Organizing...and I love visitors!

I'm a really good organizer. I don't mean that in a bragging way, it's just that I work as a Project Manager, and when you do something for 40+ hours a week for 14+ years, you almost can't help but get really good at it. So I'm good at organizing things. I manage all sorts of stuff in my life via spreadsheet - keeping track of everything from charitable giving, to projects I want to do on the house, to the next family vacation. I even have an amortization table for my mortgage, and I've been known to use spreadsheets to compare the attributes of different brands of a big ticket item I'm planning to purchase, to help me choose which to buy. (Okay, so I'm a bit of a spreadsheet geek, I admit it.) Anyway, I am really good at applying my organization skills to the "big" things, like vacations and taxes and big purchases. But I often fall down on the job in terms of organizing the "little" things, like drawers (desk and kitchen), countertops (mine often goes missing, covered under what I fondly call "the detritus of life"), and wrapping paper.

Wait, did she say wrapping paper? Yes, wrapping paper. When you live on an island, you don't take for granted that the next time you need to give a gift you'll be able to run out to WalMart and buy a really cute gift bag. So you keep and reuse things like gift bags, ribbons, and tissue and wrapping paper. At least I do. I even have one of those cute organizer bags (of course!) to keep it all in. But the thing about those organizer bags is they don't actually organize the wrapping paper for you...if you just shove it in there, it's nearly as bad a mess as if you didn't have an organizer bag in the first place. (It's slightly better because at least the mess is all contained within one area.)

Anyway, I really wish I had taken a "before" picture of my wrapping paper organizer bag, but you will just have to believe me...it was a wreck. (My family, who needed to use said wrapping paper while here for the holidays, can attest.)

So today, I spent a while organizing my wrapping paper organizer. And now, it's marvelous! Everything is in its place (something which makes me inordinately happy), and the interior sections of the bag are even labeled. I thought about posting an "after" picture here on the blog, but without a "before" it's not really worth it.

Something unexpected happened while I was organizing. I discovered that I have tissue paper. LOTS of tissue paper. Now the reason this is unexpected is when my sister asked me for tissue paper while wrapping gifts recently, I said "this is all I have" and referenced three measly, previously used, wrinkled almost beyond belief, torn sheets which were in the organizing bag, near the top. I was so wrong. I have many, many sheets of tissue paper. Most of them are used, but I actually even found several brand new totally flat ones too. It's amazing what you'll find when you organize. There might be something really great under all that clutter!

I have a friend who started a blog this year to track one of her resolutions, which is to throw away something (or multiple somethings) every day. I bet, as she clears things out, she'll find some nice surprises, and probably learn some great lessons along the way, too.

So why the sudden need to organize my wrapping paper bag? Well, I have guests coming to visit this weekend, and whenever people will be staying in my house, I get all motivated to tidy up (especially, to find the aforementioned missing kitchen counter). Often, that motivation spills over into organizing things that the guests are unlikely to see, just because I get "in the zone" in terms of my energy - I want to put it all toward tidying, organizing, neatening things up around here.

So that's why I love visitors! Left to my own devices, I would probably have really- well-organized "big" things, most likely on a spreadsheet on my laptop. But I might not be able to find the laptop itself under the general clutter. (Okay, it's not that bad, really. There's plenty of clutter on the desk where the laptop sits...but not on top of the laptop. Just to the left. And the right. Oh, and yeah, behind it, too. Guess I need to work on the desk next!)