This is my freakish “junk drawer.” You know the drawer. At my house, it’s in the kitchen. It used to be a mess. The place you put something when you don’t know where it goes. So full of stuff it sometimes gets jammed because something is sticking up inside.
Today it looks like this: (click to see a larger and more detailed image.)
But the BEST part is that it has looked this good for YEARS. Seriously. YEARS. How? By applying the Underwear Principle and answering the question “Where Does it Go?”
The drawer went through more than a few changes before it finally ended up in this particular configuration. The key to its long term organization was to pay attention to what happened inside the drawer after I organized it the first time. One glance and I could tell what was and was not working for my family. What were they stuffing in there? Was it consistent enough to make a “home” for it in this drawer? For all the things currently stored in that drawer today, the answer was yes. For all the other stuff they were tossing in there? I found a “home” for it someplace else. (like receipts, cough drops, business cards, cell phone chargers . . . you name it. It all has to have a home or it will end up in the junk drawer. Or worse. On my kitchen counter.)
In case you can’t tell what’s in here, let me give you a little tour. In the top back left, we store extra tape and staples. Along the back, from left to right, we keep lip balm, rubber bands, safety pins and paper clips. Back to the left, in the white rectangular bin we keep tools (screwdrivers, a little hammer, usually an emery board and often a Tide pen). Next, in the tan rectangular bin we keep highlighters and a staple remover. In the large black drawer organizer, we have pencils and markers (I love my Sharpies). Below that are pens and mechanical pencils, separated by a small plastic bin holding pencil lead. Below that, in the bottom left corner, it’s pretty easy to see what’s there: Tape dispenser, stapler, sorted change and calculator. Then over to the right, we have colored ink pens, a stamp dispenser and extra stamps, and in the front, we have scissors and hole punch. You can probably see the rulers we tuck along the right side of the drawer.
Notice that everything is in containers and none of the containers are round. I hate round containers. They waste space.
I explained the origin of my foundational organization philosophy in the The Underwear Principle. I’m going to “strip it down” into steps which can be applied in many situations, so it can be used as more than just an organizational tool.
The Underwear Principle, Step by Step:
Step 1:
Let it go. I have to pry my white knuckled fingers off of “MY Way.” I have to consider that “different” isn’t wrong and I can’t force anyone to follow my directions. At least not in the long run.
Step 2:
I have to accept whoever is contributing to the problem. Even if it’s ME. In my family, I know that they are not purposely trying to sabotage me (or make me bang my head on the nearest table in frustration). I try to stay focused on what’s really important. People and relationships. I’m making memories. I want them to be good ones, with no flashbacks of me looking like Cruella DeVille on a self-centered rampage.
Step 3:
I HAVE to pay attention. I HAVE to watch what happens naturally and figure out why. Is someone doing something a certain way because they are taking the path of least resistance? Is there an obstacle I don’t understand?
Step 4:
My favorite part. I gather information. I get to learn stuff. From any source. Books, the internet, magazines and periodicals, friends, family . . . I gather ideas with the mindset that I can figure out how to solve the problem. Some ideas I hate and immediately discard. I might take other ideas and twist or build on them a little to customize something for my situation. Some ideas might be great right from the start.
Step 5:
I implement changes based on what I learned and then watch to see how others react. I don’t change everything at once.
Step 6: Modify and Repeat. Circumstances change and I have to adapt. Application of The Underwear Principle is never a done deal. Some changes don’t work. Some changes make improvements, but don’t work completely. It requires modification over time.
The Underwear Principle can be applied in so many other situations. In the coming weeks and months, I’ll post some of my experiences applying it. See the original Underwear Principle post for links.
Do you have an “Underwear Principle” story? I’d love to hear it!
This post gets more hits on my blog than any other, largely due to my long time friend, Charlene Davis over at Busy Mom’s Recipes! She linked to the Underwear Principle and her people just keep coming!
Are you in a crisis situation? Do you know someone who is? Someone who is fighting cancer? Suffering from a chronic condition? Recovering from an accident or injury? Someone who’s just had a baby?
