Paper Pile Giveaway
Congrats to the winner of Lysa TerKeurst’s book Made to Crave. She is: Kristina; timestamp 11:51 pm on January 5th. Send your home address to me at [email protected] right away!
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Paper.
It piles.
It perturbs.
It is a problem!
Is there any aspect of trying to maintain a clean home that is more unnerving??
Sure the kitchen may get messy.
So what!!
We can always clean it up again, wiping and scrubbing until the counter is clean, the dishes are done and the pots and pans back in their rightful place.
If we want to keep it that way for a while, we need only to eat a meal or two out of have paper actually be our friend (in the form of plates on which to dine!!)
But with paper it is a whole different ballgame.
While we may be able to spend an afternoon sorting, purging and pitching our piles of paper leaving only the needed ones in our abode, it is only a temporary fix. No sooner have we tossed our piles into the trash (or recycle bin) than a whole new batch enters our home.
They come at us from all directions.
The newspaper arrives.
The mail gets delivered.
The kids return home from school or an extra-curricular activity.
Because we aren’t always sure what to do with this stuff, we end up placing it neatly in a pile.
Oh, come on! Do neat piles actually exist? I’m not sure I ever seen one.
Okay, maybe I’ve seen a few, but they didn’t stay neat for long. As soon as someone was in need of a paper they thought might be hiding in said pile, they rifled through it and left it a complete mess.
And what do the neat piles do to us women?
They shout, “Failure, failure, failure!! Why look at you mom! You can’t even make a decision. You don’t know where to put us so you just choose any horizontal surface within a three foot radius and plop us down. Incompetent woman! Can’t you even take care of the paper in your home, for crying out loud!!”
Okay, so maybe I’ve never actually had a pile talk to me like an apple tree on the way to Oz, but I have had that exact line of thought run through my brain.
Piles make me feel defeated. They remind me that I was not on top of the ballgame.
I didn’t have a plan for those papers, so there they sit, a stack of unmade decisions I put off until another time.
They are the culmination of the “for now”s in my life.
You know, “I’ll set this mail here, for now. I’ll put these papers on the counter for now. I really don’t have time to think about what to do with these clothes, shoes, toys, store items. Etc… I’ll just lay them here for now.
Gals, the phrase for now is derailing our organizational train!
Well, since January is a time for all things resolution-y, I’m sure many of you have made a goal that has to do with getting more organized around your place.
Maybe with your time.
Or with your cleaning & clutter.
Or your grocery shopping & meal planning.
Perhaps even with your paper piles!
Here’s a little giveaway to help boost your moral. It includes:
~A periwinkle (one of my favorite colors!) three-ring binder.
~A set of whimsical tab dividers for the binder.
~A sturdy vinyl folder with many inside pockets for organizing fliers & such.
~ A set of colorful push pins.
~A set of matching jumbo paper clips.
~A set of push clips for a bulletin board that hold coupons & such right where you can see them.
~A pocket 2011 calendar and matching notepad.
~Some totally fun, swirly-patterned, comfy-grip mechanical pencils. ( I always do my calendar in pencil since things may change & a I HATE a messy looking calendar!)
~An undated desk-size, week-at-a-glance planner pad to map out your days.
~Finally, a personalized copy of my book The Complete Guide to Getting & Staying Organized.
To enter the giveaway you must leave a comment on this post sometime between now & Monday morning at 7:00 am when the winner will be chosen and announced.
Either…..
Tell us what aspect of paper causes you the most trouble….
or
Give us a solution for any aspect of paper problems.
Now, if time is tight or you are simply drowning in paper at the moment and as a result your brain won’t work, simply say, “I’m in!” Drawing is random. :-)
I’ll try to hop on over the weekend and share a few of my paper tips with you too. (NOTE: I have done this in the fourth page of the comments giving directions for how to assemble a Brain in a Binder that will house your papers. Click on the comments & then scroll down to see :-))
Now…get tackling those piles girlfriends!!!!
Pile-busting Blessings,
Incoming Mail! Yikes, as I was reading your blog I look around me and there are paper stacks everywhere! What’s a girl to do :)I’m in!
My biggest problem is the statements that come from the insurance company. There’s seven people in my family, and the insurance company makes sure that each person has their own statement for everything! Somehow I feel compelled to keep them all, just in case I need them for taxes or something. Yet I don’t even bother to open 90% of the envelopes. So what I have is a basket containing a year’s worth of envelopes which is completely overwhelming!
I completely relate to that stack of neatly placed papers screaming out at you. The more organized I “feel” I become, the more papers there are to deal with — that new recipe that looks delicious, that money-saving coupon… the list is endless.
I have a standing folder system for the weekly coupon inserts, and I have a three-ring binder to put that special poem, quote, tip, 8×11 sheet recipe. I’m always looking for a solution for the things that don’t “fit” into my semi-organization.
Paper is where I still struggle the most. With school papers from 4 children, mail, and paperwork from our business, I need to find some solutions. I have tried different filing systems and ways to keep it together, but I am still working on it.
