helping you organize: September 2011

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Multiplying and moving

I have two friends who are both due to give birth in about a month. Both of them are also moving this month. One is moving about 50 miles, while the other is moving about 1,500 miles. I sincerely wish both of them luck with this unique and challenging endeavor.

While I can't (or, rather, don't want to) imagine the logistics of such a move: packing, labeling, moving, unpacking, plus the added bonus of figuring out a new city, figuring out new doctors and a new plan for where you're actually giving birth, I have thought of a few tips that might make the whole process a tad more organized. These two friends are inherently organized people, so they likely don't need these tips, but I felt it was the least I could do. Roslyn and Megan, this post is for you:

Ask for help. Being pregnant is a perfect time to recognize your limits and engage your family, friends and village to help make this life transition easier.
Make lots of lists. Lists have a calming effect and help you capture ideas and to-dos that might be in your head one minute and out the next.
Try to take it one step at a time. If possible, do a chunk of packing every day and a chunk of planning and preparation every day.
Install some support people at the receiving end. Line up family or friends to meet you at the new location to help you settle in. You'll be exhausted by the time you get there and facing a houseful of boxes might be overwhelming.
Get a lot of rest, if possible. Things will seem more manageable if you're rested.

Good luck!

Creative Commons photo posted to Flickr by awnisALAN

Lelah Baker-Rabe is a Los Angeles-based professional organizer. To discuss your organizing needs, call her at 818.269.6671 or email lelah@lelahwithanh.com. Sign up for Lelah's News, a once-monthly newsletter.

Monday, September 26, 2011

Pacific Standard Time

This fall, Los Angeles cultural institutions are participating in a huge collaboration of exhibits and specific events dedicated to LA arts and artists from 1945 to 1980 called Pacific Standard Time. If you live in the LA area, now is a great time to visit some museums and take part in this event. There's even free admission to a lot of the venues on October 2nd, and many museums have their own free day once a month. The Los Angeles Times has an online guide with reviews and articles about Pacific Standard Time shows.

Sam Maloof chair, 1984.

I'm planning to visit the Huntington next week to see The House that Sam Built: Sam Maloof and Art in the Pomona Valley, 1945–1985 and am really interested in the Beatrice Wood exhibition at the Santa Monica Museum of Art. I met Beatrice Wood about twenty years ago, as she lived in Ojai and I portrayed her, sari and all, one year in the Ojai Fourth of July parade.

If you get to see one of these shows, come back and comment and let us know what you thought!

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Poll #5: Planning for the holidays

I was a little surprised at the results for my last poll: Is it too soon to start planning for the holidays? While I'm a bit torn on this issue myself, I didn't expect it to be so close! 60% of respondents said Not at all, while 40% said Yes, it is. Personally, while I love the fun and family aspects of the fall to winter season (back-to-school all the way through the new year), I never want to start so early with the planning and celebrating that the magic wears off or I get overexposed to holiday fervor. However, there are some things you can do to prepare that aren't going overboard and will make the season go more smoothly:

Find out how the people you tend to spend holidays with are feeling about travel and hosting. Figuring out where you might be on the major holidays is a big first step. Then you can make travel, lodging and time-off arrangements.
Focus on the early fall holidays, like Rosh Hashanah or even Halloween, so you can feel some of that holiday spirit without getting too far ahead of yourself.
Make lists. Lists are a good way to order your thoughts, but you don't have to act on them right away. Lists I've already begun: Halloween card recipients, menu ideas for Thanksgiving and Christmas gift ideas.

I'm really looking forward to the traditions that make holidays so much fun in my family, but I'm practicing patience as best I can...the holidays will be here soon enough for us all, I'm sure!

Creative Commons photo posted to Flickr by nao.k

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

How to make grocery shopping less of a chore

I used to love grocery shopping. It was one of my favorite errands, making a list, checking things off, shopping smart with coupons and bringing my reusable bags. I used to live about a quarter of a mile from a big, shiny supermarket and a five minute drive from a Trader Joe's.

Now I live about an eighth of a mile from a medium-sized supermarket, five minutes from Trader Joe's, with a Whole Foods smack in between, and shopping threatens to become more of a chore than it should be. I still live by my list, but the problem is that I often have to go to at least two of those stores on any given trip in order to cross everything off. So I've tweaked my shopping style and have a few tips to help make the process more enjoyable:

