Getting Organized!

I’ve always wanted to be one of ‘those’ people who knew exactly where everything was at any given second. I want to have neat little containers for push pins and paper clips. I want little plastic cases for papers and pencils; I want glass jars on shelves with coloured pasta in them.

The fact of the matter is, I’m a “piler” – a word so evil in the English language that even the most renowned spell checkers can’t actual verify if my spelling is correct… Yes, folks, I “pile” stuff - everything from tin cans in the cupboard (with the labels helter skelter) to piles of unopened mail. I pile books, cd’s and bags of pasta. I pile clothes on a chair in my room and metres of unsewn fabric in my craft room.

Ladies, gentlemen: my name is Corrie and I’m a piler. It is sometimes also known as a ‘stacker’ – but that is just a junior title… In order to be a true piler, you must create piles so high and so deep that even your best friend or husband won’t venture into your office to rummage through your things to find the book they lent you or the receipt for the kid’s bike.

The other qualifier to being a ‘piler’ is to be able to – at a moment’s notice – go to any stack in the house and find exactly what you’ve been asked to retrieve (give or take a pile or two). I never ceased to amaze (and annoy) my coworkers with my ramblings of “have you seen…?” followed by “Oh! Here it is – it was in a different pile!”

I know this is my flaw – I do and try as I might, I just can’t seem to hold my various attempts at organizing together long enough to do any good. Eventually, and rather quickly, I might add, my organized desk goes back to a disorganized stack of piles. I’ve cleaned my sewing room/office up so many times that I don’t think my husband believes me any more when I speak about ‘getting organized’ in there so that I can work on the mountains (the graduated form of piling) of projects I need to accomplish.

So – why am I writing about getting organized? Well, because like so many things in my life, I think if I make them public and attach some accountability to my attempt, it may keep me on track and on target! So over the next few weeks, I will be organizing and making a true attempt to remain organized as I move forward into a new phase in my life.

We are on a tight (hear "no") budget for this. I want to do it as cheap and green as possible but reusing, repurposing and revitalizing things I can find already in my house or get for free from local recycling places.

The readers of my blog are my judges on this journey and you are also the ones I will be accountable too... In the form of a monetary reward if I fall down on the job! Leave a comment and and check back June 1 and I will do a random draw for a $25 gift certificate from Ikea (as who better for home organization than Ikea?).

First stop... My kitchen!