Nesting.

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.” – Dr. Seuss

So, I feel compelled to write about a blog I found through Pinterest.  The Nest Effect is written by a first-year teacher with lots of enthusiasm for new organizing ideas and willingness to share them. I feel like I need to write about it TODAY because Tiffany, the girl who writes this helpful and inspirational blog, sounds like she needs a little inspiration herself.  I feel like she needs to know how much of a difference she makes through blogging, and what a gift she has!

I think one of the hardest things to do as a human being is "put yourself out there."  It's something that bloggers do that I very much admire. . .put their thoughts and feelings and deepest inner selves on the internet for all to read and see.  Of course, they do this with the hope that someone else will read it and it will resonate with them. This sharing is such a beautiful part of the human experience and one of the many things that makes the internet so fabulous. I am sure it feels great when bloggers get positive comments and know that lives have been changed through their compassion and openness.  And I am pretty sure that one negative or hurtful comment can be enough to ruin an entire day, to make you question your purpose, to delete the 100 kind comments from your mind.  Not cool, negative people, not cool.  My momma always told ME, if you don't have anthing nice to say, don't say anything at all.  She's a smart lady, my mom.  I kind of wish she had a national pulpit to share that kind of advice from, because obviously a lot of other people in the world are well-meaning but don't have my mom's voice ringing in their head when they choose their words!

I just want to say some nice things about Tiffany's blog and the awesome changes she has helped me make in my life in 2012.  There aren't before pictures because the before was sooooo bad.  :)

My home office

The first post I saw of Tiffany's was this one. . .

http://www.thenesteffect.com/2011/10/october-project-conquer-paper-clutter.html

SO, I made it my new year's resolution to DO IT.  And I did!   And my life is so much better for it.  My goal is if I died tomorrow, Paul might be sad but hopefully not stressed and looking around like, "How do I run this place?"  I made a home management binder and a file box for all of my incoming papers.  It so beats the piles that used to sit on my living room desk.  Since this desk is in our living room, people see it right when they walk in the door.  Piles of papers aren't the best for your entryway!  Tiffany gave me the gift of confidence and time, because now I actually know where my papers are instead of digging through the giant pile on my little desk!  THANK YOU!

My finances

Making Tiffany's home management binder really make me get my booty in gear and get my finances in order. Up until this point, I have relied on mostly guesstimating how much money we have coming in for the month.  I am an awesome guesstimator and all, but since I work as an independent contractor, it can be hard to know when money is going to come in.  We don't like to carry a credit card balance, so my goal was to budget our entire family on 4 paychecks a month, use any month where there is a 5th paycheck to save for non-monthly expenses like our prepaid cell phones, the yearly stormwater bill, getting my hair done, etc.  Then, when I do get paid, we can use my paycheck for bigger expenses, like shoes for the kids or home projects, or put them into savings.   Since making this binder, I have honestly never felt so secure and confident about my finances.  It didn't make more money magically appear in my bank account or anything like that, but it did make me feel good that I could budget and plan appropriately.  It also made all of our information totally accessible to Paul any time he wants to crack it open. Tiffany gave me the gift of financial peace!  Amazing, girl!

My kitchen

I spend most of my time in our kitchen.  For some reason, these kids need to eat MULTIPLE times a day???  Huh.  Go figure.  Anyways, even though I spend a lot of time cleaning the outside of my kitchen, my kitchen cabinets were a little bit of a disaster.   Everything was pretty much where my Aunt Therese had so kindly unpacked it the day we moved in. I never gave it another thought as I just shoved stuff back in and shoved more stuff in the cabinets. Thanks to Tiffany I emptied every kitchen cabinet. I moved some things to where I could reach them more easily.  I got my spices and baking supplies in order.  I donated a bunch of kitchen things I wasn't using.  I matched all of the food storage containers with their lids, threw away the broken ones and managed to put them back in the cabinet, lids-on, which makes my husband sooooo happy.  I made a RECIPE BINDER

 so all of my fabulous recipes would be in one place.  I would like to consider this an heirloom.  :) On the outside, my kitchen looks pretty much the same. . .but on the inside. . .so much better!  She has given me, once again, the gift of time because every minute I spent organizing my kitchen has saved me immeasurable amounts of time and frustration digging around when I bake.  Tiffany rocks.

My purse

Because of all of these organization improvements, including a receipt basket by our front door to catch all of the receipts coming in, my purse is becoming slightly less disorganized.  SLIGHTLY.  There are still dead leaves and tiny plastic dinosaurs on the bottom.  But less papers.  And that's nice.

So, Tiffany, thank you for all you do!  I look forward to continuing to follow your blog and gaining more inspiration along the way!  I will leave you with a quote from my favorite neighbor. . .

“If you could only sense how important you are to the lives of those you meet; how important you can be to the people you may never even dream of. There is something of yourself that you leave at every meeting with another person.” 

― Fred Rogers