Progress

I'd like to think it's my progress, but it's really not. My husband has been busily cleaning out his office closet over our Christmas break. He was fortunate enough to have a couple of weeks off of work, and has been using it to spend time with our daughter, relax, and let me boss him around.

Okay, that last part is a major exageration.

All I did was suggest that we work on clearing some of our junk to make organizing that much easier. If we have a system in place, eveything goes more smoothly, and maintaining an organized house is way easier than purging every 10 years or so.

It really didn't take much convincing; he has watched his parents try to clean out their garage many times, and still not be able to fit a car inside, let alone two cars. And two cars is our goal. We've always been able to fit two cars in our two car garage, and while we would love a three car garage, that's not going to happen for some time. Until then, we need to manage our space extremely carefully.

So, he's been working on it and doing a really great job. It makes me feel like I should be jumping in and doing the same...

But, I have other things to manage. Like preparing for school to start next week.

Organization Help

I am disappointed.

I recently stumbled across a blog that I was sort of excited about. I realize that sounds a bit contradictory: sort of excited? Isn't excited by it's very nature extreme?

Well, yes. But, I was weary. I read through some of the archives and I thought it sounded helpful. See, it's an organization blog.

Hello, that's what I need! Help organizing.

After a bit of reading, I realized that she didn't give away too many secrets online because she is a life coach and she wants you to pay her for the information. Okay, that's fair. I think there should still be some sneak previews, if you will, to prove to me that it'll be worth the investment, but maybe that's just me. I'm pretty protective of my money in general.

So, I subscribed to her email list, because she promised a free packet of organizational tools. Cool! I love free! And I was pretty curious. What could this mysterious packet contain?

Well, let me tell you. A sheet with eight boxes for your goals. Another sheet with a 30 boxes for your monthly menu. A sheet with the direction to "envision what you'd like from your room." And a few others that weren't much better.

Really? That's the "free" preview? All she did was slap her banner on the top of a lined piece of paper. That is not what I want! Nor is it helpful, at all.

The thing is, those are pretty standard forms. In fact, they exist in some form in almost every self-help book you'd probably ever see and can be quickly generated on your home computer. Oh, and let's not forget, they're pretty obvious. You mean, if I want to go to the store only once a week, I should plan a week's worth of meals? Wow! Groundbreaking!

Okay, that might have been a little harsh. After all, these are the *free* documents. One can only hope that the ones you pay for are more helpful.

But, what it made me realize is that it is an entirely personal journey. YOU have to decide how your home and life should be organized. There are some pretty organized people out there, but if you got plopped into their lives, it probably wouldn't work for you.

So. I'm recording my journey to a put together life, but that's all it is. My journey. Yours should look entirely different, if your goal is a put together life at all. Maybe it's not. And that's okay. Just don't expect what I do to be what you should do.

The end.

Stocking Up

I've been doing a lot of thinking about what I actually expect of emergency preparation. I think it's important to think about it before you do anything, just to get a handle on what you can achieve, given financial constraints and space. My goal is to have a stockpile of the things we need for a year. I'd like to be at a point where I can purchase things only when they are on a great sale. I'd like to have that because it will accomplish two things: first, I'll get the best deals on everything I use (thus saving us money in the long run), and second, I'll have that year supply of necessities should tragedy strike.

But. We don't have a basement or a crawl space; the water table is a bit too high where we live for that. So, what do we do with a year's worth of stuff?

I've been thinking a lot about this, and I've come up with some ideas that will hopefully enable me to accomplish my goal without bursting at the seams.

