The end result of my personal Monday Mission project is a thing of beauty, isn’t it? Oh, how I love having a clean kitchen counter!

* sigh *

Well, as promised, I shall stand tall and brave (just like my clients) and reveal to you one of the best-kept secrets and hidden truths of a real-life professional organizer’s lived-in home…

[ insert an overly dramatic drumroll here, please… ]

Yes. It’s true. This was the fate of my kitchen counter nearly one month after Amanda and I returned home from our two-week summer vacation!

Normally, like many of my clients, I’d hide my head in shame if anyone outside my immediate family were to see my kitchen looking this way. In fact, I was incredibly grateful that the weather remained pleasant enough that the MOPS playgroup could meet at the elementary school playground rather than my home (which was our designated rain-out location)!

Now mind you, if our group did end up meeting at my house before I completed this week’s Monday Mission organizing project, everything that you see on the kitchen counter would’ve simply been gathered in one fell swoop, hauled into the office, and dropped onto the floor in the middle of the room.

I’d close the door to the disaster, of course, so that anyone—who, heaven forbid, might need to use the restroom—could make their way down to the guest bathroom at the end of the hallway, completely oblivious to my messy little secret!

… suffice it to say that everyday living can even get in the way of a professional’s best intentions! You’re not alone!

Whew! This post has turned into far more than I had originally anticipated, so stay tuned… Next week, I shall continue to reveal how I successfully managed to clear off my kitchen counter (and keep it that way)! Until next time…

On Monday, April 28th… Apartment Therapy is giving away 2 copies of Sorted! The Ultimate Guide to Organising Your Life by Lissanne Oliver, Australia’s best-known and most experienced professional organizer. So, don’t delay… enter the contest today!

Using more than 40 “recipes” and illustrating each point with full-color photography, Lissanne’s best-selling how-to guide teaches any reader to get organized and live more efficiently and effectively.

Understanding that organization is an accumulation of small, individual decisions, sections include the cleaning up of a number of locations, such as work, on-the-go, paper, living spaces, kitchen, and kids rooms.

Organization is a skill that can be learned, and is crucial to personal and professional success; from finding shoes that match to ending the cycle of late payment fees, readers can use this book to simplify and better lives.