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Catfat
| Thursday, January 08, 2004 - 2:25 pm
Are you wearing a pedometer or something to measure the number of steps you take?
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Lkunkel
| Thursday, January 08, 2004 - 4:23 pm
Cat: Yup, I am. Oh happy day!!!! I met with a Pro Organizer today. I'm spending two hours with her on Sunday to try to knock out the majority of the boxes. At $50.00/hour, I want to get a LOT done. I do need to get more manila files, since that's how she rough sorts papers, but that's fine. I just want to get this crap out of here!
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Lkunkel
| Thursday, January 08, 2004 - 4:58 pm
Sorry about the back-to-back posts, but I wanted to put in my plan for the weekend so I didn't lose it in my boxes! 01/08 Evening: Clean up the flat surfaces in the living room 01/09 Morning: Clean up craft area 01/09 Afternoon: Planting 01/09 Evening: Rough sort boxes into paper vs 3D. 01/10 Morning: Patio 01/10 Afternoon: 3D Object Clean-up 01/10 Evening: Boxes on own 01/11 Morning: Boxes on own 01/11 Afternoon: Pro Organizer comes 01/11 Evening: Relaxation treatment
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Kappy
| Thursday, January 08, 2004 - 6:15 pm
Speaking of 10,000 steps ~ I started jury duty today and grabbed my pedometer ($15 at Kaiser) at the last minute. Am I glad! We had so many breaks while waiting to be called to courtrooms. It's the first time I've easily hit 10,000 because I headed outside whenever it wasn't raining and circled the courthouse! Then I sat in the juror's lounge and planned what spots I most needed to clear out next in my house. Cat ~ Sounds like you're accomplishing more then you realize. I too got really bogged down and extremely irritated with DS for not cleaning up after himself and then down on myself in the process. But I figure even if I only change my own habits with all of this, then it will still all be good! By the way, does hauling out dead branches and tree trunks out of the yard and to the curb count as lbs. for this challenge? Or is it strictly from "inside" the house? I can actually walk around to the side of my house again, lol.
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Kappy
| Thursday, January 08, 2004 - 6:15 pm
LK ~ Glad to hear she called back and good luck on Sunday!
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Lkunkel
| Thursday, January 08, 2004 - 6:18 pm
Kappy: House, car, property, schoolroom, locker, office--anywhere you consider your domain! Congrats on the steps--and for participating in jury duty!
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Sherrie
| Friday, January 09, 2004 - 8:22 am
Laurie - I hope this time the Pro Organizer shows up and helps this time. They say three's a charm, right? My fingers are crossed for you! Cat - Laurie is right. I have put on about 30 pounds over the past few years (my sister hung one of her wedding photo's recently and I can not get over the difference 6 years has made!!!). So I have started by committing too 10,000 steps a day and am hoping that will lead to the desire to do more. Okay, I have decluttered every area (that I know of at this time - there seems to be surprise areas that pop up every so often) and am about to tackle my one closet. I am dreading this!!! I have not touched any of the shelves in at least 5 years. I am going to take it 15 minutes at a time but send help if you do not hear from me soon! 
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Tabbyking
| Friday, January 09, 2004 - 10:17 am
how far is 10,000 steps? if i do 2 miles on my treadmill, in addition to my just walking around, i should have that much, right? please say "yes"
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Lkunkel
| Friday, January 09, 2004 - 1:57 pm
Sherrie: Are you there???? Are you okay? Did the closet eat you??? Please check in!!!! Tabby: I can't say that because I don't know how long your stride is. First you have to determine your stride. Then you have to count your steps (I let my pedometer do the counting!). Then you can do the math:- Multiply the number of steps by the stride length. The answer will be the number of feet you walked.
- To convert to miles, divide the number of feet by 5,280. (1 mile = 5,280 feet)
I like my pedometer, because it tells me how far I walked and calories burned.
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Lkunkel
| Friday, January 09, 2004 - 2:02 pm
FLYLADY: Zone 2: Mission #5 Friday by Kelly All week I have sent you into the fridge, the pantry, under the sink.....so what is left? Ahhhhhh the FREEZER! Grab a bag and toss those open boxes, the empty ice cream containers, the old whipped toppings, and the unidentifiable items that are covered in freezer burn. No guilt allowed here, you are to toss the items that you know you do not need nor will you use!! Be proud of yourselves this week, we have decluttered our kitchens one mission at a time!! PS Yes, yes, yes even frozen food items can be weighed and posted for our Super Fling Boogie!! Don't forget to send Cindy your weird items from the Freezer!!! Cindy with "Weird Freezer" in the subject line.
