Do you Inbox?

AAAAaaaaahhhhh! I'm falling behind. Boo. All of my well laid plans have fallen by the wayside. It's a tragedy. I need to get back on track if I want to NOT lose my mind. *sigh* I'd like to say I feel a little better, but not so much. Things are still a mess whether I admit to it or not.

Now, I think my problem is that I get busy, tired, and lazy. Life, eh? The other problem is that I tried to continue on my road without  turning, or upgrading, or however you'd like to think of it. I maintained the course without making any further improvements. Improvements are always needed on an endeavor like mine. I believe I've said something about an "inbox" before. I was going to think on what to use. I also don't have a command central, yet. I think that I was waiting for the command center to finish what needed to be done. Bad move on my part.

Do you have an inbox? What do you use? Does it work for you, or is it just another drop spot? Does size matter? How often do you clean it out?

Well, I have had an inbox before. I never cleaned it out. I dumped everything in it; ie: yarn, crochet hooks, knitting needles, sewing needles, hair ties, bills, paperwork, pencils, school papers, spare keys. Blah. Seriously. I am horrible about these sorts of things. I maintain that I need to make time every day to go through the inbox. I need to put things that need my attention in it and not junk mail, school spam, or anything else that should probably go straight in the trash. Oh trash! I need to keep it free of trash.

So, now I know what to do. I know where I want to put it.....eventually. Until I have my command central, though, I think I shall put it on top of one of my bookshelves in the front room. That way it is easy to get to and right where I can see it and it can remind me of what needs to be done. This definitely needs to be a thing.

The next order of business is what to use. I wanted to use those stackable ones so I could have an in and out box. However, I'm cheap and didn't want to pay $8-$9 each. Boo. So I have a ton of wicker baskets at home, I thought I'd use one of those. However, I used one of those the last time. What a debacle! I did use a large one, though. I used a large one because I always have so much that needs to be taken care of.....because I let it pile up......and then it becomes unmanageable.....and we are right back where we started. Blech.

I still think one of my wicker baskets could work. And, hey! They are cute. I like cute. It's my thing. I have one that's shorter and rectangular with handles. I think it will work nicely.

It looks much like this one from epicureanfoods.com.

I also have a really cute white one with big handles and a cute flower liner. I haven't made my final decision. I do need to decide soon. I also need to take a bit of time to catch up on my paperwork. This weekend, hopefully. 

In crafty news, I am a knitting machine lately. I have finished two and a half hats since Sunday! I know, right?!? lol I still have a bunch of whatnots on the needles, and I am happily plugging away. I hope you are staying safe and warm during the snow (if it happens to be where you are).

Breaking the Silence

All this quiet, huh? I know it's been a while, but I have been so very busy. It's a great excuse, right? While I haven't been doing any great organizing lately, I have been doing a lot of crafts.

Yesterday, my baby turned three. It's a little bit incredible, really. She was so tiny just yesterday. I swear. lol I made her the cutest baby doll. I know she doesn't look like a real baby, but we decided to use her favorite colors. I used this pattern.

I gave her blue eyes and blond hair (I didn't have it on her yet), and Miranda exclaimed, "just like me!" It was so great that she noticed.  I even gave her a belly button! It's called a woven spider wheel stitch. Pretty neat, huh?

Of course she needed a dress. So, she got hair and a dress and was ready to go! I used colors that I knew Miranda would love. I'm happy with the results and she loves it. 

Hubby modeled her for me. He's the best. Then, at the last minute, I decided I needed to make her a dress. I found this tutorial on Pinterest. It was really easy. I think it took me roughly two hours from measuring and cutting to finishing up. The tutorial was easy to follow and fun. She also had a great link to the exact measurements for a wide range of sizes. You can find it here.

Hands on hips is totally her new stance. lol I made it out of two of hubby's old tshirts. The body was a dark red and the arms were a beigey-brown color. I didn't think it fit the birthday girl too well. So, I went and got some navy blue Rit dye and gave it a soak for about an hour. I like how it turned out. She seems moderately happy with it. lol 

I've also been working on a wonderful baby set for my sister's new baby that she is expecting in April. I was so incredibly thrilled when she asked me to make the coming home outfit. I can't share pictures yet. I am very sure she doesn't read this, but I just want to be sure. 

