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Tips to prettify inexpensive flowers

Tsh — Mon, 12 May 2008 04:00:22 +0000

I
love having fresh flowers in the house, and my husband seems to know just the right time to bring them home. But if you’re not cost-savvy, they can cost a fortune.

Sometimes the most eye-popping flower arrangements contain simple, inexpensive flowers and supplies.

Take carnations, a jelly jar, and scrapbook paper, for instance. Yes, another use for scrapbook paper.

Simple flowers, like carnations, work best in all one color.

Eliminate fillers like fern leaves and baby’s breath. Those actually can look quite pretty in their own glass jar.

To make an impact, cut the stems short.

To find the best jar, look at its mouth. Too often, vases and jars are too wide, which makes the flowers too spread out. For the most bang for your buck, flowers look best squished together.

If the label doesn’t remove cleanly off your jar, like mine, cover the remains with pretty ribbon or scrapbook paper. I just wrapped a length of paper around and fastened it with a little piece of scotch tape.

Add whatever else you can think of that would make you smile. A little tag, some twine, or nothing.

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The 2 Key Questions to Ask While Decluttering

Tsh — Fri, 09 May 2008 04:57:35 +0000

In the poll I had in my sidebar last week (I’ve got a new one there, by the way), I was somewhat surprised to learn that most of you find organizing to be the hardest part of your home management. I wasn’t surprised because I think it’s easy, but because you said it was harder than money management, menu planning, cleaning, or juggling parenting in the mix of housekeeping. None of those tasks are easy.

Photo by Molly

“Stuffitis” can clog our clarity, productivity, and peace to the point of exhaustion. It makes organizing our homes so much harder. When we have so much stuff that those items are no longer useful or provide enjoyment because the mere having it causes added stress – it’s time to rethink its purpose in your home.

One of our unexpected benefits of moving to the other side of the world last year was forced downsizing. Because we were limited in how much stuff to bring, we literally questioned every single item we owned. It either went with us, it moved into a very small storage unit (for those items we wanted to keep but not risk a major overseas move – like family keepsakes), or it left our home and went to another (via garage sale or donation).

And when we inventoried our belongings, the two main questions we asked – sometimes unconsciously – were:

1. Is this item useful to us?, and
2. Is this item beautiful to us?

The answers could be quite subjective, but it pointed us to an overall theme in our life and in our home that I hope we now keep lifelong. It’s this simple quote that is now my homekeeping mantra:

“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” -William Morris

Sounds extreme, and in a way, it is. But I like it because it validates the things you do have in your home, and it gives you the freedom to truly enjoy having them pass your threshold. Rather than making that collection of candles on top of your TV cabinet feel pointless, you can enjoy having them there because you’ve made a conscious decision that they were worth being there. They passed the test, in other words.

It helps us that our home isn’t too big. We live in a very urban high-rise condo, which provides about 1,300 square feet of living space. We have one closet, which is actually pretty unusual here, since closets are a rather American concept. Our bedrooms have wardrobes which serve as ample space for all our clothes.

Most families won’t have a major international move to force them to downsize. But I highly encourage you to quickly ask yourself an object’s purpose or beauty in your home the next time you declutter. If it merits neither, then maybe it shouldn’t even belong. Perhaps another family would find a better use for it.

And you might be surprised to learn how little you’ll miss the thing once it’s gone.

2nd photo by karly b

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How Do You Declutter?

Tsh — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:46:21 +0000

There are two schools of thought when it comes to decluttering:

Touch everything only once, and
Declutter in steps, moving piles around until it’s done.

Photo by Camilla Engman

When you touch everything only once, you pick up an item and put it in its rightful place immediately, even if it means going to the other side of the house. Sometimes you can maximize the effectiveness of this method and pick up several items going to the same room, using a basket to take your goods with you. Then you stay in that one room, reshelving everything you brought, and when you’re done, you return to the room you started in and continue on your work.

When you declutter in steps, you essentially make piles. If your dining room table is cleared off, you pile everything together that’s going to your daughter’s room, then the bathroom, and so on and so forth. When all the declutter has been transferred to their appropriate piles, you focus on shrinking the piles until they’re gone. When there are no more piles, your place has been decluttered.