I cringe with every piece of paper coming in our house! I get overwhelmed with school papers/keepsakes and mail that doesn’t need to be addressed now but later.
My paper problem is recipes that I print from the internet. Some I make right away and put in a binder, but there are some that I print that I might make one day. I have a whole pile of these!
I have two baskets (one for incoming mail that needs attention and one for filing) that help keep things somewhat contained. However, it sometimes feels like the piles just live in those basket.
My biggest challenge is finding time to file the things in the file basket.
I keep a three-slot file that (supposedly) gets emptied once a week: to read, to do (bills, etc) and to file. My biggest problem is all the magazines!
I am so in…and drowning in piles of paper!
Huge orgnaizational issues with papers from school and extra curr. activities – just as quickly as I get the counters cleaned off – someone comes home and adds more to the counter!!
I have real issues…HELP!!! :-)
This is one of my unspoken resolutions – to deal with the paper piles. (Well, I guess now it’s “written” – lol). Not knowing what to do with certain things is an issue for sure. Then, when the piles get bad, or we have company coming, I pick up the piles and pile them into boxes or bags to hide. The house looks good – but those hidden piles are still lurking, waiting to attack me with the “you’re so inept” thoughts. In addition to not knowing what I should keep and what I should not, there is the time issue. With my work, I may be gone for 15 hours a day. By the time I get home, I can barely think straight – let alone want to spend time with the piles instead of my children. Aaarrrggghhhh! I HATE PILES!
This is such a huge issue for me! I am in.
I am an organizational flunkie. I try but have so much trouble being consistent. My biggest struggle is with the stuff I’m not sure what to do with. Maybe I’ll need it later but not right now. Maybe I need to act on it but must do something first. Maybe it is something that I MIGHT want to do but need to think about it, pray about it, research it…I never quite know what to do with those things and so I leave them on the counter…to remind me. Then I bury them and find them when it is too late, I have forgotten, missed out, etc. UGH! I need help!
Ok – no working solution here! I have had this problem for as long as I can remember. My non-effective solution is to let the pile sit there until I’m going to work on it. I then put it into a bag to carry it to the work area. After going through some of it, I put what’s left back in the bag. That’s when the real trouble starts…when I go to “hide” the pile for company, I stow the bag away until a later time but never get back to it! I seriously need help in this area. I know my husband would appreciate it forever as well. By the way, this is a multi-generational problem in our family as I remember my grandparents’ dining room table full of paperwork as well as my parents’. I think it must be inherited! I know it’s time to break the cycle!
I have piles of paper that I stack up nice and neat and try to get to and sort. But I usually don’t get to them so then I have a drawer in my desk that I stuff them in. I wish I could organze them alittle better.
School papers and recipes are my biggest problems! I have tackled the mail paper clutter by opening, addressing, and recycling immediately. I definitely need help organizing school papers and recipes!!
We would LOVE for those piles to leave our catch-all counter top. But it’s the first thing you come to when you come in the door. My husband would think I was a real domestic goddess if I found a way to get rid of that clutter!
I’m going to get a handle on my piles…I have piles everywhere! I have a file for our billing stuff, but it piles up and then I have to marathon file it all away. I need a system and place for all the paper to go!!!!
What a FABULOUS giveaway – Thank you! I have learned that the least amount of times I can touch paperwork, probably the better. Example: When the mail comes in, the sooner I can file it, better! When the children bring home papers from school, if I can sign them right away and place them back in their backpack to return, better!! Managing effective systems seems to be a continual work in progress!!
Tell us what aspect of paper causes you the most trouble….
LOL! ALL of it! It’s unreal. Between the mail, the newspapers, the coupons, the paperwork from the doctors’ offices, recipes, books, notebooks, post-it note reminders, calendars, magazines & school paperwork, I feel like I’m drowning in paper. Just on my desk alone, I have 6 piles of paper! *sheesh*
Any tips that you can share will be most appreciated!
Thanks! : )
I am so in…It is like the big paper chase in my kitchen and on my desk! I have lots of great intentions and now that my oldest is in school even more paper is coming into the house and I am drowning in it!
Homeschool = endless paperwork nightmare. I use the standard clothes pins to temporarily organize. Mark one ‘file’, one ‘keep’, and so on. Then, as I sort, the stuff is supposed to get into the right place. It does work…but I’m always shuffling papers. I’d love to gather more tips and tricks though…and maybe something more stylish. :)
Wow, this post is SO me! And I can see by the comments already that alot of us struggle in this area! I again had to go through a “pile” just last night. Definitely on my to do list this year, to end the “piles” and the clutter. Thank you for your insights into alot of the areas we all struggle with. God bless.
Karen,
My biggest struggle is organizing my kids school papers. Artwork, worksheets, newsletters, anything that comes home in their backpacks. I have too many “now” piles. And I need to get a handle on this because in a few years I will have another in school. Any suggestions would be great and deeply appreciated.
Thanks