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Catfat
| Friday, January 09, 2004 - 7:11 pm
This is cut-and-pasted from FlyLady's email, which I received this afternoon. I know some of you don't subscribe to the email list, so I though I would post it here. Maybe we need to discuss guilt, what our messiness has done to our families and do we need to apologize and ask forgiveness from them? "Dear FlyLady- This is the ugliest e-mail I've ever sent. It's ugly because I'm telling you what I haven't admitted to anyone else, and I don't like the way it makes me feel. My throat is closing up, and I'm crying. I don't want you to know how I failed my family. I haven't been a good steward of the blessings God has given me. God has forgiven me. I'm working on forgiving myself. When I joined you last year, the unspoken motto in our house was "When mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy!" There was a lot of "mama ain't happy." I could always put on a happy face for friends at church, but my DH and precious kids bore the brunt of my depression and irritation. It never occurred to me that the state of our home was polluting our family. My house was a wreck, I didn't know where to start, it wasn't going to be perfect, and the guilt about not being a perfect "stay at home mom" was overwhelming! The clutter was so loud! Does that make any sense? I let Guilt keep me pinned to the couch in my pajamas for days at a time grouching at my DH and kids. When I couldn't stand it anymore (about twice a year) I would have major crisis cleaning sessions and fall back into old messy habits quickly. For a while I even looked for excuses to stay away from home. We went to Wal-mart a lot! While I was there, I'd buy more stuff! You keep giving me permission to throw away what doesn't make me happy. I'm finally taking you up on it ,and I'm flinging! I 'm taking the guilt out with the garbage. This year I'm LIMITing the guilt I feel when things don't go as perfectly as I would like because "I'm not behind!" I'm letting go of the guilt I feel about failing my family by not caring for our home. IT'S HARD! But I won't let it drag me down again. Guilt has been an uninvited guest in our home for a long time, and I'm packing it's cluttered bags and kicking it out! Since joining last year, I've been reclaiming my life, my family, my health, and our house 15 minutes at a time. Believe when I say I've looked for happiness everywhere! Surprise! It was in me the whole time, that bright beautiful light God put in me. I just had to get rid of the clutter to find it again. Our house really is a comfortable home now and where my heart finally is. My family is so happy, peaceful, helpful, and loving. It's like I'm meeting them again, and I REALLY LIKE THEM A LOT! LOL In my blessed home I hear a voice, the voice of a friend I haven't met, that says, "You are not behind! I don't want you to try to catch up; I just want you to jump in where we are. O.K.?" Marla, You are an angel on earth. Your words are so comforting, encouraging, and gentle to my achy conscience. Thank you! XXXOOO Bless your heart! Flybaby C PS-I quit my payroll job 10 years ago when we had our first child. I was a great payroll SHE. At my payroll job, I had a desk, a phone, a calendar, a place for all my supplies, a "control journal" for my position as purchasing manager. I used all of these tools very efficiently and loved it! It never occurred to me until I joined you last year that I needed those same tools to run my home. Talk about your God breeze....."
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Lkunkel
| Friday, January 09, 2004 - 7:34 pm
Okay, so much for the plans of mice, men, and women. The original plan, as you may recall, was this: 01/08 Evening: Clean up the flat surfaces in the living room DONE 01/09 Morning: Clean up craft area Went to hospital w/ friend, then to nursery 01/09 Afternoon: Planting* 01/09 Evening: Rough sort boxes into paper vs 3D.* 01/10 Morning: Patio 01/10 Afternoon: 3D Object Clean-up 01/10 Evening: Boxes on own 01/11 Morning: Boxes on own 01/11 Afternoon: Pro Organizer comes 01/11 Evening: Relaxation treatment The professional organizer called at 3:XX and said: "How about I come today instead of Sunday?" Well, what the heck? I didn't have the folders she had wanted, but, I was only going to do the planting. That was put on hold, when I realized it would make a lot more sense to do the planting when I had daylight enough to walk to Walmart to get small, manageable bags of soil, rather than the large back from the nursery that I couldn't handle. So, she came over and we ripped through 12 boxes of 3D items and paper. It's a start, and I can see a lot of progress. I had forgotten that tomorrow I have to go to the University with DH for his class, but I do think that I am making progress around here. I feel re-energized and know that I can finish this up by the 16th. *Not done, but I see it getting completed tomorrow.
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Catfat
| Friday, January 09, 2004 - 8:18 pm
Way to go, LK!
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Lkunkel
| Saturday, January 10, 2004 - 4:38 pm
Thanks. On a bright spot: it is good that it worked out that way. DH will be home tomorrow all day, and this way I was able to make a big impact on him, as well as re-energize myself in going through this stuff.
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Catfat
| Saturday, January 10, 2004 - 10:56 pm
Today I sat out in my studio (I am a professional artist) and made the same kind of control journal for my studio and workspace. All my paints and materials are always in impecable order, I just have trouble with the extra stuff, like magazines, old rags, empty cracker boxes and lots of still-life subject matter which I probably will never use. It is professionally important for me to get this space in order so that I can have clients come in and I won't have to pay 45% to a gallery just for handling my work. Baby steps.
