The Great Organization
I've been thinking about what to call this endeavour (because everything has to have a spectacular name in my head) and I realised that it's all just further branches of the Great Organization that I began last summer with moving the books and getting rid of clothes I no longer wear.
So -- The Great Organization
In my head, the Great Organization comprises three parts. They are house, finances, and health. There are subparts of those parts, but for now, the big bits will do.
House
We work, live, play, store inventory, and do just about everything in our house, so often, it's not fit for company. Before we left for Gulf Wars, I cleaned up my office and Bob cleaned up his so now things are easier to find and a lot of junk we forgot we had was removed.
The guest bedroom is filled to the ceiling with books at the moment, but I would like to repair the ice-dam damage to the walls and paint it a bright colour, like my favourite green. The damage may require a professional plasterer since it's not drywall in there. But none of this can happen while the books are stacked to the ceiling.
Obviously, the books need to be catalogued and shelved. One begs the question "Where?" but this is something we need to resolve. Books we don't want need to be listed on Amazon or eBay.
We need to do a purge of the clothing we're not wearing. There's still some left from my purge last summer, and of course I didn't purge any of Bob's clothes (because I'm not that kind of wife).
I'd like to start doing little improvement projects around the house: painting, refinishing the floors, snazzing up the house's exterior. Honestly, our biggest stumbling block is our garden/lawn. We are both horrible at keeping after weeds and, here in the fertile Delaware Valley, if you stand still too long, something will grow on you! I'm wondering how much a gardener would cost to come and periodically keep after it. I don't like to spend money on things I could do myself, but we've lived here for seven years and we've never kept up with the weeds.
Finances
For the past two years, I've been helping out a friend and she's been helping me out. She cleans my house once a week and I give her some money. Well, a little more than a month ago, she got a full-time job and can no longer come to clean my house. So I have that money back in my budget. I'm going to use it to pay down my mortgage because that's my biggest bill. And checking online mortgage calculators, paying this extra little bit on the mortgage every month will make a TON of a difference in interest.
I've also been very self-indulgent. Bob and I go out to breakfast at a friend's coffee shop almost everyday. The food is very cheap and the coffee is amazing and we're helping a friend's business. But it's just too easy to order pancakes or cinnamon rolls. And if we want to eat healthfully (which we both do), we're going to have to start eating at home more often. So we're only going to go out on special occasions and put the money we would have spent towards our second mortgage. If I'm really, really diligent, I can pay this baby off by March 2014.
Health
This is both body and mind. Body-wise, I want to lose enough weight and get in good enough shape that my feet stop hurting, I can walk more easily, and I'm not out of breath when I haven't done much. Mind-wise... I really need to take time to meditate. There's this time of evening when Bob is downstairs with the dogs and it's very quiet up here. I should spend ten minutes meditating every night.
I'm sure there will be more. I'd like to work out some bullet points so I can cross them off. I like lists.
And now I must go. Mellie jumped up in bed for a snuggle and threw up on my bed. So I'm for coffee.
So -- The Great Organization
In my head, the Great Organization comprises three parts. They are house, finances, and health. There are subparts of those parts, but for now, the big bits will do.
House
We work, live, play, store inventory, and do just about everything in our house, so often, it's not fit for company. Before we left for Gulf Wars, I cleaned up my office and Bob cleaned up his so now things are easier to find and a lot of junk we forgot we had was removed.
The guest bedroom is filled to the ceiling with books at the moment, but I would like to repair the ice-dam damage to the walls and paint it a bright colour, like my favourite green. The damage may require a professional plasterer since it's not drywall in there. But none of this can happen while the books are stacked to the ceiling.
Obviously, the books need to be catalogued and shelved. One begs the question "Where?" but this is something we need to resolve. Books we don't want need to be listed on Amazon or eBay.
We need to do a purge of the clothing we're not wearing. There's still some left from my purge last summer, and of course I didn't purge any of Bob's clothes (because I'm not that kind of wife).
I'd like to start doing little improvement projects around the house: painting, refinishing the floors, snazzing up the house's exterior. Honestly, our biggest stumbling block is our garden/lawn. We are both horrible at keeping after weeds and, here in the fertile Delaware Valley, if you stand still too long, something will grow on you! I'm wondering how much a gardener would cost to come and periodically keep after it. I don't like to spend money on things I could do myself, but we've lived here for seven years and we've never kept up with the weeds.
Finances
For the past two years, I've been helping out a friend and she's been helping me out. She cleans my house once a week and I give her some money. Well, a little more than a month ago, she got a full-time job and can no longer come to clean my house. So I have that money back in my budget. I'm going to use it to pay down my mortgage because that's my biggest bill. And checking online mortgage calculators, paying this extra little bit on the mortgage every month will make a TON of a difference in interest.
I've also been very self-indulgent. Bob and I go out to breakfast at a friend's coffee shop almost everyday. The food is very cheap and the coffee is amazing and we're helping a friend's business. But it's just too easy to order pancakes or cinnamon rolls. And if we want to eat healthfully (which we both do), we're going to have to start eating at home more often. So we're only going to go out on special occasions and put the money we would have spent towards our second mortgage. If I'm really, really diligent, I can pay this baby off by March 2014.
Health
This is both body and mind. Body-wise, I want to lose enough weight and get in good enough shape that my feet stop hurting, I can walk more easily, and I'm not out of breath when I haven't done much. Mind-wise... I really need to take time to meditate. There's this time of evening when Bob is downstairs with the dogs and it's very quiet up here. I should spend ten minutes meditating every night.
I'm sure there will be more. I'd like to work out some bullet points so I can cross them off. I like lists.
And now I must go. Mellie jumped up in bed for a snuggle and threw up on my bed. So I'm for coffee.