Most home organizing “experts” advocate the Touch Everything Only Once method, but it doesn’t work for me. I get too distracted. If I crate up just a few items for my bedroom, before I know it, I’m perusing the magazine on my nightstand, or I’m organizing the shirts in my wardrobe by sleeve length and color (I’m a bit sick that way – ask my husband or my college roommate). The original room I started in has long been forgotten.

My method is to stay in the messy room and pile its misplaced belongings in one central location, then move on to the next room and add to those original piles. After I’ve gone through the whole house and decluttered, I should have only one big pile for each room. Now all I have to do is empty a pile at a time until it’s gone.

What do you do? Have you even thought about it before? Just wondering if I’m in the minority or the majority here.

I’m off to make some piles.

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6 Habit-Changing Helps for Stay-at-Home Moms

Tsh — Mon, 05 May 2008 22:00:12 +0000

So – those of you focusing on a change of habit this month… how’s it going so far? I personally have been surprised how difficult going to bed at 10:30 is for me.

Photo by gblock

When the kids are finally asleep, it’s so much easier to get stuff done. But the clincher is, my youngest is still not sleeping through the night, and when I’m sleep-deprived, not much gets done at all during the day. I operate on survival mode, and if I do that day after day, I burn out. And that’s not pretty.

Here are a few tips when it comes to changing to a new and better habit while juggling kiddos at home:

1. Don’t halfway it. Pick the most pressing thing in your daily life that needs to change, and be all about it. Commit to it. Assume you will be able to change, and tackle this habit with success as the goal. It might be hard to focus on a new discipline when the house feels like chaos, but focus on God’s applause and work heartily to the best of your ability. And live fully in His grace.

2. Only focus on one habit. Trying to stick to a new bedtime, work out five days a week, learn how to tap dance, volunteer at the local orphanage, and finally go to the Lincoln Memorial at the same time is just too much. Especially when you’ve got regular life to juggle, like carpools and laundry. That’s why we’re doing this thing once a month, one habit at a time. We want it to stick.

3. Get accountability somewhere. Find a fellow mom to call you in the morning if you want to stop sleeping in. Set a timer to go off if you want to go to bed at a certain time (talking to myself here). Even just telling a friend about your new habit gives someone an opportunity to ask you about it later on. Why not blog about it (shock, gasp!)? Then you can have all your kith and kin know about it.

4. Give yourself a little treat. When you discover that – wouldn’t you know it? – you’re staying on top of all your ironing, reward yourself. Spend one of the kids’ nap times sipping coffee and reading a book.

5. Take note of your triggers. Does checking your Google Reader first thing in the morning suck away 30 minutes of time you’d otherwise spend working out? Maybe wait to read your blogs after breakfast. Do you have more energy after dinner than just before bed? Maybe that’s the best time to do the dishes if you’re wanting to have a clean kitchen first thing in the morning.

6. Remember your reasons why. Write down your reasons for wanting to change habits. For me, my reasons are that more sleep would improve my health, would give me more energy throughout the day, would help me be in a better mood for my husband and kids, and would honor God by resting in His promises that He’ll always provide. I’ve got those written down in my notebook to remind me.

Have you discovered anything that’s helping you?

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Personal Finance 101 – Saving for your Kids’ College

Tsh — Mon, 05 May 2008 01:00:43 +0000

This is the sixth part in my series on Dave Ramsey’s Baby Steps, a proven personal financial plan. My goal is to explain a really solid money management plan in plain ol’ English, for intelligent yet financially “average” home managers.

Photo by arnoldo

O
nce you start funding 15% of your income towards retirement, and once you’ve fully funded your Emergency Fund (and any other big purchases you’re saving for – like a Car Replacement Fund), it’s time to start funding your kids’ future education.

This does not mean you can now afford to save up for the most expensive private school out there, nor does it mean your chid doesn’t need to contribute personally towards his future. But it does mean you are financially free enough to provide at least some towards a college education – at least a start towards entering university life debt-free (and hopefully staying that way).

Here are the nuts and bolts of Baby Step #5 in Dave Ramsey’s plan – put money towards your children’s college fund.

Dave’s Rules for College

These are pretty straightforward:

1. Pay cash. The average college student today graduates with about $15,000 in student loan debt after spending 3-4 years in an apartment. What a heavy weight strapped to a graduate’s shoulders fresh out in the job market! If you’re able to help your child avoid that burden, then do so.

