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Friday, March 26, 2010

At My Fingertips

Some of my "clutter boxes" are full of papers: pages I've pulled from magazines, brochures I've picked up, and articles I've clipped from various sources. At this point they are useless to me because they are just stuffed in those boxes. I have no idea what I have or if they even apply to my current life.

So that is one of my big projects in this taming my paper tiger. Going thru those papers and throwing out the ones I no longer need/want and making accessible the information I want to keep. The main way I'm organizing them is in project notebooks.

The largest notebook (a 3 inch binder) is for my home remodeling and landscaping. I bought dividers with write on tabs and made sections for each room of the house and for each project I'm going to work on in the yard. If I can fit the idea onto a piece of notebook paper, I glue it on (fast and easy). If it's a large page or a brochure, I put it in a page protector.

I have a similar sized notebook to hold my hobby/crafting ideas. I'm starting to think perhaps I'm going to need a separate notebook to hold my photography ideas and tips in.

I have another notebook that holds clips that relate to my "Remodel Me" goal. Hair styles I like, clothes I like, ideas for using accessories, "best" make up and skin care products, nutrition information and so on.

There are notebooks I keep correspondence from my sponsor kids (7 notebooks), writing buddies (1 for all of them), and 2 sponsored adults. There is one that I keep things from my mission team meetings.

I like the notebooks because they are easy to carry around without papers falling everywhere.

I'm using a little different method for organizing my recipe clippings. For this I'm using a heavy duty accordion file. It has 12 sections to sort with. My categories for this are: Meat, Eggs, Pasta, Grains, Starches, Veggies, Soups & Stews, Breads, Fruit, Desserts, Drinks, and Misc. That's as much as I'll be doing with my recipes for a bit. I've something planned up for a later goal...

3 comments:

  1. I'm forever battling my Paper Tiger. I sort through tons every time I move across the oceans and continents, but as soon as I've parked myself somewhere else, the heaps grow again like mushrooms. I print and keep too much stuff, and then never read it again.

    I'm organized to some extent, but even the organized stuff never sees the day of light again once it is put away.

    It's an addiction, all that paper!

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  2. Love your notebook ideas! You've inspired me to set a few up that I hadn't thought of before! Like Miss Footloose above, I too have a tendency to print too much out and have it stacked on my desk. Keep up the great work with your organizing, Teri!

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  3. I've started asking myself "Why?" am I keeping that piece of paper. And I also have put limits on how much of a subject I will keep. It seems to be helping as I sort... and already I can tell I'm keeping a lot less new stuff.

    The notebooks have already been useful. Such an easy way to access information.

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