Welcome to my blog’s new series… I will be featuring (and maybe even reviewing) some of my absolute favorite organizing tools and products on Fridays! Here’s the first…

TasteBook.com is the best place online to discover, organize, and share favorite recipes—then turn them into beautiful personal keepsake-quality hardcover cookbooks.

You can search more than 100,000 recipes from major lifestyle magazines and leading recipe websites, upload your own favorites, or shop professionally edited TasteBooks created by top cookbook authors and food editors.

TasteBook.com is free to use, and personal cookbooks start at just $19.95 each. Every TasteBook can hold up to 100 recipes. Order them all at once or in batches. It’s easy to add more pages to TasteBook’s expandable hardcover binder system at anytime.

• Custom covers: Choose a beautiful cover image and edit the title of your cookbook.
• Cooking notes: Add helpful hints, cooking tips, and personal notes to any recipe.
• Personal photos: Upload your own pictures along with your personal recipes.
• Colored tabs: Organize your recipes any way you want with ten tabbed chapters.
• Perfect gift: Create one for bridal showers, family reunions, and holidays.

So, fill a TasteBook with all your family’s favorites, and you’ll soon discover just how “easy-breezy” it’ll be to get dinner on the table every night of the week (now that your recipes are finally organized)! Mmmmmm…

Next time you’re packing up your suitcase for a much-needed vacation or business trip, consider using old buttons to organize your earrings… just push the wires through the holes and secure them at the back.

In fact, if you don’t own a fancy-schmancy jewelry organizer for your earrings at home, you can use this idea to keep pairs together in your jewelry box (or wherever else you store your earrings).

Well, it’s official… I am now working part-time at Lowe’s. So, if you happen to find yourself in the market for new cabinets or countertops, I’m your gal! Stop by the Georgetown store, and I’ll “hook you up.”

I tell you… It’s really strange to be sitting in the doctor’s office, waiting for the nurse to come in and give Amanda her immunizations (in preparation for Kindergarten), and thinking, “Cool… I actually know the name of that countertop edging!”

This doesn’t make me a terrible mother, does it? 😉

Every day between now and June 15th, you can enter the sweepstakes sponsored by Real Simple and The Container Store for a chance to win $3,000 worth of organizing merchandise along with the help of a professional organizer! How cool is that!?!

In May 2008, Meredith/NBC Universal announced the results of their survey entitled “What Do Women Want?”™ More than 3,000 women revealed key insights on the female psyche across topics including health and well-being.

When asked which service professionals they would most like to hire, 24% of women responded that they wanted to hire a professional organizer to declutter their living space or office.

This finding suggests that women recognize the need to simplify their overwhelmed lives. But, do they realize the inherent health benefits of enlisting the help of a professional organizer?

As Debbie Jordan Kravatz, owner of Virtually Organized, noted on her blog…

Getting organized:

• helps reduce your stress levels (which can help with everything from anxiety and depression to cardiovascular and weight issues),
• puts more time in your day (which can be better used getting annual check-ups, counting calories, and exercising regularly), and
• frees you up to focus on things BESIDES your cluttered counter tops and overstuffed garage (such as spending time with your loved ones and enjoying your favorite hobbies—activities which have been proven to have lingering health benefits).

What are your thoughts? Have you noticed how the amount of clutter in your home affects your health? I’d love to hear details about your personal home/health connection!