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Marilyn's Blog
When I was 4 years old my mother taught Home-eck in high school. (I don’t know how to spell it). She was one of those dedicated teachers who worked early and stayed late. I stayed with a woman I called Granny Grover all week and my mom To stop me from running away she told me there was a boogie man who lived in the would come and get me to go home on the weekend.
I wanted to be with my mom even though Granny Grover was someone I liked. I started running away and Granny would have to come and find me walking along the road headed home which was about 15 miles away.
ditch bank who would come out and get me. From then on it kept me from running away.
Do you tell yourself stories that keep you from getting rid of clutter? Do you make up stories such as:
•I can’t get rid of this because I may need this someday.
•I can’t get rid of this because it was a gift.
•I don’t know where to put it.
•My house is too small to organize.
•It will just get cluttered again so why bother.
If you honestly do want to get rid of clutter, get rid of the boogie man stories you tell yourself and clear clutter one tortoise (tiny) step at a time.
I was so excited when I bought my new camera last May. It was just before I went on a trip to Hawaii. It was lighter than my old one and it took great photos the easy way—point and shoot. I didn’t have time to read the instruction book so I just filed it away (this allowed me to get rid of clutter right away!) to read when I got back. It was a great feeling to know exactly where I could find it when I had time to read and practice all the new things it offered.
One of the biggest problems I see as a professional organizer is paper clutter. No matter what room we start working in getting rid of clutter in the office is a biggie. How many hours have you spent of your life searching for an important piece of paper? It is so frustrating!
I have an organizing tip that will help with getting rid of paper clutter:
1.Have a landing place for mail. Use an attractive basket and place it the room where you want to sort your mail or if you know where it goes put it in your file right away, like I did.
Getting rid of clutter in your office can free up your time so you can have less frustration and more time to do what you really want to do. If you had an extra 15 minutes a day what would you do?
Show ‘N Tell Tuesday
BEFORE and AFTER PHOTOS I took a photo last week of my in box and part of my desk—it was AWFUL!!!! I worked hard yesterday getting rid of clutter so I could show you the after.
This is how I got rid of clutter:
•I started at the top and took each paper as it came.
•I took care of what was in my hand without putting it back and saying “later I would take care of it”. This saves so much time! A decision has to be made sometime—why not now?
•I broke it down into several different times to work on it.
I recycled 15 pieces, wrote 2 letters, made 2 phone calls, 3 to shred and 2 important papers went to the car and I delegated 4 items. I also found 8 items to file and paid 3 bills.
What made this easy for me was that I set a goal to do it and I had a deadline (today) so I could show the finished drawer. I thought about just moving the things and taking a picture but that would have been cheating so I didn’t!
Now I will clean out the other two drawers. I already know there are a lot of resource materials I refer to there so it will go faster. This was fun and my office looks 100% better.
Saturday was fun. Thank you to all of you who supported me by coming to my book signing and emailing me good wishes. One friend brought me some chocolate.
I suggest in my book as you are getting rid of clutter in a particular room that you get a treat (my preferred is chocolate) and a drink, (water rather than a margarita), but hey, do what works for you.
Let voice mail or the answering machine pick up messages so you can stay focused. Pick up messages about every 3 hours. This way you will be able to concentrate on getting rid of clutter
and it reduces outside distractions.
Do you have a hard time not picking up the phone when it rings and then forgetting what you were doing?
Comments people said on their first impressions about my book :
•The size is small enough to put in my purse.
•The colors are so bright and vibrant it makes me want to organize.
•Wow! There are some great ideas in here.
Are your recipes organized? Mine were until 3 years ago when my daughter decided to take them apart and make a family recipe book out of them. AHHHH little did we know what a huge chore that would become and what clutter it would create.
I could find any recipe I needed until she took them all apart and created boxes of clutter—the clutter grew and grew. In this photo they had been tamed. (But they were still REALLY bad) It was driving me nuts never to be able to find a recipe I wanted. I so needed to get rid of clutter in the worst way so I could cook my favorite dishes again.
Look at this—from chaos to organization again. She has put all of them in this recipe notebook. There is one notebook for Holidays and one for everyday cooking. I feel like I have gone to heaven.
Are your recipes organized or do you need to get rid of clutter so you can find your favorites?
