Anyway, I tend to like personalized things. So I thought a good solution to this growing problem would be to get each person in my family a personalized cup for Christmas this year. Then it will be, like, totally easy for everyone to keep track of their cups every day.

I have these…

…for Noah and Nathan. But I want “adult” drinking cups, preferably not breakable.

So, dear readers, please share links to web sites that sell what I’m wanting… preferably sites you’ve ordered from before, so you know the quality is good. Thanks, peeps!

Storage bins and spreadsheets aside, this is the #1 thing that has kept my life organized for over a decade. It may take some adjustment if you’ve never used one before, since it’s of little benefit if you don’t actually USE it daily, but it’s well worth the effort. I honestly don’t think I could function without it. I personally believe everyone, from a top level executive to a stay-at-home mom, can benefit greatly from keeping a calendar like this. Below are the key features of my black book and why I think they’re awesome.

• it zips - I stick bills in my black book, along with invitations and occasionally receipts. Having a zipper is so important, because it prevents important stuff from falling out.
• monthly pages - Each two-page spread has one month on it. Less than a month (say, a weekly calendar) is too limited for me. I like to know how the month is filling up at a glance. If I had to flip between weeks, I’d be confused almost instantly. More than a month is too compact for me. I need to have some space to write on each day.
• boxes - I buy the refill pages that have a nice border around each day (see photo above). Like a child learning discipline, I like to have boundaries. They make me feel safe. Okay, maybe that’s an exaggeration. But it does help me see which appointments are on which day, as long as I keep my writing within those boxes.

What do I write on my calendar? Everything!

• appointments
• meetings
• vacation days
• school plays
• reminders to pay bills
• reminders of calls I need to make
• dinner reservations
• parties
• weddings
• baby showers
• basically any event
• reminders of when I’m volunteering for something
• anything and everything else I could possibly need to remember

I also use highlighters to color code various things. That might be overkill, but it helps me visualize. For example:

• blue = events my kids have at school (open house, pep rallies, football games, school dances, etc.)
• green = school holidays
• orange = kids’ appointments
• pink = my appointments/meetings
• yellow = reminders to pay bills

The two most important things to remember in order for your black book to be effective are: (1) always write everything down in it and (2) look it over every single morning. I promise your life will be instantly organized if you do these two things faithfully!

old photographs
I’m proud to say I’ve put all my old photos in chronological order inside acid-free, photo-safe albums. If you’ve yet to do this and have photos everywhere, it can be overwhelming! Start by getting all your photos in one big box. Then get file folders and label them by year. As you sort through the photos in the big box, drop them in the “year” folder they belong. Sometimes if the photos are old, this can be challenging – just make your best guess. Once separated by year, arrange the photos in each folder in chronological order. Again, this can be challenging. Usually clothing will be a hint as to time of year, and holidays are easy to sort. Try to group, too. For example, put all the school play photos together, all the family reunion photos together, all the Christmas photos together, etc. If you do the big events first, it’s easier to guess where the random photos fit in based off clothing, hair style, location, etc. Once all the photos are sorted, you can start putting them in albums. Don’t forget the importance of getting good quality, acid-free, photo-safe albums!

digital photos
Once I went digital, I stopped getting prints. It gets expensive, plus you have to find a place to store all the prints. Now I save my digital images (still in chronological order) by backing them up on CDs. The CDs are always labeled by date and topic (easier to find images later), and I keep them together in a CD binder. If you’re not going to go through the effort of keeping them all together in one safe place, what’s the point of backing them up? Seriously.

an exception to my rule
I do get some prints of the digital images. Each of my kids will have a set of scrapbooks (probably about 7 albums each, which gives you some idea of how many photos to include each year), which go from birth through high school graduation. This is an excellent example of how OCD I am. This is my gift to them – photos documenting their lives while they were under my care. I’m not suggesting you all do this. Photos are very important to me, and this is something special I wanted to do for my children. I only include the best photos from each year, focusing primarily on each of them, but also including both our immediate and extended family. Very few friends make it into these scrapbooks (exception: birthday parties). Family is forever. Friends come and go throughout our lives. Besides, they have yearbooks to remember their friends!

Again, this is just how I do it. It works for me. It won’t necessarily work for everyone.

(By the way, I also keep and reuse tissue paper that hasn’t been ripped.) Not only is reusing gift bags good for the environment, but it’ll also save you money. Depending on how fancy pants the bag is, it could easily tack on $5 to your overall gift price. Not that your family members and friends aren’t, uh, worth the extra $5. But you know what I’m saying. It adds up.

