organizing

My Pollock-in-training's handiwork

I don’t know about you, but I get REALLY excited about my kiddo’s artwork. I study the washable-paint swirls, looking for the makings of an artsistic genius lurking in those messy masterpieces.

I hate to part with anything he’s colored/painted/drawn, so when the pile was so high that the husband began to drop hints like, “Is that really necessary?” I had to come up with a new idea.

He does the majority of his painting on an art easel with a roll of paper, so most of his art ends up measuring 18  by 20 inches. That is just enough paper to wrap a box!

So I took all of his loose artwork and rolled them together, and put them with my rolls of wrapping paper. When I use one for a gift, I try to center the top of the box on a colorful part of the paper for maximum impact. I don’t add any ribbons or bows, and either write the child’s name on the box or attach a gift tag.

I love this idea threefold: it goes along with my 3 R’s obsession, it showcases my budding Signac at work, and allows me to continue to hoard. What more could I want?

Getting started in the money game

We decided to start giving the kiddo a few chores to do around the house on a daily/weekly basis, just to get him into the swing of responsibility. In return, we started to give him a very small weekly allowance.

I wanted to be sure he got the concept of saving, giving and spending. About a year ago, he and I made a giving jar, so I grabbed two more glass jars from my stash for a saving and spending jar. Note that the spending jar is the smallest one…I did that on purpose. I just slapped some white labels on the new ones and BOOM, you’ve got allowance jars.

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This one is for any of my fellow bloggers, whether you be crafty, a mommy, or anyone with a million ideas going around in their mind that you want to get online. 

Jill at Controlling My Chaos shared her blog idea book, and man…what a difference a simple idea can make. I absolutely love how easy and portable this little book is. I think of my best ideas when I am out and about, not at the computer!  And it goes so well with the January theme of organization.

Do have another way to control your chaotic blogger mind?

Well, we survived the Christmas holidays. Although I felt like I was out of control between all the projects and celebrations for the few weeks leading up to Christmas, I was able to settle down for a bit for the days leading up to Friday and enjoyed lots of family time.

I did, however, get the time wrong for our Austin family gathering on Sunday and nearly missed the whole thing. I vaguely remember talking to my cousins a week ago about eating at 2:00 p.m., but somehow it became 5:00 p.m. in my mind. We made it about an hour late and without the dishes I’d been assigned to cook, but all was well and they had PLENTY of food even without my latkes. 

It’s sad, but we’ve already taken down and packed up our Christmas decorations. We usually leave them up until after New Year’s but we are getting ready to put our house on the market, and seeing as we close on our new home in mid January we don’t have much time to lose. We will get new carpet in the back room on the 6th, and hope to have it on the market that next Monday. If you know of anyone looking for a super cute two bedroom, one bath house in the midtown area, let me know!

Anyway, so all the packing and cleaning has got me in an organizational mood. I’ve always had a separated and compartmentalized personality, so I just LOVE this kind of stuff. Here’s some places I’ve gone for ideas and just a bit of drooling.

HGTV has some easy and quick tips for organizing your entire house, and tons of other ideas. 

I *heart* The Container Store. Nuff said.

The cover story for the Better Homes and Gardens’ January issue is 50 tips to cut clutter and organize that I found very helpful, and there are tons more tips on their website.

Simplify 101 is a website I’ve recently found, and love her organizing tips page. The fact that she is a fellow scrapper is helpful. Be sure to check out the blog too.

Okay, I have to stop. The urge to put things is boxes is overwhelming, and I must sleep now. Let me know what organizing tips you have, I’m all ears!

Photo from Gardnervilla.com

I thought this was the most appropriate idea to craft about today: bookshelves made from rain gutters! Thanks to Yavonda of Baby and the Beasts for the very timely project link.

I hope to see you guys out at Boo at the Zoothis weekend! Come visit us at our table near the carousel where we will be sponsoring free rides. Hope to see you there!

Inspired by Moody Mom’s post on the sweet note she left in her daughter’s lunch box, I went out on the web for ideas for lunch box goodies…

Photo from AlphaMom.com

Skip to My Lou (who I love, love, love…I made her crayon roll recently)  has her free printable lunchbox notes, tags and stickers on Alpha Mom. All you have to do is print them off and cut them out! Super cute, and I want them badly.

Photo from FamilyFun.com

As usual, FamilyFun.com has some great ways to jazz up your kids lunches while keeping them healthy in their series called A+ Lunches and Snacks. Like Moody Mom, this mom from FamilyFun.com used cookie cutters to jazz up her kid’s lunch sandwiches, but she’s got her method down to a science. I love this reader’s idea for letting the kids pack their own lunches, while reigning in on the junk food. And this post for six different ways to make a turkey sandwich is sure to keep some variety in the lunch sack.

Photo from ReusableBags.com

Photo from JumillaStories

A step beyond buying a reusable bag is making your own. The Sew,Mama,Sew! blog has linked to several different styles of lunch bags for kiddos and yourself. My favorite was the kid’s lunch bag from JumillaStories, a blog that I drifted away with for a while as I was researching for this post.

What cute and useful ideas do you have for your kiddo’s lunchbox? Drop me a line and I’ll share with everyone. Have a great holiday weekend everyone!

Leigh

Oh, I’m so excited! I got a chance to do a little shopping at yesterday and picked up some super cute fabric for my next projects…crayon rolls and those reusable sandwich bags!

I made one crayon roll Friday night that turned out 85% perfect. I used the wonderfully easy tutorial on Skip to my Lou to make it, but I skipped on the interfacing not knowing how important it was (gives it more oomph and stability), and sewed the ribbon with the wrong sides facing out.

All rolled out, and cute as a button!

All rolled up!

I love all those pointy crayon tips.

So talented!

This is a really easy project to do, involving a small amount of fabric, that can be whipped out in about an hour or less. They would make great birthday and Christmas gifts. Set aside an afternoon or evening to make several of them to stockpile for gifts.

i don’t know if you are like me, but i shudder every time i start to think about cleaning out the artwork my son brings home from preschool. i am so excited about every single piece, that in my mind they are all mini picassos and pollacks, and how dare i recycle/trash these wonderful masterpieces! i mean, who else can scribble like that? the gods?
anyway, i’ve come up with a few cute ways to display his art throughout the house, like in our tv room above the blinds-

hanging above the window

framed artwork with our liquor collection…yes, i know it’s on the edge of inappropriate-

a masterwork and maker's mark

and on a former window in his bedroom, turned into a bulletin board by my fabulously handy husband-

the bulletin board of fame

i also found a little website called a craft life, and she had some great suggestions for art storage . small notebook , a wonderful place with tips to simplify every thing in your life, had some great advice and more links to other blogs on organizing and displaying  children’s art.  her key deciding factor in what she kept and didn’t keep? she kept the ones that made her smile the most. great idea!

so what storage solutions have worked for you? send me an idea and we’ll try it out…thanks!