Do you want to help, but don’t know what the needs are? Do you want to deliver meals, but don’t know what foods they like (or don’t), what day to cook or when to deliver the meal? Do you want to offer to pick up kids, but don’t know when or where to show up? Do you want to help with cleaning or laundry, but don’t know when your presence in their house would be convenient for the person who needs help? Do you want to shop for groceries, but don’t know what to buy or when to deliver them? Do you want to offer to pick up prescriptions, babysit or take someone to the doctor – but you just don’t know what the exact needs are?
Do you just wish there was an easy way to organize all the volunteers?
That’s where lotsahelpinghands comes in.
Let’s say you have a friend who’s on bed rest due to an injury. We’ll call her Grace. You go to http://www.lotsahelpinghands.com and create an online community for your friend, Grace. You decide to designate yourself as a Coordinator and you recruit others to be Coordinators as well, because many hands make light work. So there’s a Coordinator from Grace’s son’s 3rd grade class and another for her daughter’s 1st grade class. There’s a Coordinator for her Bible study group, and two people have volunteered to be Coordinators from her church. There’s even someone from her husband’s office who wants to serve as a Coordinator. Grace wants to be a Coordinator as well!
After Grace’s online community is created, the names and email addresses of friends and family are entered into LHH and a notification email is sent to each one of them. These “invitees” simply click on a link in the notification email and confirm their email address to become active members in Grace’s community.
Now they can log into Grace’s online community any time they want. They can check out the master calendar and see that meals are needed on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. They can see that Grace’s kids need to be picked up from school on Wednesday and taken to play rehearsal. They can see that Grace would love to have someone come over and do her laundry on Monday morning. They can see that she needs someone to go to the grocery store on Thursday and they can even see her grocery list! Members sign up for any activity they want!
The really cool part is that all members can see when needs are filled or “taken” and when they are still “open” so there’s no confusion. All members can see who’s signed up for an activity and activities can even be “assigned” by any coordinator. LHH even sends out reminder emails when someone signs up for a task. What if a community member signs up for something and then gets sick? They simply contact any Coordinator and that Coordinator can remove their name from an activity, freeing it up for another volunteer.
If friends and family haven’t been “invited” to join, they can go to http://www.lotsahelpinghands.com and request membership in Grace’s community. Any coordinator can approve membership and send the notification email. Any coordinator can enter the needs, called “activities” onto the calendar.
LHH communities have pages for announcements, well wishes and even a secure blog so Grace can let everyone know how she’s doing! There’s also a “people” page which lists all the members while allowing members to determine their level of privacy.
Then, in The Underwear Principle we learned about the power of flexibility, acceptance and riding momentum.
In “don’t file paper at home anymore. part 2.” we read about POW’s transformation. After changing her name to Perfectly Organized Woman, Reformed (POWR), she created a flexible and successful replacement for the “perfect” filing system. This new system, while subject to multiple modifications over the years, is still working today!
But what happens to all that paper when it becomes outdated? Where is it stored for the 7 years required by Uncle Sam? Where does all that paper go while it waits for the shredder? Where is “death row” for the paper in her house?
Referring back to The Underwear Principle, she observed. What actually happened to the papers POW had obsessively filed in those old Archive Folders anyway?
nothing.
Absolutely nothing. They were never touched again. Neglected. Ignored. For YEARS. Eventually shredded.
So WHY did she put so much time and effort into creating and maintaining them and their predecessors, the Active Files? Why? Why?
Why?
Flash forward to today. Picture a blue Rubbermaid tote. Inside are 7 expandable bucket folders. In each bucket folder you see a beautifully disorganized display of paper.
But here’s the beautiful part. Each bucket folder contains one year of paper. If POWR is ever audited, she has all the papers she needs for the friendly IRS auditor She can sort the paper then. If she’s not audited, she never has to sort and can shred with abandon. And shred she has – for the last 7 years. Amazingly, she has never been audited. And she never needed to look up a cell phone number she dialed in March of 2004. She never needed to search for an item listed on her credit card statement in October of 2003. She never needed to find out how much she paid for internet in April of 2002. She has never touched her Archive Folders until shred day. (cross cut, of course).
“But she doesn’t need to keep everything!”
True.
