IHeart Organizing: 2010-01-31

To put a wrap on Home Office month, I thought I would do a quicky post on sorting mail. Yippee skippy right? But really, honestly, and shamelessly, how many of you out there, dread getting the mail, and have pileups of papers around the house? And how many of you heart how those pileups, keep piling up, and spreading, and become more attractive as they grow? (sarcasm is key here!)

It's a fact Jack! Or Jill. Mail pileup is a very common household problem, and I have a quick and easy solution (yes, down to just 4 easy peasy steps) to keep it under control.

Step 1:

Acquire a letter opener. It saves your fingers from paper cuts. Which are painful, and make you not want to go after very many envelopes. I found ours (shown below), at either Target or Walmart for a few pennies. Completely worth it!

Open your mail, RIGHT AWAY! Don't grab your mail out of the mail box when you are driving away, it will most likely end up under a seat and get forgotten! Only bring in your mail when you have two seconds to give it a peak.

Step 2:

Recycle! Recycle all envelopes and inserts, along with any "junk" mail and catalogs. Only keep any correspondence and bills that require filing, paying, etc... I find that these plastic Sterilite baskets are the perfect size for recycling paper, and easy to tuck away in different rooms throughout the homestead.

(If you are getting overwhelmed with the junk mail you are receiving, here is a great website with a lot of ways to cut it down and go green!)

Step 3:

Most likely you don't keep your filing cabinet/tote/etc... right where you are sorting your mail. If you are lucky enough to have your filing system completely handy and accessible, then skip this step. However, if you are like most of us and sort your mail in the hub of your home, create an "In" box for all opened mail. You can now be done for the day. Really, that's all you HAVE to do when you bring in the mail. If you open your mail by your filing system, you may choose to just file it away instantly. If not, you can even create an "In" box to revisit later as well. It's all personal preference.

I am totally digging these "In" baskets found at Pottery Barn. Not only do I use them for our mail, but they are great for housing current kid schoolwork/projects/etc...

Step 4:

About once a week, when I have a little more time to devote, I go through our "In" box. I place any invitations in my planner and mark down dates and times. I write out any bills (that I can't pay online), and place them in our "Out" box. We just use this cute little tin basket to hold our outgoing mail.

I then use my filing tote (which is super portable so I can do this task anywhere I please) to file away all remaining paperwork. I only keep what is necessary to refer back to. Everything else gets recycled.

Totally do-able right? How many of you can do it in less steps than that, and if so, spill your secret beans because I would love to know how! I am always up for simplifying life so I have more time for the ones IHeart!

I know it's the moment you all have been waiting for, you have been feeling that excited butterfly feeling in your tum tums since I started this makeover, and I am sure those butterflies have been fluttering harder and harder as I revealed more teasers here, here and here. No? OK, so maybe it's my butterflies I am referring to, but I have to say, I couldn't be more excited that the office is half done! Half you ask?! Yes, half. In future months I will be focusing on craft and hobby spaces, at which time I will revisit my space to add some additional storage for my scrap-booking cart and wrapping paper supplies, since ultimately the space should function as more than just an office space. So until then, I will call the space half complete, which I am definitely feeling pretty good about!

If you recall, I started my planning process here, laying out my vision and shopping list. And the then sitting room, looked a little like this:

We had decided for a couple of reasons, that we wanted to relocate our office back to the little sitting nook off of our bedroom. First, running a daycare, little munchkins tend to want to play with computers, printers, pens and other office supplies, so to ensure safety, they were all removed from the kid accessible area. Also, as you may recall, I have a large dream of starting up a Professional Organizing Business, and this will be the perfect place for me to start creating contracts and spreadsheets, and of course, blog!

So, we moved our desk from here:

to here:

But that wasn't enough for me. I wanted to add storage, color, and additional functionality that we didn't have when it was out in our game room.

So, I started by wallpapering the desktop and the door fronts in a fresh floral pattern:

And then I created some memo boards to hold all sorts of goodies:

And finally, created some labels full of cuteness, for the fronts of some large magazine storage boxes:

Then came Sunday fun day. Mission completion. Time to get all of the goods installed and pull the room together. But let's back up a step shall we? On Friday evening, we were doing some final measurements and looking at everything we were planning to install. My plan was to put a 5 slot bookshelf, horizontally above the desk, to hold the magazine storage boxes. However, we were great about measuring the length to make sure it would fit, but not so great about measuring the depth. That's right, a big, OH NO happened. There is a heating vent in our ceiling, that would be covered up by the shelving unit, if we were to go through with the original plans. So, we created a quick plan B. A simple floating shelf would have to do the trick, to balance the weight of the desk. So, back to our second home, Ikea, one last time, to grab a new shelf. The little measuring mishap cost us thirty smackaroos.

We were glad we discovered that little problema before installation day, since we were able to pick up a shelf ahead of time.

While the hubby hung the new shelf, I started to ponder how I could mat a poster sized collage calendar I had ordered from snapfish.com when they had a big 30% off all calendars sale. I already had the frame in the room, it was a matter of tying the poster into the other changes going on. So, I grabbed some more leftover wallpaper from the desk and bulletin board project, and used it to mat out the poster calendar.

As you can see, I also used some "clips" frames, scrapbook paper and some black and white photos I printed out at home, to create a trio of photos, one of me with each of my sweet little angels.

By now, the shelf was totally installed and next it was time to hang the bulletin board and the magnetic board. The magnet board came with slots cutout on the backside, making it easy to hang, we just anchored it in with some drywall anchors and were good to go. The bulletin board came with nothing for hanging, so we got resourceful and borrowed and hanging kit from an old frame that we no longer used.

I told the hubster, he probably would never make it as a hand or foot model, he was a little tearful, but I think he will be ok.

Placement of the magnet board was easy, because there was only one space on the wall big enough for the board, and so that is how we determined it's new home. The bulletin board would be placed on the opposite side of the wall for some balance.

And in-between the two memo boards, was a bar holding some cups for pencils, markers, etc... using some hooks:

And that was it! We were donzo. As you can see from the pics, we added some more white flowers around the space to keep it girly! And my accent color of pink, is placed all over the room: as matting to my kid's photos, the fronts of the tins, on the bulletin board, in a flower on the desk, on the labels for the magazine boxes and in a vase and frame on the upper shelf.

And something that only you really observant individuals may have noticed, that is a little different on the desk... some new pulls! I love when I find things lingering around the home! I have a bin in the garage for misc. hardware and assembly pieces, and stumbled across two handles! And that's when I gave my hub the infamous eyes and he installed them on the doors, he's a good man!