Organizing a Purse

January tends to be a time when people have organization on their minds. People make resolutions to become more organized or to de-clutter. People are putting away Christmas decorations and trying to make space in their homes for the gifts they've received. Orthodox Christians generally are trying to get their houses ready to be blessed, which means every room must be presentable; no shoving things in one room and shutting the door. And since people tend to be spending a lot of time inside, it's natural to think about how to make our homes more pleasant and livable.

I'm no exception. I have a lot of plans for making my home more functional this year. I want to spend less time looking for things, less time shoving stuff back into closets, less time rearranging thing so they'll fit. I have plans for my laundry room, my closets, my kitchen, my bathrooms. But I decided to start small. I organized my purse.

I'm very fond of my purse for several reasons. Most importantly, it belonged to my cousin Alison, who departed this life a year ago at the age of 34 due to an infection complicated by type 1 diabetes. She was a kind, smart, funny, beautiful person, and I love carrying this reminder of her everywhere I go. Secondly, I like that it's green, my favorite color. (My family would probably call it my signature color.) Finally, I like that it's nice and deep and holds a lot of stuff.

The downside to the depth and capacity of my purse is that invariably what I need is at the very bottom. It leaves me digging around with my arm in it up to my elbow, or pulling out all the contents and piling them somewhere in order to find what I need. Very soon after I received the purse, I realized that constantly trying to find my keys in the depths of my bag wasn't going to work. I bought a carabiner (big clip) to put on my keyring, so I can clip it to the strap. It's one of the best organizational things I ever did. But you can see how sadly I was lacking order in my handbag. Here are its contents. Note that this picture is not staged in any way. I just pulled everything out and piled it on the ottoman.

In my experience, the main steps to organizing something are editing, categorizing, and containerizing. For me these steps are pretty fluid. Sometimes editing and categorizing might take place simultaneously, and depending on what you're organizing, either one might take place first. Editing is determining what needs to be kept and what doesn't belong in the area being organized. Categorizing is sorting the items and grouping like items together, and containerizing is storing the items so that they're accessible and will stay sorted. A good way to start the editing process is to sort everything into keep, discard, and store elsewhere piles.

This is my store elsewhere pile. It contains an eyeglass case, a pair of sunglasses, a clip, an emery board, and a lip gloss. I realized I don't take off my glasses when out and about, so I don't really need the eyeglass case. I'm now keeping prescription sunglasses in my car, for easy access when driving, so I don't really need to carry around the sunglasses. The clip was from a bag of snacks which have been consumed, and the lip gloss and emery board were duplicates. All of these have now been stored in an appropriate place other than my purse.

This is the discard pile. There are lots of receipts, an empty checkbook, expired coupons, assorted paper items.  Some could be recycled, some needed to be shredded, some had to be tossed.

The big wad of paper with the receipts actually wasn't in my purse. It's the stuffing from this purse insert, which was a key part of the containerizing process.

My extended family does a $10 random gift swap on Christmas, and this is the gift I received. I doubt I would have thought of buying something like this myself, but I really think it's going to help keep things accessible. Here's what I put in it: a pen, an eyeglass cleaning cloth, a little notebook, the printout from our most recent Bible study that I want to read over, two zipper pouches, and some mints. The pouches and notebook fit neatly in the main compartment, and the pen, mints, and eyeglass cleaner each fit into a designated pocket. 

The icon pouch contains my little prayer book. A friend of mine brought this pouch back from Greece a while back, and when she gave it to me, I immediately put my prayer book in it. Aside from my key clip this is really the only successful organizing effort I had previously instituted in my purse. The book had taken a beating from being knocked around with the other items.  I've had to reinforce it with book tape. The pouch protects it, and by keeping it from falling open, has made it easier to extract from my purse.

The peace sign pouch was given to me this Christmas by one of our God sons. I'd been thinking about making some zipper pouches for my handbag, so I was really pleased to get this pouch and the purse organizer for Christmas. I'm sure my purse got organized much faster than it would have if the project had required me to purchase supplies and get motivated to do some sewing! The contents of this pouch are an an example of categorizing and containerizing, I grouped like items together and then contained them so they'll stay together. I used this zipper pouch for grooming items. The comb and hair bands went in the side pocket, and I put lip gloss, chapstick, and an emery board in the main pocket.

Now you've seen all the contents of the purse organizer. Here are the other two items currently in my purse: my wallet and a small umbrella.  The wallet got cleaned out as well, and the loose change from my purse is now stowed in the zipper pocket of my wallet.

When I'm not at home, my phone goes in my purse as well, but as you may have guessed, I've been using it to take these pictures.  Typically I also keep a re-usable bag that folds into a pouch in my purse, but I believe I left it at my parents' house over the holidays.  Having now given a lot of thought to the contents of my purse, I think some hand lotion and a handkerchief or tissues would be useful to have.  There's room for a book, when needed, but usually I carry another bag with me to work for library materials, or I stow a book in my knitting bag. Do you have any purse organization tips?  Is there anything I don't have in mine which you consider a necessity?