But she also doesn’t want to spend one second sorting through the paper to extract the shreddable from the non-shreddable. Not. One. Second. If one blue Rubbermaid tote will hold it, why sort? Why not just put the lid on the box and every January, feed everything to the shredder?
But hey, if you want to sort paper, go for it. POWR’s too busy.
There had to be a way to apply the Underwear Principle to her filing situation. The filing system needed to be a two part system. First, what to do with “Current” paperwork? Secondly, she needed an easy but efficient “Archive” system.
First, the “Current” System. She had to watch. Evaluate. What was naturally happening with the paper in the house? It seemed to accumulate in the kitchen. Everywhere in the kitchen, but still, mostly in the kitchen. Paid bills stacked in one corner. Receipts in a drawer. The refrigerator wallpapered in paperwork from school. Recipes and telephone numbers taped to the inside of kitchen cabinets. A stack of papers to be shredded next to the garbage can. Paper. Paper everywhere.
POWR was on a quest. Organize the paper, but keep it in the kitchen. This new filing system had to be just as easy for her family to follow as it was for them to put the papers in their current locations. She went back to her books and articles, culled what she deemed to be the best ideas for her situation, made a decision, bought the necessary organizing paraphernalia, explained the new system to the family and implemented it.
Then she waited.
To see how it would fail.
So she could modify it.
See, that’s the key to any family organizing system. A successful organizing system will ALWAYS FAIL if it only works for the person who created it. It has to work for everyone else as well. So POWR watched her family. She watched the paper trail. She modified the system. And again. And again. And again. (you get the idea).
Finally Currently, the system works like this:
1. There are two large magnetic clips on the front of the fridge. One for each kid. These clips hold ACTIVE papers ONLY. Lunch order forms, project instructions, this week’s spelling words, upcoming birthday invitations, permission slips, etc.
2. There are two plastic bins in the laundry room (off the kitchen). One for each kid. These bins hold all inactive paper for the kid for that year. So there’s a “1st grade” box for her daughter and a “7th grade” box for her son. They put their papers in their own boxes. Whenever she sees paper, she can say “put this in your box” and it disappears! At the end of the year, the boxes get lids and are stacked in the top of the kiddo’s closet. Then, some time later when the papers aren’t as precious and the kids can bear to part with them, she can sort through the box with them. Great for a rainy summer afternoon.
3. There are cork boards on the inside of as many kitchen cabinet doors as will accommodate them. Tacked behind one door are frequently used recipes and measurement conversions, behind another one telephone numbers. One cork board is designated for her son, another for her daughter, who uses hers to keep track of every Webkinz card she owns.
4. There’s a tabletop hanging file folder box on a counter, right next to a cross cut shredder and the garbage can. There are no folders inside labeled with the names of vendors. There are no folders inside the hanging folders at all. Just the hanging folders, with generic labels like:
“Automobiles” for all family car info including insurance, repair, maintenance.
“Insurance – Health” for all medical, prescription, vision, dental paperwork for the entire family.
“House” for all things related to the house, like homeowner association info, pest control, security alarm, newspaper delivery, etc.
“Phone/Cable/Internet” which includes both cell and home phone records, cable and internet bills, cable repair records, etc.
“Banking” for well, all things bank related.
“Credit” for all credit card statements. (The fewer you have, the smaller the folder.)
“Instruction Manuals” for things used frequently, like the phone, the cameras, the DVD player, the camera.
And here’s a key component in the new filing system: papers are stuffed in the hanging folder in whatever order as long as it is within the same year. The papers inside each folder are NOT organized AT ALL. Not by vendor, by date, by person, or even by size. The order of the papers inside each folder doesn’t matter. When (if ever) a paper is needed, each folder is small enough to be searched in less than a minute. It’s essentially a “stuff it” system, similar to a “pile” system. Only vertical.
5. Receipts. Big issue in her house. They got tossed and stuffed EVERYWHERE. Last year’s system was a binder clip in a kitchen drawer. All receipts for the current month were added to the clip throughout the month. A 3×5 paper was in the front noting the name of the month. At the end of the month, the full clip was moved to an out of the way location (for her, in the laundry room in one of those plastic drawer units.) A new clip, a new 3×5 paper and they begin again. When they need a receipt, say for a return, they know exactly where to find the receipt and there was absolutely no organizing effort required in the process.