I keep a running list of items needed, then before I plan to go to the store, I check all the recipes I intend to make in the coming week and fill the list with needed items. I do a quick walkthrough of the house to make sure I'm not forgetting something like toothpaste. This cuts down on forgetting anything and decreases the frequency I need to shop.
I've pretty much given up on coupons, unless I happen to come across one that is for something I already buy and use. I find that if it is for something I use, but a different brand, then the savings the coupon represents still don't make up for the price difference against the brand I usually buy, so I'm not really saving money. I also don't have to worry about remembering to take them with me or pull them out at checkout.
Of course, I always bring my own bags. Remembering to do this every time is a point of pride with me, and I prefer my own sturdy and pretty bags to disposable ones anyway.
I bring a bottle of water and stay hydrated. Especially if I'm going from store to store, I always get thirsty walking around with a cart, and drinking water helps me feel better and cuts down on impulse buys like expensive smoothie-type drinks.
I try to time my shopping so when I arrive home laden with bags, my husband is home and available to help me unload. We live up two steep flights of stairs, and while the exercise is good, it's also nice to share the load.
I stock up on dry staples wherever I can, so sometimes I can get away with a short, light shopping trip one week (fruits, veggies, milk) alternated with a staple-heavy trip the next.

Creative Commons photo posted to Flickr by simiezzz

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Puzzles and patterns

I've been working on a puzzle. It's a 1000 piece panoramic puzzle of the Louvre museum, and as I've gone through the steps to complete it, it has occurred to me how very much putting together a puzzle has in common with organizing. Perhaps that's why I enjoy puzzles so much.

The first step I always take is to separate the edges from the rest of the pieces and assemble the outside edge of the picture. This is usually the easiest way to get started, as the edges are easily recognizable and it gives you a feeling of accomplishment to get the border complete. In organizing, sometimes going after low hanging fruit (maybe purging all those old newspapers and magazines or socks with holes in them) is the best way to start, so you can get your energy up and be ready to tackle the big picture.

Next, I generally spend some time sorting the pieces, putting broad categories of pieces together in individual boxes, such as all the sky pieces, all the browns, all the pieces that look like they belong to a certain building. I find sorting to be an immensely comforting task. I like finding patterns in objects and deciding how best to group them. With a puzzle, this is enacted at a very basic, soothing level. Because you can't look at any one piece too closely, you have to make quick judgements about color or pattern.

At the 2011 NAPO National Conference, Julie Morgenstern gave one of the keynote speeches. She said at one point that what differentiates organizers from other people is our ability to see patterns where others cannot. I think that is a key trait that organizers possess, and it is a valuable tool in so many situations.

Assembling a puzzle is often as much trial and error than anything else. When trying to find organizing solutions that work, trial and error is a well-used method. We also break down organizing projects into managable chunks, rather than trying to solve everything at once. A puzzle can only be put together one piece at a time. I'm going to stop with the analogy, as I think I've made my point. Plus, I have the rest of the sky to finish!

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

1000 Twitter followers and a special offer

I’ve reached 1000 Twitter followers and I feel like celebrating!

For a limited time, any new client who books a 4-hour session will get a 25% credit toward a future session! The subsequent session must occur before 12/31/11.

Sessions are immediately available. Call 818-269-6671. Visit www.lelahwithanh.com/packages/ for more information.

What would you like to accomplish this month?

Get the stacks of paper off your desk
Finally figure out how to use your smartphone to help you save time and paper
Get help figuring out the boxes of bills, receipts and mail that have been accumulating over time
Make your kitchen functional again
Be able to park your car in your garage
Unstuff your linen closet
Get your guest room guest-ready

The sky is the limit when it comes to how organizing can improve your quality of life in just a few short hours.

I have never done a promotional event like this one before. Take advantage of it while you can!

Monday, September 12, 2011

Poll #4: Back to school

I do love fall. Even though fall doesn't technically start until the 23rd of September, the weather in Southern California has mellowed from a late-summer heat wave to cooler nights and mornings and lovely sunny afternoons. Though my life is not based around an academic year, living it for most of one's life does tend to give you the sense that the year doesn't start in January, when the calendar turns, but rather when school buses replace ice cream trucks on suburban streets.

My poll last week was about back to school rituals, many of which we still enact even if we are no longer the ones going back to school. Half of the respondents replied that their favorite thing was new school supplies. Sharp pencils and fresh sheets of paper are endlessly inspiring. With 20% of responses each, back to school clothes shopping tied with the sentiment that back to school season isn't my readers' thing. I understand that, too, as summer can be a magical time that no one wants to see end. With just 10% of the votes, the return of routine lagged far behind the others. I suppose a few of my readers don't let their routines waver, even through summer, while others don't institute one at any time of year.

Next up, a very short poll. As my own thoughts turn toward Thanksgiving and Christmas preparations, I want to know your thoughts. Is it too soon, or are we just being prepared? Thanks for participating!

