Organized? Who me?

I have a tendency to beat myself up about a lot of things. I’m not the tidiest person. I go through fits and starts with tidiness and organization. I’ve recently started reading a new-to-me blog (though she’s been blogging for quite some time) called Organize and Decorate Everything at www.OrganizeYourStuffNow.com and have found some pretty fun decorating ideas and some nice organizational inspiration.


Last Wednesday Leanne announced that she was going to do a link party tying into organizational ideas and posts, etc. Well, this got me thinking. I have recently organized my desk at work, but there isn’t anything special in that…it just looks clean! My house doesn’t look the cleanest…but you know what?!?! I DO have some things that are foundations for keeping our family on track. I have “systems” in place….and that, my friends, is organization!

So, take the shopping/grocery list we (and by we, I mean I) do every week. We typically shop weekly at two stores, so I made a form/list specific for those two stores. If we need something elsewhere, like the hardware or where ever, I add that to the side. The top is the list is our Target list, the bottom is the grocery list and meal plan for the week. I don’t believe I have ever used all the lines I have listed in either the Target or grocery sections!  Eric and I both work outside the home, so we only list dinner plans…except for weekends and vacation days. Otherwise, I take the leftovers for lunch the following day and Eric does sandwiches.  Breakfasts are pretty set for us, too, so I don't list them, either.
Writing both lists and menu plans concurrently with the weekly ads helps keep costs down and at the same time makes sure that we aren’t buying randomly. There is a plan in mind. It stops the questions about what is for dinner each and every night. (And Eric will sometimes catch an ingrediant I forgot to include on the shopping list because he noticed it was needed for a meal.  This isn’t to say that we never have issues with forgetting to take something out of the freezer or a night goes haywire and we end up doing takeout, but it greatly reduces those happenings!

Now I’m thinking about other things that we do that work for us…like laundry.