Unfortunately, the waiting game goes on and on because the stars are never perfectly aligned. In the meantime, what happens? Life (and often success and happiness!) pass you by. Win Borden said, "If you wait to do everything until you're sure it's right, you'll probably never do much of anything." Stop waiting until everything is perfect! Live your life now. Pursue your dreams, follow your passions, launch your business, apply for that promotion, ask that special someone out on date… whatever it is. You probably have "enough" already under your belt to take a step in that direction. Remember, done is better than perfect. (For more on this topic, check out my article Done is Better Than Perfect. 2. The Comparison Trap The Comparison Trap is often right there waiting to attack. It is the voice in your head that says, "I could never do that" as you look at others' accomplishments, successes and happiness. It forces you to look outward for your definition of success. You look at others, measure yourself against them, and then think you are less than. When I work with a client, I implement a rule that he or she must follow: No negative self talk! You'd be surprised how difficult it is for many people to adhere to it. Words are powerful, and negative self talk always puts you in a losing position. The world is filled with a sense of competition. Women tend to compare themselves to other women in so many areas: physical appearance, parenting, relationships, and business. Men tend to compare themselves based on material possessions, status, and money. It's exhausting trying to keep up with everyone else! Use what others' do as a model, sample or template, but, make it your own. Otherwise, you will just spin your wheels trying a little bit of everything, but mastering and enjoying nothing. The problem with the Comparison Trap is that it is completely false. No one stands in your shoes. You are the only you. And the trouble with someone thinking they can get ahead of you is that you're assuming that they can walk in your shoes. And this reminds me of something that the actress Judy Garland once said: "Be a first rate version of yourself, rather than be a second rate version of someone else." An original is better than a copy every time. 3. The Impostor Syndrome The toughest critic will often be you. There's a theory called the Impostor Syndrome that many successful people suffer from. It's where you feel like a fake even if you have the education, training and experience to be successful at what you do. Jodie Foster has talked about it freely in some of her interviews. She said that every time she would go on a movie set, whether as an actress or a director as her career progressed, she felt like an impostor and was worried that she'd be "found out." And this is coming from an accomplished performer since she was a child, and a celebrity by most people's standards. But it doesn't matter. When she looked in the mirror, she didn't see that celebrity. She didn't value herself the way others valued her. We so often judge ourselves harshly because in our own minds, we aren't quite there yet. We tend to focus on what we have not accomplished yet, what remains to be done, what goals we have not yet reached. Try to remind yourself of what you have already accomplished, how much you have already grown and changed, and the goals you have met. It is often on the journey to becoming who we are that the true growth takes place. The term authenticity is often used these days (some may say over-used). I think being authentic means taking ownership of your true value, including all that you bring to the table, while humbling yourself enough to admit that you still have some steps to take on your journey. That doesn't make you an impostor. It makes you human.

Copyright 2015 © Lisa Montanaro  Lisa Montanaro is a Productivity Consultant, Success Coach, Business Strategist, Speaker and Author who helps people live successful and passionate lives, and enjoy productive and profitable businesses. To receive her free Toolkit, Achieve Powerhouse Success with Purpose, Passion & Productivity, visit www.LisaMontanaro.com/toolkit. Lisa is the author of several books, including DECIDE to be Organized: An Empowering Process for Change. Through her work, Lisa helps people deal with the issues that block personal and professional change and growth. To explore how Lisa can help you be purposeful, passionate and productive, contact Lisa at (530) 564-4181 or by e-mail at Lisa@LisaMontanaro.com.