Getting My House in Order: Refrigerator

So, as I mentioned, the ice storm last week gave me plenty of time to get some projects done around the house. The biggest accomplishment was cleaning out the refrigerator, which probably hadn't been done since some time in the summer. It was sorely in need of cleaning and organization, as you can see:

It was a pretty straight-forward project, but it took me a whole afternoon to get it done.  I pulled everything out of the refrigerator one shelf at a time, sorting things as I went.  Then I cleaned off each shelf in the sink before pulling out the next shelf.  Once I had cleaned all the shelves and drawers, I wiped out the interior, dried and reinstalled the shelves, and returned the keepers.  Then I repeated the whole process with the door. My dish washer was about 2/3rds full, and I filled it with the newly emptied containers and ran it immediately. That was handy for banishing odors from a few things which were spoiled.
 
As I was sorting, I paid a lot of attention to the things that I had let go to waste. I wanted to better organize things and establish a system to make sure we eat what we buy and don't let things turn into science experiments. The main trouble spots I identified were: leftover odds and ends, an insane number of lemon and lime slices, a surplus of homemade salad dressings, and fresh herbs.

The solutions I've come up with for these problem areas are:

1. I designated the top shelf for leftover odds and ends that need to be used up.  We don't usually have a problem with leftover meals going to waste. It's things like half a can of re-fried beans, leftover toppings and sauces, and way too many slices of lemons and limes in tiny containers that make their way to the back of the fridge to die. Hopefully having all these things corralled in one place will help us use things up, and will prevent us from slicing a new lemon when there's half of one already cut.  I'm trying to monitor the shelf and utilize the contents in meals or put things in the freezer before they've been hanging around too long.

2. I'm trying to make only enough dressing for the salad I've made that night. I realized that when I make too much, we just don't end up using it.

3.When I buy fresh herbs, I'm going to try freezing half the bunch in ice cube trays immediately after I've bought it. I almost never use a whole bunch of cilantro or parsley, so it turns to green goo in the produce drawer. Yuck.

So here is the after, almost one week later. The contents have rotated a fair amount. So far the new system is working well, although a week isn't really enough to know if it's standing the test of time.

I'm really pleased with the result. I haven't decided the best use for the top right hand section of the door, though. It has a really flimsy shelf, so I need to make sure I don't put anything heavy there. Right now it has essential oil and ginger for sushi. Also, I can't believe how soon I'll be finding a new use for the eggs/dairy section! Lent is quickly approaching. I'll probably put packed lunches there then. Right now I have that with the breads, just to distinguish it from other leftovers. 

What do methods do you find helpful for managing the refrigerator?

Getting My House in Order:Bathroom Drawer

We have lived in our house almost two and half years now, and so, of course, we're facing the classic American problem: too much stuff. Right now we're embarking on a mission to amp up the storage around here and to pare down on the over-abundance. I plan to go through every drawer and closet in the house, and leave it looking like something out of a Martha Stewart magazine. Okay, probably not nearly that prettified, but hopefully by the end of the year (or sooner) we will have a place for everything and everything in its place.  I'd like our home to be as pleasant as we can make it, and I want to make sure clutter and confusion are not wasting our time and draining our energy.

So, last week I attacked my bathroom drawer. There is only the one in the master bathroom, and I'm the one who uses it. (James gets the medicine cabinet.) Here's the scary before--I know how inspirational a good before and after is. This is what my drawer actually looked like. It really was organized at some point, but clearly that system had long since stopped working for me.

Before:

Hopefully, everyone knows what comes next. I pulled everything out of the drawer and sorted it.

Most of the empty containers were recycled. I saved a couple for re-use with a project I have planned. I put the things that don't belong in the bathroom in their proper places. I got rid of old make-up items. I stowed extra stuff that I don't use on a day-to-day basis under the sink. I'm going to overhaul that cabinet soon, too. Then I cleaned every single item that was going back in the drawer: removed the general make-up gunk, cleaned the lint out of the vents in the hair-dryer, washed the make-up brushes, and cleaned out the hairbrush. I also wiped out the drawer, though that may have been after I took the next picture.

When I told James about this project, he suggested I might like to use this extra utensil organizer we had from a former kitchen. I was skeptical, but he was right. It works great! I'm thrilled with how it turned out.

After:

I put the make-up that I most frequently use in a small make-up bag that I also already had. I don't generally wear it, so I put it in the back of the drawer, but it's handy when I want it and conveniently corralled so I can grab it for trips. I put the soaps in the back of the drawer, since they fit neatly there, but they may not stay once I reorganize under the sink. I love how all my day-to-day stuff is neatly stowed in the utensil holder, with plenty of room for the hair-dryer. It's amazing what a joy it is to bring order to small areas of chaos in my life.  I feel a little giddy every time I open the drawer and see everything neatly arrayed.