This year, POWR’s husband has asked for a change. The process of clipping receipts was annoying. He wants a “stuff it” system, similar to the one described in #4 above. So, they are trying a magnetized plastic box on the side of the fridge. No clip to squeeze, no drawer to open and close, no lid to remove and replace. Once a month, she’ll empty the box, rubber band that month’s receipts and put them in the plastic drawer unit in the laundry room as usual. Another modification.
Expecting marital bliss, I was dismayed to discover my new husband would toss his underwear in the same spot on the floor every. single. day. After months of pleading, begging and withholding stimulating intellectual conversation (this is a family friendly blog), he still refused to put his underwear in the hamper! So, determined to win this battle over underwear, I did the unthinkable.
I moved the hamper to the underwear pile location.
Success!
The Underwear Principle:
First, I had to let my idea of the perfect hamper location GO. Let it go. I had to pry my white knuckled fingers off of “MY Way.” I just liked the hamper there. It didn’t have to stay there. MY Way is not always the BEST way. MY Way is not the ONLY way. It is just ONE way. A DIFFERENT way. (But different in a more aesthetically pleasing way. Come on, he’s a GUY.)
Secondly, I had to accept this “flaw” in my husband. What was really important here? It was a HAMPER. It was UNDERWEAR. I wasn’t going to divorce my new husband over underwear. I wasn’t even going to fight with my husband over underwear. (I was going to fight with him over money, like any normal newlywed).
Third, I had to pay attention. He didn’t want to carry his underwear across the room every day. He wanted to dump his underwear somewhere along his normal walking path. Watching what WAS happening and figuring out WHY was the key. I was able to modify MY Way to accommodate HIS Way.
Finally, I had to do it all over again when we moved into a new house. Circumstances changed and I had to adapt. Application of The Underwear Principle is never a done deal. Some changes don’t work. Some changes make improvements, but don’t work completely. It requires modification over time.
So, I had to adapt my way of doing things to accommodate his way of doing things. A compromise, to be sure, but still. A win-win situation. The Underwear Principle can be applied in so many other situations. In the coming weeks and months, I’ll post some of my experiences applying it. See below for post links.
So, what’s your “underwear?” It may not be a tangible item. It may be a way of doing something or a difference of opinion. Have you unknowingly applied the Underwear Principle in your life? Can you see any possibilities for application now?
“crazy woman say what?” (yes. we watch Hannah Montana.)
Really. Don’t file paper any more. Let me tell you a little story.
Once up a time, the perfectly organized woman (POW) would meticulously label color coded folders. Then she would sort papers, first by vendor (to go with the folders of course) and then she would sort the papers again. This time, chronologically. (of course). She would then staple together anything that was numbered “X of XX” and punch holes in the top to load onto the prongs in the folders. Folders without prongs? NEVER!
The mail would come in, the bills would paid and the checkbook balanced. (By her husband of course – she married him so she would have someone to balance the check book and change the cat litter.) The POW’s husband would then stack up the remaining paperwork and the POW would file it neatly, according the perfect filing system previously described. At the end of the year, the contents of the pronged color coded folder would be moved into a matching folder behind it. The contents of this matching archive folder was arranged chronologically as well. Both the active folder and the archive folder were nested neatly in a matching, color coded hanging folder.
The POW would open her file drawer and angels would sing the Hallelujah chorus.
Then, one day, the POW and her husband had a baby. Then, a few years later, they had another baby. And after a time, for some reason or another, the POW needed a copy of the first baby’s birth certificate.
AND SHE COULDN’T FIND IT!
She suddenly realized she hadn’t filed in her perfect system for SIX YEARS. When she opened her file drawer, she heard screaming. Realizing the screaming was coming from her own body, and being the problem solver she is, (and confident that she would never find the original birth certificate in her own house) she ordered a new birth certificate from the State.
Then the POW filed for and was granted an official name change. She is now known as
Perfectly Organized Woman Reformed (POWR). She purchased 47 books on organization (second hand, of course), read 2413 articles entitled “100 Ways to Organize Your Home” and then had an epiphany.
