Hello and thank you for taking the time to read my ramblings.  Can you believe it's already September?  Where is this weird year going??  We didn't have a winter....then spring disappeared in a heat wave and summer brought drought....who knows what's ahead for fall, but it's coming so we might as well embrace it.

I had a productive weekend.  I am an avid fan of Pinterest.com.  You'll find my site here:  http://pinterest.com/dianecota/  Pinterest is a site for sharing ideas, and some of us can linger there for hours, drinking in the ideas shared. When I first joined, I didn't repin anyone else's stuff....I kind of thought of it as a place to highlight my own projects and work.  Last week that changed, when I talked to my friend Christie about the site.  She's a self-proclaimed Pinterest junkie.  That made me look at it another way: as a source of inspiration.  A highlight for me came with "31 Days To An Organized Home."  http://bit.ly/rjdLxv  The writer is more organized than I will ever be, but there was something about Day 9 that lit a fire under me, so I am honoring her inspiration by sharing it with you here.  I hope that's okay.

First I started with all the piles of clothing that are strewn about my bedroom.  I got rid of ANYTHING that doesn't fit anymore because my rationalization is that if I lose this weight I have gained, I deserve new clothes!  So I just kept tossing away things that didn't fit my life anymore.  I found once I started it was easy to keep going, but I did set goals: the closet and bedroom Day 1, the drawers and bureau Day 2.  I am proud to say Day 1 passed as planned, with aforementioned tossing of clutter.  In the end, Dave carried out five very large, very heavy bags of stuff I no longer want or need.  I can't believe how much stuff I got rid of that I will never miss!

Day 2 was cleaning off surfaces of bedside tables, dressers, etc. and the cleaning out of drawers, the unseen clutter.  Here's where I have to admit I was getting tired of working.  If you had seen the "before" of my bedroom you would not only understand, you would be sorely disappointed in me.  But I got the surfaces clean...what a difference! and all the drawers of my dresser are now tidy and much less stuffed.  When I got dressed for work this morning, I didn't have to fight my way through a bunch of stuff I can't wear to find something I can.  SO made it worth the effort.

One of my biggest challenges is the big headboard in my room.  It's a huge triangular shelf that begs clutter.  I use my Longaberger baskets to organize the stuff that accumulates there and this time I think I have found some winning combinations:  bills, pens, glasses, checks, stamps, envelopes in one basket.   Medications in another small basket.  All that miscellaneous stuff like tape, scissors and arts and crafts, in the biggest basket.  I love the way it looks now!  Getting that one shelf cleaned up and organized took half a day.

So I got to go to bed last night knowing my bedroom was a place of rest and relaxation, not a cluttered, crazy maze to navigate.  It's a good feeling.

What's that noise?  Oh shoot, it's the dining room table.  More clutter calls...I gotta go!