2. And If you have the cash or the scholarship, go. As in, to college.

Student loans are so normal these days; there’s a prevailing myth that you can’t possibly go to a university without them. But they’re just not worth it. Even with the low interest rate most federal student loans have, you just never know what the future holds. I know I’d hate to corner my kids into having to pay for their education after they’ve received it. What if they’re offered some really great opportunity after graduation that pays very little (or not at all), yet is invaluable to their career or overall well-being? What if they want to settle down and become a wife and mom right away? These things would be so much harder to do with student loan debt.

Dave says this:

“If you’ve planned your savings goals and don’t have much room in the budget for college, don’t panic. Knowledge is just part of the formula to success. With what you are able to save, those precious kids can probably get a good degree if they will suffer through lifestyle adjustments and get a job while in school. Work is good for them.”

I wholeheartedly agree. I worked part-time all through college, and while I hated it at the time, I can look back and see the enormous life and business lessons I learned from those long shifts waiting tables. These life lessons are just as much a gift as the money you contribute to your kiddo’s education. Consider giving them that valuable experience.

Photo by s2photo

Where to Save the Money

Dave recommends putting college tuition funds in either an Educational Savings Account (ESA) or a 529, which are state plans and therefore different depending on your state of residence. College tuition goes up faster than regular inflation – 7 percent for college versus 4 percent for most everything else. This means that in order to keep up with tuition rates, you’ll need to earn at least 7 percent per year to keep up with the tuition increases.

With an ESA funded in a growth-stock mutual fund, your money will grow tax-free when it’s used for higher education. You can currently invest $2,000 per year, per child in an ESA (if you make under $200K a year) – and if that ESA averages 12 percent, you’ll have $126,000 in tax-free education funds by the time they’re ready for college.

If you make more than $200,000, or for some reason you want to contribute more than $2,000 a year (possibly the case if your kids are older than 8), then 529s are for you. There are lots of different 529 types out there, but Dave only recommends a “flexible” plan. He says you could pick from virtually any mutual fund in the American Funds Group or Vanguard or Fidelity and probably be okay.

Application Time

How this applies to you depends on your circumstances.

• If you don’t have kids, it doesn’t apply to you at all because you can’t open ESAs or 529s for people who don’t exist. But seeing as this is Simple Mom, I’m guessing most of my readers are parents.

• If you you’re not debt-free (Baby Step #2), you don’t have three to six month’s of expenses in savings (Baby Step #3), and you haven’t started contributing towards your retirement (Baby Step #4), then you’re not ready to start saving for your kids’ college. Under Dave Ramsey’s plan, you’d hold off contributing to your kids’ college fund until you completed the previous Baby Steps.

This makes sense – why would you save for your kids’ education and not your retirement? In doing so, you’re strapping your kids down with having to take care of their parents down the road. I’d rather not do that and have them work for part of their college funding.

• If you are at the stage of saving for your kids’ college, then Dave recommends sticking to mutual funds through an ESA or 529. And do what you can afford without feeling guilty if you can’t fully fund their education. That’s never been part of the definition of a good parent.

Photo by snowdeal

Our Personal Plan

As of now, our plan when we’re at Baby Step #5 is to provide a “matching promise” for our kids – we’ll match whatever they’re able to save, up to what an ESA allows at the time. And if they don’t have enough saved by the time they’re ready for college, we will highly encourage them to not take out student loans. They’re just not worth it.

I’ll end with another quote from Dave:

“Regardless of how you save for college, do it. Saving for college ensures that a legacy of debt is not passed down your family tree. Sadly, most people graduating from college right now are deeply in debt before they start. If you start early or save aggressively, your child will not be one of them”

Missed other parts of my series?

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Home Management Notebooks are a great idea.

Tsh — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 07:00:13 +0000

Home Management Notebooks absolutely work for me.

Here’s are quick links to my Home Management Notebook series:

Having a Home Management Notebook is good.
Identity and target your Most Important Tasks.
Consider using a Daily Docket.
Use a Weekly Checklist as your main reference point.
Brainstorm ideas for what else you might need in your Notebook.