I hope to have more to share soon. Hope everyone is enjoying their month!

Playing, I Mean, Organizing Yarn, Hooks, and Needles

Today I want to talk about organizing yarn/needles/hooks. I gave myself permission to have a stay at home morning. I definitely needed it and considering how it is 2 degrees F with the wind chill, I feel it's justified. So I spent the morning playing with my yarn. Read: I organized one of my stash totes.

I am still looking for the perfect way to store my yarn and projects. For now I use these purple totes that I bought on clearance. I printed out labels and taped them to the fronts. They read acrylics, natural fibers, finished objects, and unfinished objects. They still do not hold all of my yarn, but I'm doing a lot of working from my stash this year so we'll see where that gets me.

Today I worked on my Natural Fibers tote. I took everything out and made sure it was documented in my Ravelry stash and that there were pictures. This also gave me the most awesome excuse to fondle all of my lovely wool. I may have had a huge grin on my face the whole time. 

Here's a screen shot of some of my stash. I had lots of fun. Plus my phone has an app that allows me to see my projects and stash when I'm out and about. Now if I am out and see yarn that I need or actually do need to pick up some yarn I can see what I have on hand. I am filled with so much happy when I look at my stash. Plus it makes starting a new project easier. How? Well, now I can link the yarn and see how much I have and if I need more or if I have enough to start another project with that yarn. 

This leads me to my needles. I made this needle roll a few years ago. I love it, but a few years ago I didn't have nearly the needle stash that I do now. I am thinking that I need to make another one just for DPNs and keep this one for straight needles. We will see what time allows, though. I'd also like to confess that even though I have this roll there are still needles all over the house. Meh. It's life.

There is a lot of different ideas out there about organizing circular needles. I usually do not have a need to take my whole lot of circs with me anywhere, so having a moderately cheap solution for the house works good for me. It also seems that my method isn't too different than some of the more expensive options out there. I took a tote that has the deals that come up over the handles to latch it. I made this nifty label, and it's all ready to fill.

As for the needles themselves, I put them in your average, run of the mill storage bags. I write the size of the needle, the size of the cable, and what the needle is made of on the label. If I were really good I'd follow this with, "then I organize according to needle size". I'm not going to lie to you though. lol I really just have them put in no particular order. It's ok. My circular needles are not so much that this is causing a huge issue when I go to look for one. Maybe someday I'll organize it better. This is working great, for now. 

Here are my needles, sort of. This is nowhere near the extent of my hook collection as I have been crocheting for well over twenty years now. However, this is the holder that I use most. I do have a special holder for some of my other hooks that have sentimental value. Pretty odd, huh? Well, that's me. 

I think that's about it for today. I have to work on my grocery list and will myself out of my warm house into the frigid temps to get food. Boo. *sigh* I leave you with this picture of the most adorable toddler sock ever! And it was a pretty fast knit, too. 

Meal Planning, Ravelry Organizing, and The Cutest Sock

I think that maybe it has been too long since my last post. To be honest, I haven't really accomplished too much on the organizing front. There was a lot of cleaning, and a lot of good intentions. However, there was very little actual progress, well other than knitting.

I've been desperately needing to get my meal planning and grocery list in order. Like I've said before, I've had a system in the past that worked quite nicely. I had enough dinners planned for a week, and four separate weeks listed. I would just get my lists out when it was time to go shopping and ask hubby what he wanted to eat for that week and then make my grocery list from there. I was looking for something different now. The reason? Hubby likes to be overly spontaneous. He wants to go to Walmart every day and browse the food isles to decide what sounds good. It drives me and that little OCD voice in my head completely bonkers!! But, I don't like making a list and going shopping just to find out that he doesn't want anything that I've bought. Or worse is when I go to make dinner and after all the preparation and work, he won't eat it because it doesn't sound good. Ugh.

We were seriously discussing the whole food situation last night and he told me just how much he liked my old way of doing things. Ok! Why mess with a good thing? Well, other than to improve it. So I made a list of our favorite foods. Then I made a plan. One day a week we will have each of the following for dinner: salad, soup, crockpot meal, meatless meal, and a new meal. With that settled I started on my weekly plans.

genius in the making...