The importance of keeping all this stuff together in one nice, neat spot is that otherwise, you’ll have to search your house looking for a bag when you need one, inevitably give up, drive to Target, and waste $5. Girl, you know it’s true! Ooo ooo ooo, I love you. {name that band}

I’m personally not a big fan of wrapping paper because it can’t be reused. I’ve had the rolls in this storage bin…

…since I bought them on clearance December 26, 2004. Yes, they’ve lasted that long. Crazy, I know, especially considering how many kids I have. Clearly, I don’t use much wrapping paper.

p.s. – You can go ahead and make fun of that label for the wrapping paper. I deserve it. I could explain that this particular box used to be under my bed, which was dark, and the label helped at that time. However, that’s a really lame excuse. I deserve to be ridiculed.

I’m 30 weeks pregnant. Taylor was 10 days early, Nathan was 11 days early, Noah was 13 days early, and Jonah was 19 days early. See the trend? I expect to meet Josiah in 6-7 weeks. Almost there!

1. you are done having kids
2. you want more kids

If you are done having kids, quit hoarding keeping every dang outfit your precious spawn has ever worn for “sentimental” reasons, and refer to this post on how to decide what to keep and what to donate. If you want more kids and fancy the idea of using hand-me-down clothing, then this post is for you!

I’ve learned that if clothes are tossed into trash bags or cardboard boxes, then stuffed into the back of closets or an attic, they get forgotten, therefore defeating the purpose of saving them in the first place. For example, I bought a cute pair of Vans sneakers for my son (in the next size he was to wear), then stuck them on a random shelf, and forgot about them. By the time I re-discovered them, they were about 3 sizes too small. Oops.

So, I present to you Reason # 542 why storage bins are your friend. If you’re saving the clothes so your other kids can use them (not just to hoard), I’ll let you know how I handle things.

1.) Only save what you think the next kid will actually wear. If something is stained, ripped, stretched out, or tacky, no need to keep it. Baby Brother doesn’t need to LOOK like he only wears hand-me-downs. That’s like playing favorites with Big Brother. Not nice.

2.) I don’t save things that won’t be used within 3 years. I’ve found that after about 3 years, clothes tend to discolor, elastic gets crispy, stuff goes out of style, etc. I don’t really want my kid to look like a ragamuffin, savvy?

3.) Separate by size, so you don’t have to constantly re-sort. Then label the storage bins. Nathan is 5.5 years older than Noah, so I don’t save his clothes – I pass them on to friends. I do keep Noah’s clothes for Jonah, and Jonah’s clothes for Josiah. Again, I don’t keep clothing that is stained, ripped, stretched out, etc. So, only keeping “nice” stuff, I separate by size and label the bins. For example, these 6 bins…

…are separated into the following sizes: 0-3 months, 3-6 months, 6-12 months, 12-18 months, 18-24 months, and 2T. I go ahead and mix warm and cold weather clothing into the same bin, because often the seasons overlap. Where I live, some months (such as November, March, etc) are weird. One day will be 70 degrees, and the next day will be 40 degrees, so I mix seasonal clothing. As the baby of the family outgrows the smallest size, I pass those clothes along to a friend (keeping sentimental outfits, of course). Then I replace the “0-3 months” label with the next size the big brother has outgrown, such as “3T”. It’s an ongoing process. The 6 bins remain, but the labels change.

4.) I like clear storage bins so I can know what’s in them at a glance. Notice the photo above? Without even opening the bins, I can tell you I have plenty of size 3-6 months, but I’ll probably need to buy more size 12-18 months, depending on how many stains Jonah gets on the stuff he’s wearing now.

5.) Also, this should go without saying, but keep the bins in a place where they won’t be forgotten. The attic sucks for a variety of reasons (out of sight thus out of mind, possibly squirrels or other critters, evil spiders, extreme temperatures, basically just gross, etc). Store the bins in the bedroom closet, right above where the current size is hanging.

What was the point? Oh, yeah: the address book. Although beautiful, the address book presented two problems. First, no sooner had I updated it, inevitably someone would move or change their phone number. Second, once I started adding my friends’ addresses, I ran out of room almost immediately. Of course, this was back in the late 80s, so I just kept using white-out (gag!) and re-writing addresses. Eventually I gave up and got another address book. Then another one. And another one. And yet another one.

AND THEN… I discovered the joy of excel spreadsheets when I was 22. {insert a choir of angels singing}

Although arguably not as charming as a seashell address book, I could make changes as often as I like and add as many people as my heart desired. For example, my current address spreadsheet has 229 families on it. Yes, I know, I’m quite the celebrity! Actually, I just stalk people until they enter the witness protection program. But I digress yet again.

I highly recommend entering all your family/friends’ address and phone numbers on a spreadsheet. The columns I use (in order) are:

1. last name
2. first name(s)
3. children living at home, when applicable
4. street address
5. city
6. state
7. zip
8. primary phone #
9. secondary phone #

For friends living abroad, I use the street address column for the first line of their address, and the city column for the second line of their address.