Friday, September 9, 2011

How to organize Legos

I visited the amusement park Legoland in Carlsbad, California, last week for the first time. It was a fun outing. I'm a huge Disneyland fan, so it was nice to spend time at another, more low-key park. The best part about the experience, besides seeing things like an entire life-size car made completely out of Legos, was the parts of the park where you could just hang out and play with the little blocks. Of course, if you have a Lego set of your own (and we have lots of Legos in our house) you can play with them any time you want, but there's something about being in a place where you're supposed to have fun that frees you up to really enjoy playing around and building stuff.

I was also interested in how they organized the Legos at the park at these play centers. They have low (kid-height) tables with rectangles cut in the surface, and plastic bins fitted into the holes. The bins are full of Lego parts, and periodically, after kids (and adults) mess up all the Legos, an employee comes around with a wooden sweeper and sweeps them all back into the bins. There's no sorting by type or anything like that - hunting down the exact piece you need to complete your project is part of the fun.

Legoland bins.

There are lots of ingenious methods for organizing Legos at home, from a sieve-like box that separates the bricks by size when you shake it, to carrying cases and special boxes. There are actually so many products out there that Jeri's Organizing and Decluttering News devotes a post to 16 different Lego-organizing solutions! I asked my in-house Lego expert (aka my husband) how he's spent the last twenty-odd years organizing his Legos. He had a few tips:

Organizing by size makes it easiest to find the piece you are looking for.
Don't use a cardboard box to store Legos because they can get caught in the flaps and you can lose pieces.
Small boxes, such as shoe box sized clear boxes, are ideal for storing Legos because they are small enough you can rummage through and see all the pieces in one box at a glance. If you use boxes with lids, you can stack them and even label the boxes if you are so inclined.*
Use one of the boxes to store the instruction manuals that come with some Lego sets. If the pieces are organized, it doesn't matter if the bricks from the sets get combined.

*Lelah's note: I like The Container Store's clear shoe box for this purpose. They are sturdy, inexpensive, stack well, and are modular with the other boxes in this line.

Have fun playing with (and putting away) your Legos!

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

National Preparedness Month

September is National Preparedness Month. It seems that there is always something going on somewhere around the world to make us think about our own level of readiness for a disaster or unforeseeable event. Take the time to go one step further. Reflect, then act, and make sure you have a few vital items in place, like extra water, food, flashlights, batteries, sturdy shoes, medications and first aid equipment. A lot of these are items we take with us when we go camping, so my husband and I just make sure our camping equipment is up to date and stored in a secure and accessible location.

For more disaster preparedness checklists, visit the Ready.gov website.

Creative Commons photo posted to Flickr by yoppy

Monday, September 5, 2011

New shower head

Due to the old one shooting off randomly one afternoon, my husband and I were compelled to install a new shower head in our shower last week. Here's the photo diary.


Rubber bands hold the front of the head on so we could shower before the new one was installed. It worked really well!

We had a really hard time getting the old head off. Who knows how long it had been on there? First, we soaked it in CLR.

We then resorted to the foul-smelling but effective Liquid Wrench and powerful pliers.

An hour later, success!

The new one screwed right on and works great. The CLR also worked wonders on the lime scale, so I used it to spruce up the rest of the tub fixtures.

Friday, September 2, 2011

Poll # 3: Where there's a will

I'm very interested in the subject of wills and estate planning. It's something that's imperative for adults to do, but something that most of us put off as long as possible. It can be stressful to think about end-of-life matters, but once you deal with them and have your affairs in order, you can relax.

My readers responded to the poll question "What is the state of your will?" with some interesting answers. Over half (55%) said that they had it on their to do list. This isn't suprising, nor is it bad. It's great that it's made it onto so many people's radars, but so often with to do lists, tasks percieved as unpleasant or difficult can get pushed to the bottom over and over again. I encourage those who have making a will on their to do list to prioritize it and get it done by the end of the year!

The next most common response (22%) was that their will is totally up to date. Fantastic! I have some really prepared blog readers.

Tied for third most responses (11% each) were the answers "I'm too young to need a will," and "I have one, but my circumstances have changed." To the first, I say if you are younger than 18, then yes, you are too young to have a will. But if you're over 18 and have any kind of assets at all, then put it on your to do list. To those whose circumstances have changed, it shouldn't be difficult to update your existing will with the new information. Get on it!

No one responded with the answer that they had a will, but were not sure about it's whereabouts. That's good. Having copies of wills floating around can be confusing. Though I'm not a lawyer, and if you have serious will questions, you should probably consult one, I'm pretty sure you should try to only have one will in existence at once, even if a recent one supersedes older copies.

However, you don't necessarily need a lawyer to make a valid will in most states. NOLO is a wonderful resource for do-it-yourself law, and if your circumstances are fairly straightforward, you can do your own will without a lawyer in very little time.

Creative Commons photo posted to Flickr by iowa_spirit_walker

helping you organize