Marilyn Bohn | Creative Organizer

A friend was talking about her precious memories of music in her life and shared a story of her father who had a beautiful tenor voice and every morning very early could be heard singing throughout the house or when he was outside all the neighbors could hear him because of his big booming voice. Years later when he was in a nursing home and she would walk in to the building she knew it was a good day if she could hear him singing and not so good a day if she didn’t hear him singing.

Because I organize homes, give home organizing tips, and organize home offices I asked myself the question do I have any precious memories of organizing.

The first thought that came to mind was a compliment I received from my daughter when she was twelve years old. We had gone to a relative’s for Thanksgiving dinner. The table we sat at for dinner was covered with junk and 30 minutes after the planned time to eat she just swept the stuff off and threw handfuls of silverware into the center of the table. As a family we decided that was the last year we would go to their home for this important dinner as we all felt unwelcome and disappointed in the way we were treated.
After dinner the children went off to play games and they couldn’t find games to play. That is to say, the games in the house were scattered, game pieces were missing and when they decided to make up a game involving paper and pencils the children who lived there couldn’t find pencils. When they asked their mom where the pencils were she couldn’t come up with an answer. She did start throwing out suggestions, but the children still couldn’t find any. They then decided to create crafts, but that involved using scissors which also couldn’t be found.
When we left their home my then eleven year old daughter thanked me for keeping our home organized, for caring enough about them to have places for pencils, games, and teaching her and her sisters how to keep their rooms organized.
Years later my daughter called me from college just to tell me thank you for having our home organized and for teaching her how to organize. She had so many roommates who were ‘slobs’ and it really bothered her and made her appreciate me and organization all the more.
It takes time and effort, sometimes frustration, trial and error, creativity, and determination to have a home organized and to teach children to organize. But when your children report back years later and thank you, it is worth all the bother it seemed to be at the time. This is what creates Precious Organizing Memories.

What are your Precious Organizing Memories?