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Lkunkel
| Sunday, January 11, 2004 - 1:45 pm
Cat: Good for you! I am trying to figure out how to organize all of my graphic images. Right now, they're all over--which is part of the problem of altered books as an art form as I do it: it has similar components to scrapbooking and decoupaging. But, I will figure it out. Back to work...
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Catfat
| Sunday, January 11, 2004 - 6:16 pm
LK--I have a friend who talks about making 'altered books', but I can't remember what she does. Can you tell me about what you do? And as far as all those magazine clippings, I have three bankers boxes full of files of reference material, which are light enough to carry around with me. I still call it my 'morgue' from back when I was doing newspaper writing.
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Lkunkel
| Sunday, January 11, 2004 - 6:42 pm
An altered book is an existing book that has been changed or altered .... "glued, painted, collaged, rubber stamped, cut, torn, or added to. It is an expression of one's self, a piece of art, an experiment or a conversation piece." It's amazing what I use in my altered books. I also do altered composition books. That uses even more images, beads, buttons, and "stuff" I think I am going to get some of the plastic paper organizers for my images. I use the sturdy 26ish slots for my standard paper and cardstock. It's handy having the paper and cardstock together by color. So, I'm going to plan on setting aside an hour a day (while watching TV) to categorize pictures/quotes/etc.
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Catfat
| Monday, January 12, 2004 - 4:00 pm
That sounds great, LK. I love collage and assemblage anyway, maybe I'll assemble some stuff in a book. Yippee, a new medium to experiment wit.
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Catfat
| Monday, January 12, 2004 - 4:06 pm
Help, stop me, stop me!!! I just went to the Goodwill store to drop off a few things and decided to take a spin through the store. Came home with 2 baskets (already have dozens), a book on Rembrandt (duplicate to one I already have), a giant all-blue teddy bear, a dress that doesn't fit but I like the fabric, and 13 lacy straw place mats which I can use in my new altered book. Oh, and a blueberry scone the soccer team was selling outside the store. At least I can make that disappear.
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Lkunkel
| Monday, January 12, 2004 - 5:44 pm
Oh Cat! That's why I have the donation recipients pick up! Remember the in-and-out rule, tho: for everything that comes in, other things have to leave--so say good bye to two more baskets, one of the Rembrandt books, etc. If you're interested in more information on Altered Books, check out the files on the Yahoo!Groups Altered Books forum.
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Dipo
| Monday, January 12, 2004 - 5:44 pm
LK: I know you have done tons of research, before I do my own, have you researched shredding companies?? I have everything set up to shred small amounts and I know you can set up for a monthly service, but wondered if there is a one time pick up for shredding service. Thought I would ask before starting my internet search. I have realized that not only am I saving all the documents for my taxes for seven years, but somehow I decided I needed to keep the other stuff ( not used for the taxes) from that same year. For some reason it just clicked for me this year that I don't need that stuff!!!! It is on the shelf in my closet. Needless to say I have several years info to get rid of. Have been good about only keeping 7 years for taxes but forgot about this other stuff.
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Lkunkel
| Monday, January 12, 2004 - 5:51 pm
Dipo: The place I'm going to use does one time pick-ups and charges $5.00/Banker's Box. (At least, that was the charge when I checked last year.) Unfortunately, you will have to let your fingers do the walking and check out your local companies. Things to look for: Pick-up, Certification of Destruction, No minimum shredding amount.
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Sherrie
| Monday, January 12, 2004 - 7:28 pm
Hi - I am back (guess I should have told everyone I was going to my sisters for the weekend - sorry). I FINISHED THE CLOSET!!! I still can't believe the stuff I thought was worth saving...the good news is the spiders were not as bad as I feared. As always, when you think you are done you find more. I found 4 huge storage containers in my laundry area. ALL filed with random pieces of paper. Looks like I will be busy for a while. Laurie - I AM SO HAPPY FOR YOU!!! I know you have been struggling for a while with your boxes. Now that you have your night stand what are you going to reward yourself with? Tabby - I think 2 miles on the treadmill should count for 10,000 steps!!! And CONGRATULATIONS to everyone who has been sticking with this! It is great to have a place to go to with people who understand!!!
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Lkunkel
| Tuesday, January 13, 2004 - 10:00 am
Sherrie: I am so glad you checked in! I was getting a little nervous...well, a LOT nervous. Congratulations on the closet--you can join me on the paper sort! I haven't figured out my tangible reward yet for when I finish...maybe the house being cleaned professionally, since the carpet will be cleaned free by the apartment complex.
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