I hope you found this series useful. Using a Home Management Notebook isn’t a new idea – chances are, many of you already use one. But if this is new to you and trying one is uncharted territory, here are a few pointers:

• The point of a notebook is to have all your management tools in one place. Include what you need, leave out what you don’t.

• Do what works for you. If you prefer to scribble in pencil on a Moleskine Notebook, then by all means, do that! You could even have it all online using your favorite tools in one location. I’ve thought about doing that myself, but I just can’t handcuff myself to the laptop – I share it with my hubby, and I’m up and around too much during the day. Maybe one day, though.

• It helps me if my notebook looks pretty – know I use it more when I like to look at it. I use scrapbook paper, magazine clippings, and whatever else strikes my fancy to personalize my baby and make it mine.

• If it doesn’t work at first, don’t throw in the towel! Give it more time, or change it up, or take a short break and think about what might work better for you. We all manage our households differently – the point is to do it well, simply, and stress-free.

~~As promised, here is a FREE PDF download of my Daily Docket and Weekly Checklist.~~ Update: All the downloads can be found on the downloads page. I’ve made them a bit more generic, so maybe you’ll find them useful. In fact, I’ve included two Daily Dockets – one is identical to the one I use; the other has two areas with blank titles for you to fill in, in case mine aren’t something you need. You’ll see what I mean when you download it.

And finally, here’s a little more inspiration juice to get you going on a notebook that works for you:

Here’s a basic list of more ideas on what to include.
Organized Home has a few downloads you might like.
DIY Planner has some good ideas using the Getting Things Done system.
And my favorite… a beautiful visual homemaking journal, courtesy of Ann at Holy Experience (follow other links for inspiration!)

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The Rest of My Home Management Notebook

Tsh — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 15:02:18 +0000

Photo by esotericsean

So far, I’ve discussed my Daily Docket and my Weekly Checklist as the essential components of my Home Management Notebook. I use the Checklist as my reference for my Docket – my general goal is to complete everything on the Checklist every week. Rarely does this happen, but having a master list as a visual reminder really helps.

So what else do I have in my Notebook?

• Calendar – I use Google Calendar for my personal daytimer, and I usually just refer to it online to keep track of my appointments. I especially like that I can have it remind me of events via email or pop up – very handy when you’re writing emails and you’ve lost track of time. But I also print the calendar several months at a time to keep handy when I’m not near my laptop and I want to jot something on the schedule. I also menu plan monthly, and I enter this online when I plan (99% of my recipes come from the internet). When I print the calendar, I have a month’s worth of my dinner plans easily accessible in my Notebook.

• Grocery List – I’ve written up my master grocery list in Excel, and it’s a lifesaver. How often do you forget what you need to stock up on? For me, it’s all the time – so having my usual purchases already written out really helps trigger my memory. I normally have a print-out hanging in the kitchen, so that anybody can mark what we need, but I keep several copies handy in my Notebook. And I make sure I have several blank pages of paper in this section for me to jot down menu and food ideas.

• Budget – I write a monthly budget a la Dave Ramsey, and I also print out a copy of this and keep it handy in my Notebook. I use Pear Budget for now, which has a $3 monthly service fee, but there are lots of good budgeting resources out there. More on that soon. I also write out current financial goals we have and where we stand on reaching them, and any other financial information that might prove relevant that month (bank statements, important receipts, etc.). My husband has a lot of work reimbursements for his job, and I also keep track of this here. I have a little plastic envelope where I keep all the current month’s receipts.

• Master Project List – My brain is flooded with little ideas throughout the day, and if I don’t write them down within a few minutes, they leave and don’t return. I have a few sheets of paper to jot down anything that comes to mind that I want to work on – make slipcovers for the pillows, fix the bathroom towel bar, order such-and-such book on Amazon. Having this blank space adds a nice combination of order and stream-of-consciousness to my thought process. I can doodle or outline, and this really helps me.

• Blogging Ideas – Similar to above, I keep paper handy for jotting down blog post ideas. If I don’t, they’re gone, and frustration inevitably ensues! I’ve lately used the process of mind mapping to come up with ideas, and it truly works. Right now I have 79 post ideas for this blog alone!

• Babysitter’s Guide – Our kids are pretty easy, but we want to keep current information handy when someone comes to watch our kids. We list our cell phone numbers, bedtime routines, what’s off limits, and what to do in case of basic emergencies (like where we keep our bandaids). We even have instructions on how to turn on our TV and DVD player!