Benefits of making an excel spreadsheet:

• you can make changes and additions easily and often, without using white-out or getting a new address book
• you aren’t ever limited by space, so you can add all the friends, family members, co-workers, and acquaintances as you could possibly want
• when someone pisses you off, the delete button offers a surprising level of satisfaction
• someone getting married and changing their last name no longer presents a problem, because moving them to a different page is as easy as clicking “sort”
• always in alphabetical order, without any brain power required
• two words: mail merge! {insert a choir of angels singing again} (addressing the envelopes for those year-end Christmas letters has never been easier!)
• you have the ability to sort, so you can locate all family members or all local friends quicker than you can say “smack that bootie”
• you can use pretty fonts
• you can run spell check
• you can print new copies whenever you want
• you can sell the list to spam companies for supplemental income

The list goes on and on, but I’ll stop there.

p.s. – No, Microsoft isn’t paying me for endorsing excel. I wish they were, but no. Any advice on how to make that happen?

I used to write all the birthdays and anniversaries on the next year’s calendar I’d buy each December. Not only is this tedious, but it’s extremely time-consuming. (Not to mention the suck factor if you, God forbid, are OCD like me and accidentally write the wrong letter, but think white-out is gross, etc. Not that I’ve ever trashed a calendar because of sloppy handwriting, just so I could start fresh. Stop judging me. Seriously. Shut up.)

At the end of 2009, I came up with a better plan. Rather than write all the dates, I created an excel spreadsheet. (I love spreadsheets and discovering new ways to implement them into everyday life!)

The spreadsheet has four columns:

1. month
2. day
3. year
4. name (format: last name, first name)

I did this so I can easily and quickly find, for example, all the April birthdays, or a list of everyone I know who’s turning 30 this year, or the entire Partin family so I can verify I’ve included each family member, because I wouldn’t want to play favorites! Initially, it really doesn’t take longer than handwriting all the dates on a calendar. And once it’s done, it saves a lot of time later on down the road, because you don’t have to re-create it every year. I can print one month at a time, and keep it on my desk. It’s easy to remember to glance at it every day, because I made it a habit (just like checking my regular calendar). As I meet new friends, I add their important dates to the spreadsheet. Easy as pie. In fact, even easier (yet less delicious) than THIS pie.

*I do have one exception to this rule. I have a shower caddy that hangs from my shower head (obviously, this is also out of the reach of children). I keep one bottle of clorox spray there at all times, and also one hanging scrubby brush. Why? If those two things are in my shower, I find that I clean my shower more often. Because you know when you remember to clean your shower? When you’re in it. You know when you forget to clean your shower? As soon as you get out. Leave the two necessary supplies (spray cleaner and scrubby brush) in your shower at all times, and this will never again be an issue for you. Just please don’t use the scrubby brush to also clean your body, because that is Le Nasty (which should go without saying, but I know some of you are super freaks).

As far as what to keep permanently for sentimental reasons, I keep two storage bins for each kid. For example:

Storage bin # 1 is larger and primarily for special clothes, which usually end of being infant clothing with a few larger sizes (such as a dress from when Taylor was a flower girl in a wedding). This container also has their hospital newborn bracelet, any special baby blanket, first pair of shoes, a special toy, etc.

Storage bin # 2 is smaller and for birthday cards (not all, just the ones with, for example, a personal handwritten message from Grandma and Grandpa), drawings, and school papers. Now, I don’t keep just any school papers. I only keep art projects and short stories they wrote. These are things that reflect their personality and creativity, therefore they are of value to me.

If I have more than fits in either bin, then it’s process of elimination and only the most important items are kept. Again, I limit myself to these two bins. There’s no way that much stuff can possibly be THAT sentimental, to me OR to my kids. My parents kept a ton of my school papers, and 99% of it I threw away when I was an adult. Because honestly, why would I keep it all? Spelling tests? Math homework? Seriously. And who really needs three closets worth of clothing that no one will ever wear again? There’s a fine line between keeping some sentimental items and hoarding. There are valid reasons why organizations such as Goodwill and Salvation Army exist. When you and your kids are no longer using things, pass them along to someone else who can. {steps off soapbox}

I always use clear storage bins and include labels (see photo above). This prevents me from wasting time sorting through the same boxes over and over.  If the bins are clear and labeled, I know at a quick glance exactly what’s inside. Believe me, this will save you a headache later if you’re looking for something in particular. And if/when you move, you’re already partially packed and ready to go! Plastic bins also keep out dust and bugs, which cardboard boxes do not.

One more thing… When printing labels, use a timeless font like Helvetica (or I suppose Arial would suffice). For the love of God, don’t use Comic Sans (gag!), Lucida Casual (barf!), or that abomination known as Papyrus. Why? Because it can potentially cause permanent brain damage and/or rectal bleeding.