Very Smart Ladies

(Source: Small Notebook)

Forgot how I found Rachel yesterday, I think I liked her comment on someone else's blog, or someone else mentioned her in their blog. Oh, I found her when googling ideas about travelling light with kid. Anyway, after jumping over to her blog, I totally fell in love with her Small Notebook. So far, I am only reading the organizing section, and her view of an organized home is so refreshing! Like her "Organizing until it's good enough, admire your work, and then move one to something else." approach on a kitchen drawer. Yes, we all want our home beautiful and organized like the ones in the magazines, but only some people were bornt like that, the rest of us just work extra hard try to catch up. And not all of us can afford the expensive organizers and drawer dividers the magazines promoting. I am a big believer of "use what you have" when it comes to organizing. This is also one of the reasons I love Chez Larsson and Lazy Organizer. I love their idea of organizing is to minimize first! Do we really need all that stuffs? They don't make us "rich", they just possess us! We are slowly becoming slaves to our house, cars, stuffs, spending our precious time trying to maintain "control", instead of enjoy what we have. This is just wrong. And we don't have to wait till we can afford those beautiful organizers to declutter our home!

Last night, while I was packing for our little trip, (yeah, I always start packing way too early just in case I forget something), I tried to remember to "pack light". So I packed 3 sets of outfits for two of us, and a couple more for little caterpillar (she makes messes all the time). We like to use our own shampoo and lotion that kind of stuffs, so I poured them into the little empty hotel bottles I collected from previous vacations. When I was staring at the our stuffs, I suddenly realized I might be able to fit everything in two carry-on luggages! No check-in? I am so excited!

Then I took a look at our tiny closet. It's so small, we each have about 3 feet of space! So, every year I have to move seasonal clothes up and down (off season stuffs stay in attic) TWICE! Tons of work! And all mine! Then half of the sweaters I don't even wear, and haven't wear them for years! Why am I keeping them? And why am I moving them around? Stubborn has only 4 sweaters, about a dozen of dress shirts, a dozen of tshirts, a couple of shorts, some pants and jeans! That's it! And he wears them all the time, until they die! If I get rid of more stuffs (already donated tons over the past several years), I probably will be able to keep everything in my side of the closet! No more trip to the attic! Oh, this will be one of my spring cleaning goals!

You know how mind works, at least for us women, once you start thinking about something, you cannot stop it. Oh, it's just me? Anyway, I have been planning to clean out our living room closet lately. It's so packed, I cannot seem to find anything! Same problem there! Way too many my stuffs. There are 2 coats for little caterpillar, 2 for Stubborn, and maybe more than a dozen coats and jackets for me! And I only wear 3 or 4 of them! Two pairs of shoes for Stubborn, 4 pairs for little caterpillar, and more than half a dozen of my shoes! One diaper bag, and 2 toddler backpacks for little caterpillar, and tons of bags for me! Plus I have two more bins of bags up in my closet! Too many stuffs, I have to keep off season shoes in the basement! Again, more moving stuffs around for me TWICE a year! I have to correct this! Not later! This Spring!!!

What's on your spring cleaning list?