 So here is week one and two. I have plans for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I plan to make a grocery list to correspond with each week. So week one will have a list with everything I need to make those meals, a section for things I should have on hand (so I can double check those staples), and room to add anything extra that I need, too. Each week will have a specific list. I think this will cut down my time as far as grocery shopping is concerned. I think it will also make the meal planning less of a teeth pulling affair. I'm digging it. I'll write it all out and then type them up and I'll show you the finished product. I made lists for weeks 1-3, started weeks 4 and 5, and started week 1 grocery list last night. It took a few hours. This will be quite the under taking. Once it's done, though, it will make that part of my life a piece of cake!

so much yummy crispiness!

And this is what we had for dinner last night: homemade, baked flautas and Spanish rice. The flautas were filled with seasoned, baked chicken, frozen (thawed) spinach, and shredded cheddar cheese. They were awesome! I've made them twice and both times they were a huge hit. You can find the recipe here. You can also follow me on Pinterest, because I have some pretty awesome boards filled with the most wonderful goodness. *toot toot* (tooting my own horn, like you needed to be told that)

And while I am still sitting around this morning, I did manage to get some organizing done. I organized my project page on Ravelry. I added tags and sets to all of my finished projects. It was great fun! Now I can easily look for all of the blankets I've made, or hats, or socks, or anything in a particular year. I love it. Next will be my que. I also need to inventory all of my stash. That is partially done. These are very time consuming tasks, and require hubby to give up the computer to get it done. 

see my cute, new tabs?!?

 On the crafty home front: I have finished my socks!! This prompted an immediate mini tantrum from my little Miss. She needs socks NOW. I guess I'm sort of prone to giving into her, and I love when the kids want me to make them something, so I cast right on. They are cruising right along.

they are so small and sweet.

So, the house is clean, and is actually staying that way, and I'm keeping up with my awesome record keeping. All in all I'd say the year of the follow through is going great as it nears the end of it's first month. I think that this year is going to be pretty amazing. I'm still very excited and full of momentum. I'm going to keep plugging away on my Big Binder. This year is going to come together quite nicely. :-)

Packing Away the Christmas Stuff and Meal Planning

 Well, I didn't get my small thing done that day. However, I did do it yesterday. It took me much less time than I thought, which is awesome. So, I laid it all out to see what I needed and what had to go.

Now, I know that this is not all that I had. I'm pretty sure that a very large box of Christmas whatnots was left behind in our last move. Isn't that always the way it goes? I needed to get everything into this tote. It was relatively easy.

Ta da!! It's all packed up and stored away. This is what I had to donate. I'm proud to say that I did, in fact, put it in the car and actually drop it off. I know, shock! It is amazing.

I had to go grocery shopping this week. I tried not to, but it didn't work out. Once upon a time, I had a great meal planning and grocery system. I had seven meals per week numbered week 1-4. When it was time to meal plan, I just handed hubby the list and asked him what week he wanted. This worked great until hubby changed what he likes to eat. This changes more often than you might think. I've been a little thrown off and way unorganized because of it.

 Here is my menu plan for this week. I think that I will probably make a hard copy with our favorite meals. I should hope that it would make it easier when we need to plan what to eat. 

I used that list to make my grocery list. Really, the whole process took about half an hour. Then off to the grocery we went. It made that whole trip much, much easier.

In crafty news, my scarf is moving right along. I'm almost done. Now, if the cat lets it go then I will be able to finally be done with my Christmas gift giving.

I've been thinking a lot about clean schedules and how to get my house in less of a chaotic state.  I've never really had a cleaning schedule that worked for me. I've tried several things and they all worked for the short term, and only if I focused on cleaning and nothing else. Well, we all know that real life doesn't work that way. Yesterday and today was very productive days. I timer tasked my cleaning with my knitting with my kid time. I used one of the boards on Ravelry in Reclaiming the Home. It was lovely and my hubby is super happy to have the house so clean. How do you organize your cleaning?

One Small Thing and a Garden Journal

I have been bitten by the Spring bug. I ran out and got my garden journal. I really just couldn't manage not having it started. Last year I had an amazing garden going, but I started everything months late and it had a huge impact on the relatively low yield of absolutely everything that I planted. I really, really do not want that to happen this year.

