Out of Chaos an organizing newsletter
Bringing it Home
Summer is coming, a time many of us believe will give us time for projects that we have been postponing. Yes, often these projects never reach completion and only add to the chaos they were meant to alleviate. Recently I’ve been using the phrase, “Let’s bring it home” a lot. Not only at work where I am trying to keep the client on task and focused on finishing one thing at a time, but also at home, where my children, (particularly at clean-up time) are as distractable as little kittens in a swarm of butterflies, “Ohh- look at that one! Oooo shiny!”
Also, I have to admit that at times, when I am at my desk trying to process a big pile of paper in a very compressed amount of time (see newsletters #24 & #26) I sometimes say it outloud to myself: “bring it home.”
“Bring it home.” Easy to say, hard to do. How can you make sure you ‘bring home’ every endeavor you undertake this summer?
First, you have to break the project down into steps. For example, I put together photo albums in the summer. The first step is to look through this years photos on the computer and order the ones I want to put in an album. There are always a few days in June when the children have a half-day of school, so I penciled “Order Photos” into one of those mornings (and scheduled yearly pediatric appointments for the afternoon). So step one is scheduled.
Next, I will add “albums” to the Target shopping list that I keep in my phone. I know I will be there before June. So, that will complete step two. Once I have the pictures and albums in hand I will watch my calendar for a July day when I will be home by 3pm, but the children don’t get home from camp until 5pm. As soon as I see that day I’ll put: “photo albums” in my i-cal for 3pm. Two days like that and I’ll have brought the album home.
Even the biggest projects start with tiny, manageable steps and putting them on the calendar. We are planning to paint the living room this summer, so the steps are: Choose paint, choose a date, hire a painter, empty bookshelves. As daunting as a project like this can seem (did I mention it is 19 feet of bookshelves?), most of the steps require less than a half-an-hour, and in my experience once you get the ball rolling you find the energy and time to do the hard part, in the is case the emptying of bookshelves.
So, this summer, don’t start a bunch of projects and have them staring at you reproachfully in September, Bring them Home.