31 Days to a More Organized Life : Day Twelve : Packing the Family for a Vacation

Yesterday I offered some helpful tips for prepping your house before a vacation! Today we're talking about getting the family ready to go. Packing is easy enough when you are only planning for yourself, but when you factor in kids who need diaper changes, snacks, and activities to keep them busy, it can become quite the ordeal.

I'm a classic overpacker. It is what it is and I've learned to accept it. I truly hate the feeling of not having something I need on a trip so I tend to overcompensate a wee bit. Fortunately, I've tamed it down since having kids who require so much extra stuff just so that we can actually fit it all in one car. I'm also a big believer in learning from prior experiences so here are a few things I'm doing this time around to ease the stress. Remember the intention I set in the beginning of the series...

Packing us up in an orderly way will help to keep things running smoothly during not just the packing process but the trip itself.

Thankfulness Thursdays : Week Eleven

Welcome to another week of Thankfulness Thursdays inspired by Ashley at Domestic Fashionista! Each week I share someone or something for which I am thankful as a way to remind myself of all that I have in the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving.

This week I am thankful for the beautiful place we call home.

I've lived in a lot of different parts of the country. I was born and raised in New Hampshire, spent high school and then some in Colorado, went to college in Washington state, lived for a year after college in Texas and finally moved to San Diego seven years ago. Each place has its own beauty and unique qualities, but I'm very happy to call southern California my home.

We have such temperate weather. No more starting the car fifteen minutes early in the morning to warm it up, no more shoveling snow and no more scraping the windshield. We don't get a lot of rain and we live just far enough in from the coast to enjoy an abundance of sunny days year-round. Sometimes I miss the New England autumn or the snow-filled Christmases, but mostly I'm happy right where I am. I'm thankful to have such a beautiful place to live with my family and I need to remember to take advantage of it more often.

31 Days to a More Organized Life : Day Eleven : Preparing Your Home for a Trip

Welcome to day ten of my efforts toward organizing our home and family, one step at a time! If you missed any of the previous days you can check them out here!

Today we are talking about how to get your home ready before you leave for a vacation. There's so much to do before a trip, not to mention so much excitement and anticipation. Just a few simple steps can help keep your house safe while you are out of town.

31 Days to a More Organized Life : Day Ten : Tracking Our Schedule

Today I'm bringing back a previous post about our weekly calendar with a few updates.

I found a great printable week-at-a-glance calendar at Mommy Tracked. They have a bunch of other options but this one looked like it would work best for us. It has a space for each day of the current week, plus small sections for kid's activities and the dinner plan for that day.

31 Days to a More Organized Life : Day Nine : De-junking Your Purse

Tell me if this situation sounds familiar... You're tackling a trip to the grocery store with both kids and your cell phone starts ringing. You reach with one hand into your purse for the phone while keeping the other hand on your toddler who has outsmarted the shopping cart seatbelt and managed to turn himself around still buckled. While you dig furiously through your purse with your free hand, your toddler continues to lean precariously over the edge of the seat, laughing hysterically as you hold onto the back of his pants. Normally you'd ignore the phone but you're waiting for the pediatrician's office to call back so you can tell them the the snot flowing freely from your preschooler's nose is now definitely looking green and not clear. Finally your fingers grasp the phone just as the pediatrician's office number lights up under the heading "missed call."

At any given time, the contents of your purse can mean the difference between sinking and swimming. It's not enough to carry your phone, but the ability to find the phone when you need it. It's not just a hold-all for papers and receipts, but having the receipt on hand when you need to pick up the dry-cleaning or return an item at the store. Often my purse feels more like a dumping ground than a well-ordered carryall. If you feel the same, then keep reading!

31 Days to a More Organized Life : Day Eight : Linen Closet, Part Two

Were you wondering if I was ever going to reveal my reorganized and revitalized linen closet?? I spent the weekend working on it piece by piece and truthfully, only the cabinet is done. I have plans for the closet portion, but I really want to share the cabinet now!

The first thing I wanted to do was add some personality. The inside was still this bland cream color that used to be on all the trim and the doors. When we overhauled the kitchen, we had the entire interior of the house painted and now the walls are a light gray and the trim is a crisp white. Love.

So in a bold move on my part, I painted the inside of the upper cabinet in the same light gray as the walls. I did it during naptime and while it was a nice change, it didn't really do much.

The top two shelves are painted and the bottom section isn't. Could you even tell? Me neither. So I hopped over to Michael's and found some pretty scrapbook paper.

31 Days to a More Organized Life : Day Seven : Pantry Alternative

Yesterday I shared how we removed most of our upper cabinets during our kitchen renovation, leaving us with a lot of drawers for storage. One of the biggest changes we made when we took down the wall between our kitchen and living room was getting rid of our pantry. Because of the new layout, there isn't space for a typical tall pantry cabinet. Instead, we use four large drawers to store our dry goods.