I went through all of the seeds that I have from last year and noted what I need more of and what I have more than enough of. It surprised me to find just how many seeds I will not need to buy. This is why I need to get organized. I'm all about grabbing an extra whatever while I'm at the store because I don't know what I have at home. It's ridiculous. This happens on all fronts of my life: groceries, yarn, gardening, clothing, you name it.

So far, I am using everything implemented, up to this point.  I do get a day or two behind sometimes, but so far my follow through is ridiculously surprising. I mean it. I even surprise myself.

Anyhow, I also went through and wrote down what needs to be started indoors or outdoors and when. I also have a few plants that will need to be started twice during the year. I'm using lots of highlighters to decide what my plans are exactly. I am also using the website Smart Garden to plan the garden. If you have not at least looked at this site, do it. I'm serious. You tell it where you live, how many adults/children you are growing for, size of plot, and what you are growing. It suggests a plan and tells you when to plant based on your location. I'm going to rearrange where my plants have been placed, but I really love this site and find it very helpful.

This is my garden plan for 2013, so far. I have 22 different kinds of plants that I am planting this year. It's all still a work in progress, but at least it's getting attention early this year. 

In knitting news, I am working on my Doctor Who scarf. It is a long, boring project. It is also a late Christmas present. I know, booo hisss, bad me. It is a fully garter stitch project done on size US 8 needles. Gah! Well, I am about half way done now. I needed to do twenty-five rows a day to get this done in ten days starting on the 18th. I am three days in and already twelve rows behind. I did get my twenty-five in yesterday and I may be able to make up those twelve rows today. This is one of the projects that just needs to be done. We've all been there and this is mine. 

I have been listening to a podcast called The Organized Knitter. It covers two things that I love: organizing and knitting/fiber. I think that I would like to find more podcasts to listen to, but am not really sure where to start. Do you have any that you love? I like to listen while knitting and it never really lasts long enough. You know the feeling. Well, this week's challenge is to find something small that you have been putting off and just do it. Challenge accepted! lol

These are my Christmas ornaments. Shhhhhhh.....don't tell hubby I actually put this online. lol We took down our tree in a hurry to make room for Dad to spend the weekend with us. This is what happened and this is where it has sat. It's a mess. Not just that, but it's full of things that we don't need/didn't use. This is my one small thing. I will do it today. I'll let you know how it goes.

That's all for today. We have a lot going on right now, and even more that will start happening here all too soon. For now, the house is in desperate need of cleaning and experience tells me that it just won't clean itself.

More Journals and Some Organizing

Thinking of Spring is something I do year round. I like the winter, and it's not like I want it to end, yet. However, I love dirt. I love to dig in the dirt, have my bare feet in it, and, most importantly, grow stuff in it. When the snow is on the ground, I am thinking of what to grow, when to start, and how will I not run everything late this year. I'm good at that, the running late part. Not this year. (no, I don't say that every year. *cough cough*)

I've been working on my garden book. Now I have all of the labels in it, but not much more information. I keep changing my mind on the set up. I've also been thinking of adding a separate garden journal. My garden book is for how-to's and tips I learn from other gardeners. My journal is for progress pics, start dates, harvest dates, and other info that is only pertinent to this particular year and region. I'll have to get the journal soon because it's almost time to starts some seeds! Squee! I'm pretty excited.

Don't worry; there is something to be shared on the organizing front. You know how you see something on Pinterest (or even somewhere else. Hey, it can happen!) and you think to yourself, or out loud, "now why didn't I think of that?!?" You know, it's something so simple and something that you've almost done several times. That wonderful 'duh' moment. I had one. I have one linen/medicine/towel closet in my house. It has to hold it all. It's normally a horrid mess with whatnots falling out all. the. time. Well, looky what I did.

I have two of these housing the majority of our medicine. I need to get probably two or three more to finish the job. Hey! There are seven of us; don't judge. lol Anyhow, Now there is actually room for my towels! Right now I have six categories: pain, kids, stomach, topical, first aid, and adults. I bought the containers at walmart for around $9 each. Totally worth it. My other system was horribly inefficient. I had mini totes full of medicine and we were always buying what we already had or searching and making messes in the middle of the night. This is so much better. 

There is no new craft news to share. I did, however, add some lovelies to my blog. I have the Ravelry progress bars, and they make me happy. I also added a Google+ and Pinterest button. Enjoy!!