1. I don't use my kitchen space effectively AT ALL. Part of this is that I didn't really know how I wanted to organize my kitchen when we moved in, and I've never revisited the issue. We have a lot of space that is used poorly: for instance, in one of my cupboards, I have my cookie sheets, cutting boards, and cooling rack stored flat. That wastes at least eight inches above those items. I plan to move them to vertical storage in my pantry. I think I'll also invest in some bins so I can get similar usage out of my pantry shelves. 
2. We have shelves in all of our closets that aren't used well. For instance, in our entry way closet, we keep scarves, hats, and gloves on top (above the coats) These aren't organized, they're just thrown up there, and they again only take a few inches vertically, while I have probably two additional feet above them that is unusable right now. Similarly, we don't have anything on the floor in that closet, so we are wasting about three feet below the coats that could be used. I plan on moving the scarves, gloves, and hats to bins (on a shelf system) in the garage, since we keep our cars in the garage and typically leave through the garage anyway.
3. We don't use our garage effectively. We've been able to keep both cars in there mostly because we don't have too much junk yet. But, I don't want to keep any junk! We have typically saved lots of boxes, which stems from the amount of moving we did when we were first married. However, we are settled now, and while boxes are nice, the space is more valuable, so we'll be getting rid of a good number of boxes. Additionally, we have a shed with extra space; we can move a lot of things out there that we don't need on a regular basis, and for a while, I'm sure I'll keep it covered with a tarp, just in case our shed isn't weatherproof. This should open up more space for storing, and even though I won't be able to store food out there, I can store paper goods. I hope to store a good amount of our year's supply of toilet paper, paper towels, and other non-perishables out in the garage.
4. In addition to the hall closets that are being underutilized, our bedroom closets are a disaster. The one in the nursery is pretty full of baby stuff, but ours has a shelf above and space below, and we have a large closet in the office that is full of--yep, you guessed it, junk. Some of that junk (the sentimental stuff) will be moved out to the garage to make room for the less heat-tolerant items. 
5. In addition to clearing stuff out and making more room, there are some spots where we could hide things. Such as under our bed. We have some boxes storing things under there right now, but there is still more space. We also have some bookshelves with cupboards on the bottom, and then there are the couches, where we can slide things under. 

All in all, I think we have just enough space. We'll see of course, but it makes me hopeful to get started. 

Mrs. Beeton

Have you ever heard of Mrs. Beeton? I hadn't until a few months ago. I'm a grad student right now, and I'll be writing my thesis on cookbooks as autobiographical documents. For a few weeks, I considered starting my research in the 19th century, which was when cookbooks began to come into form. Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household Management, while not the first cookbook ever written, is credited (often) with being the first cookbook to utilize the format of the recipe we are so familiar with today (meaning the ingredients are followed by the directions, which are often followed by yield, cost analysis, and nutritional information).

In addition to profoundly influencing the way recipes and cookbooks are written, Isabella Beeton also included a vast array of other information (the reason it's "Household Management" and not cooking). Her first chapter, in fact, is a description of everything a mistress should be. You can read all about it here at mrsbeeton.com. She describes the middle-class mistress and what she should be to be "put together," which of course aren't Mrs. Beeton's words at all, but describe it pretty well anyway.

What does all this have to do with anything?

Women have been trying to appear put together for ages. Andrea Broomfield, in her book Food and Cooking in Victorian England: A History, said that middle class women “put a great deal of emphasis on appearances and on ensuring their chances of success by doing precisely what they believed they should be doing to impress their ‘betters’ . . . as well as their social ‘equals.’” Does that not sound like they were pretty occupied with looking "put together"?


Of course, what was important to middle class Victorian women is not what is important to us now. Some issues have stuck, of course, such as being able to put together a delicious meal in a frugal way, but the requirements of that meal are obviously quite different. We have our own standards of what it means to be "put together" now, and while what Mrs. Beeton suggested for her contemporaries was important for them, it doesn't help us much now. 


There are dozens of texts out there that do help us, and I suppose it's up to us to select one that applies well to our own lives, and then to actually use it well. Nothing will work perfectly for everyone. I used to have a book that I really liked, but it has been lost. I hope it will eventually turn up. It's called The Ultimate Career by Daryl Hoole, one of the co-authors of the old The Art of Homemaking. The one I had was directed at a Mormon audience, but still had excellent advice for general housekeeping and financial strategies...but you know what? It was still only one woman's way of making it work. I wish I had it as a reference as I begin my journey, but we all know what needs to be done. We just have to find our own way of doing it.

What is "It"?

I feel entirely un-put-together. And from what I gather, many women feel this way. We all feel this way, and yet we all generally fake it, hoping we can convince everyone else that we are together.

So, what exactly does it mean to be together? Well, this obviously varies for every woman, and that's where the trouble comes! For me, being put together means being a perfect homemaker. For many women, being a homemaker is a second job to providing financially for their families. Luckily, I'll be a homemaker full time after I graduate from graduate school next year. Even though I have time, I'm still not together...and I'll be working on that.

What's a perfect homemaker? Someone who keeps a clean home, makes healthy, homecooked meals most nights, shops frugally, reads voraciously (especially to her children)  and sews. Tall order, I know. Which is exactly why I'm not put together right now...