• Kid Stuff – I jot down ideas or websites that come in handy for anything regarding my children. If I find an article online that’s so helpful, I’ll print it out and keep it here. I’m currently working on creating some basic letter writing curriculum for my three-year-old, and I keep any good resources I find in this section.

• Gift Ideas – When my parents ask me what I want for my birthday, nine times out of ten I can’t think of anything at the moment. In this section, I jot down any gift ideas I have for our family, along with good gift ideas for us to give to others.

• Language Lesson Notes – I keep my current language lesson handy here so that I can easily study when I’m nursing the baby. For those of you who aren’t currently learning a second language – if you have any other work-at-home responsibilities, or if you’re involved in some sort of adult education, you can keep that info handy here as well.

• Personal Stuff – This is where I write down my Scripture memory notes, other Bible study info, motivating quotes I come across, prayer requests, and anything else related to me and my relationships. I also write down my personal goals and habits I want to change – it helps me to see them in writing.

Maybe these ideas will trigger some of your own. What are you constantly looking for throughout your day? Would it help you to have it in a master notebook, so that it’s quickly at your fingertips? I think the trick is to have your notebook complete enough for it to be useful, but not so crammed full or overcomplicated that it’s demotivating to use.

You want this to be a valuable tool for home management. Make it so it works for you! Don’t become enslaved by it. Enjoy having one.

• Next up in Home Management Notebooks: Concluding thoughts, downloadable files, resources for further motivation, and ideas to spark your interest!
Photo by gamookie

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Weekly Home Management, all at a glance

Tsh — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 09:00:44 +0000

To use my Daily Docket, I refer to my Weekly Checklist. It provides me with a master plan of what I usually need to get done in a typical week.

Photo by Buddy Stone

Here’s a thumbnail of my list (click to enlarge it):

I know it seems a bit intense, but it really works for me. It helps to not have to remember “on the fly” what needs cleaning – I can just check my master list. And it keeps me accountable for those weekly tasks that I too easily slide under the rug.

Unlike my Daily Docket, I just have one master checklist printed, and I keep it in a clear sleeve in my Home Management Notebook. Under the “other” category, I pencil in items as I remember them, and if I seem to refer to it often enough, it warrants my adding it permanently to the list.

I’d be happy to offer this as a free PDF, but it’s pretty customized to my lifestyle, which has a few quirks (cross-cultural, urban living). I could make a generic checklist of tasks familiar to most households, and include a lot of blank lines for personalization.

Or – you can just make one yourself. This isn’t a revolutionary idea, but it’s super helpful for me. It’s one more thing I include in my notebook!

• Next up in Home Management Notebooks: budgets and menus and calendars, oh my!

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My Daily Docket is My Daily Lifesaver

Tsh — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 12:44:23 +0000

My Daily Docket is a personalized form I made to help me manage my day at home. It’s my most often-used form in my home management notebook, and it really works for me.

There’s a lot of info on the internet about scheduling your day as a stay-at-home mom, and I’ve tried to apply a lot of these different tactics. They never worked for me. They were too rigid — a system would encourage me to write out a specific timetable for my day, and rotate weekly jobs set in stone on different days of the week. By writing this schedule out and hanging it visibly, I’d know what to do next.

It’s a great idea, but my life’s a lot more… unpredictable. When I tried to make Thursdays my Laundry Day, or One-On-One Time With My Daughter at 11 o’clock Monday through Friday, I was trapped.

I was trapped because life happened — one week I’d have an abnormally large amount of laundry, so by trying to do it all in one day, I set myself up for failure because I just couldn’t do it all. Time with my daughter would get pushed back because we really needed to run errands at 11 a.m., or she needed an earlier nap and 11 just wouldn’t do.

I wanted to throw any semblance of routine out the window. But I really didn’t want to do that, because a routine helps me. I love checking things off a list. I’m visual, so it helps to see my day’s plan.

What has evolved as my Daily Docket is a marriage of scheduled routine and flexibility. It provides the skeleton for me to hang my agenda, but it allows for wiggle room because I fill out a new sheet each day.

