Tag Archives: tours

Storing Keepsakes

If you are anything like me, you have keepsakes all over the place. I have tried to get everything under control but what I end up doing is moving some to one place and some to another place. What I have left are keepsakes that are all over the house. I have some keepsakes in cabinets, some in boxes and some in closets. My goal for the next few Saturdays is to get it all in order and store my keepsakes the proper way. I already know how I want to do this. I plan on purchasing a plastic container … Continue reading →

The Paper Jungle 1

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Allow me to tell you about the paper jungle. It is a dangerous place. It exists in the immediate area of my office and I can’t possibly tell you how any of it really got there. I do know one thing though: it is messy. I’ve had to take out my big knife and cut some of it down to size though because I need to identify certain items of re-reading during my summer of words. I’d like to remind you of two things going forward: systems and technology. I’ve written about the importance of syllabi in the past and … Continue reading →

Digital Photography as a Time Waster

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I read somewhere recently that although we love our digital cameras, they’re a time waster. I hadn’t thought much about it before, but once I read that, I had to stop and think. I do spend more time with my photos now than I used to. In addition to the additional time we place in taking photos (since there’s no limit I am guilty of taking many more shots and trying to decide whether they’re any good right on the spot), we also spend more time behind the camera instead of getting into the action. Additionally, there’s the time it … Continue reading →

Say Goodbye to the Single Socks

What is the statute of limitations for single socks? Some can hang around for years. Why is letting them go so hard? During the day, I have my two youngest children at home. As most parents know, this makes it pretty hard to get things done around the home. Today, though, I couldn’t put off the laundry any longer and needed to get some things washed, dried and folded (ironing will be another day). When I have laundry like this to do, I try to involve the kids. It keeps them occupied and teaches some life lessons. Too young to … Continue reading →

Sleep and Habit Forming

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This last week I’ve been setting my alarm clock a little earlier than normal. My attempt was to be up by five in the morning each weekday in order to work on the various writing projects I need to work on over the summer (in addition to the reading). I’ve been thwarted, however, by exhaustion. My wife and our son have been sick during the past weeks and apparently it was Dad’s turn. So my nose runs, I have a cough, there are headaches and droopy eyes. I don’t know why I intended to get up at five in the … Continue reading →

Organizing Your Photos: Digital Photos

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The awesome thing about digital cameras is that you don’t waste any money on film. The scary thing about digital cameras is that you take hundreds of photos, which you either end up leaving on your memory card for ages or dumping onto your computer in batches (large or small) that may or may not have automatically named file folders and images. These images may live their lives with such descriptive names such as IMG_0468 living in the folder Roll 101. Yes, this is a real photo on my computer. It’s a lovely photo of my dad’s prize car, but … Continue reading →

Organizing Your Photos: Printed Photos

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If you’re anything like me, you still have a shoebox full of printed photos. They may be old photos, or they may be new depending on your camera preference, but one thing is sure: they’re not doing anyone any good sitting in a shoebox. So let’s get organized! (Organization is one of my favorite things, by the way.) I’ve stopped printing many of my photos. With the switch to digital, I now find myself printing only the ones that I have a specific purpose for. So while I’m not compounding my shoebox problem, I haven’t taken the time to remedy … Continue reading →

Closet Organizing Ideas: Shoes

Spring is a good time to purge and organize the closets. But if you are facing a mountain of sweaters tumbling from shelves, a sea of shoes in disarray on the floor and clothing attacking you from all sides, then you might not know just where to start. The key to organizing a closet, I have found is to start slowly and to use the right tools. Here are some of the ideas that are currently working for me in our master bedroom closet. When we moved to our current home, we left behind closets and were huge and plentiful. … Continue reading →

Make Camping Easy: The Camping Box

I’d like to share a brilliant idea that I got from a friend. I’m implementing it in my own home over the next couple of months. It’s the idea of the camping box. You see, I can’t stand packing. It is one of the things that I despise most in the world. Before every vacation, I spend at least a week dreading the packing and a day foully irritable while I’m actually doing it. It’s not that I’m not organized. I have packing lists. I have most of the things that we need. However, my lists simply serve to remind … Continue reading →

How to Organize If You Don’t Have a Scrapbook Room

I am not one of those lucky souls to have a scrapbook room. I know of one lady who not only has a scrapbook room but she decorated it with a Star Wars theme. This is her room for scrapbooking and nothing else. I would love to have one of those but I have to utilize all of my extra space for my work. When my writing work began taking over the extra space I once had, I realized there was nowhere to go with my scrapbooking materials. So at one point I just bagged it all and shoved it … Continue reading →