I was such an easy child for Santa. Every year all I ever asked for was a doll. Santa wrapped all of our gifts except for my doll which was placed at the back of the tree. Just remembering this brings back the feeling of anticipation and excitement to me. That is probably why I found this story about a doll so poignant when I heard it on the radio this year:
Joe and Barbara had taken their daughter and her friend Joy with them Christmas shopping. Joy kept looking at one particular doll in the toy department. Barbara noticed she kept going back to this one doll and look at her and tenderly touch her arms and hair.
After the shopping trip Barbara found out that Joy’s family had already purchased all of her Christmas gifts. They were useful gifts but Barbara kept thinking about the doll and the look on Joy’s face when she held the doll. Their next pay day Barbara and Joe bought the doll and because they were in and out of their friend’s home knew where the family kept their wrapping paper.
Barbara took some of their wrapping paper and wrapped the doll in matching paper and placed it under their tree towards the back so it wouldn’t be obvious.
Joy and her family didn’t know until Christmas morning that the doll the little girl wanted so badly but never asked for was under the tree. As you can imagine the mother tearfully thanked Barbara and her family for their unexpected gift of love.
I hope you are having a clutter free and a very happy holiday season!
Once upon a time in the land of blogs it was confusing as to how to share my ideas with you and others.
I have a great new button for my blog that will allow you to put my button on your site. It will be easier for you to find me and my tips and to share them with others.
Don’t be shy grab my button, not my bottom (right hand side of this page) and paste it onto your site/blog.
Last night we had an adventure in Barns and Noble. I’m signing my book Go Organize! and I’m giving a handy tip on how to best apply this book in your life to keep you ahead of the game.
Due to her Marilyn's organization and specific instructions on “how to keep organized” I have been able to raise my seven children in a comfortable and well organized home.
Ann Harris
Seattle, WA
If you are looking for a professional organizer who is excellent, honest and caring, I highly recommend Marilyn Bohn to get the job done for you.
Julie Penn
Clearfield, UT
"I recently used Marilyn's services after moving into a new home and realizing we really needed to downsize and organize our belongings. It was a huge undertaking and without Marilyn's help, I wouldn't have had the motivation to do it.
I can unreservedly recommend Marilyn Bohn to you for any organization needs you may have."
Clutter control is what you will have once you begin using FreedomFiler, you will never again have to take time out of your life to clean out or reorganize files! Click here to learn more.
PortaVault
Declutter your life:
Organize all your important papers and prevent chaos in emergency situations.
When I was 4 years old my mother taught Home-eck in high school. (I don’t know how to spell it). She was one of those dedicated teachers who worked early and stayed late. I stayed with a woman I called Granny Grover all week and my mom To stop me from running away she told me there was a boogie man who lived in the would come and get me to go home on the weekend.
I was so excited when I bought my new camera last May. It was just before I went on a trip to Hawaii. It was lighter than my old one and it took great photos the easy way—point and shoot. I didn’t have time to read the instruction book so I just filed it away (this allowed me to get rid of clutter right away!) to read when I got back. It was a great feeling to know exactly where I could find it when I had time to read and practice all the new things it offered.
I took a photo last week of my in box and part of my desk—it was AWFUL!!!! I worked hard yesterday getting rid of clutter so I could show you the after. 
?
Saturday was fun. Thank you to all of you who supported me by coming to my book signing and emailing me good wishes. One friend brought me some chocolate.
I could find any recipe I needed until she took them all apart and created boxes of clutter—the clutter grew and grew. In this photo they had been tamed. (But they were still REALLY bad) It was driving me nuts never to be able to find a recipe I wanted. I so needed to get rid of clutter in the worst way so I could cook my favorite dishes again.
Look at this—from chaos to organization again. She has put all of them in this recipe notebook. There is one notebook for Holidays and one for everyday cooking. I feel like I have gone to heaven.
I was such an easy child for Santa. Every year all I ever asked for was a doll. Santa wrapped all of our gifts except for my doll which was placed at the back of the tree. Just remembering this brings back the feeling of anticipation and excitement to me. That is probably why I found this story about a doll so poignant when I heard it on the radio this year:
Once upon a time in the land of blogs it was confusing as to how to share my ideas with you and others.