Instead of a set routine for Mondays, I fill out a fresh sheet for that very day, using a Weekly Checklist as my resource (also found on the downloads page). My week’s goal is to get everything done I need to do by that week, but I’m flexible as to when specifically I should do it..

Let me show you how this works.

The night before, I take one of these and fill it out for the next day. It helps if I fill it out in pencil because things are so unpredictable in our home that I have to be flexible.

The smaller categories on the page are as follows:

My MITs – The three most important things on my agenda today.
Current Scripture I’m working on memorizing/meditating over.
What’s for Dinner? – When I write it down, I remember way in advance what the dinner plans are, and what I need to do in advance for preparation, so I’m not scrambling at 5:45.
Health stuff – I’m trying to log my water and my food choices, so I like checking off that I’ve done that. And by writing down my work out plans, I’m more apt to do it.
Blog and/or Graphic Design stuff – To-do items for my blogs and my graphic design business.

The bigger items are my day’s to-do list and my day’s general plan.

Photo by Jessica F.

My to-do list: it’s short.

I limit myself to 10 things, because I know I realistically can’t get more than that checked off. I’ve actually almost never gotten all 10 accomplished in one day. By keeping it short, I’m making success – finishing my list – more of a reality. If I remember additional things throughout the day, I jot them down in my notes section, possibly for tomorrow’s list. I like Jamie’s idea of sticking with six items.

My day’s general plan: it’s general.

General is the key word here. The Docket looks a lot more structured than it is, but I don’t write out every last thing I have to do that day. I only assign a time and slot to those things I want to get done at a time of day. I want to get computer work during my kid’s nap time, so I remind myself that it’s a 2 o’clock job. I want to get breakfast on the table by 8, so I make a note of that. And most importantly for me, I want to get to bed by 10:30. Seeing it on paper reminds me that it’s important.

Here’s an example of what a Daily Docket looks like filled out (click to enlarge it):

Application Time

Feel free to download this Daily Docket (or the smaller one) for free. But you don’t have to use this — use what works for you. The point is to have a plan for your day, and to approach it proactively.

Whatever you use, keep it simple, easy-to-read, very easily accessible throughout your day, and thorough enough to manage your whole day on one sheet.

What do you use to get you focused on the day? If you use the Docket, do you have any suggestions or feedback? I know several of you have asked for an even smaller one than the Pocket Docket… I might get to that. Someday.

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4 Simple Ideas to Help you Clean a Messy House

Tsh — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:39:53 +0000

Our house is a disaster. There, I said it. We had company for almost a month, and my mother-in-law was such a help to me, I hardly did anything. Now I’m paying the price.

I most definitely prefer a regular habit of basic upkeep so that the home doesn’t get to the point of unrecognition (yes, I just made up that word). But it has, so I’ve called upon the troops and have declared a War on Mess.

Photo by Torri 479

Today and tomorrow, we will be overhauling the house, with the hopes that I can get some serious organizing done this weekend. We have guests coming over for dinner Friday night, so the goal is to have everything clean by then.

Lesson #1 – Have a very tangible, rapidly-approaching-yet-doable goal for your cleaning. Inviting friends over for dinner is a great one.

Staying true to my word, I’m not going to bite off more than I can chew and plan on doing more than I can. Today will be mostly damage repair, while tomorrow will be the actual cleaning (dusting, vacuuming, and the like).

Lesson #2 – Divide your cleaning goals into manageable chunks. That way, you can “check off” decluttering one day, then move on to scrubbing and dusting. You’ll feel more accomplished.

I also know my body ebbs and flows with energy highs and lows, so I’m going to tackle the tough stuff in the morning (my energy high) and the easy stuff in the afternoon (my energy low). I’m also going to take frequent breaks so that I don’t burn out. I’ll set a timer for 30 minutes of cleaning, 10 minutes of rest.

Lesson #3 – Know yourself and clean with your body’s rhythms, not against it.

Since we’re all involved in this, we’re going to make it fun. We’re talking a lot, we’re listening to music, and we’re still being silly as we work (tickle attacks, funny voice impressions… you know the drill). We’ll get discouraged, bored, and possibly bitter if we don’t.

Lesson #4 – Do what you need to stay in a good mood. Be cheerful. You are blessed to have a home to clean!

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4 Simple Ideas to Help you Clean a Messy House is a post from Simple Mom

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