Not what we have, but what we enjoy, constitutes our abundance.

— John Petit-Senn

Earlier this month, I was honored to be interviewed by Matt Brezina, co-founder of Xobni :

I had a great call with Xobni user Michelle Deo today. Michelle is a professional organizer from Georgetown, Kentucky. As you can expect, a professional organizer would be pretty excited about Xobni.

As a professional organizer, Michelle helps families and companies organize the processes by which they run their lives and their businesses. This ranges from new organizing systems for their closets at home to filing systems and work-flow management systems for the office.

While Michelle focuses on organizing people’s physical information, she uses Xobni to organize her digital information.

Michelle gets a lot of personal and business email and loves that Xobni organizes her inbox around people. She enjoys the automatic contact information extraction, the photos of her contacts, and having all of the conversations and attachments from a contact in one place. Michelle has been using Xobni for 6 months, and regrets not finding it earlier!

Read the full article »

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!

This week’s mission is to plan your meals.

Do you have leftovers that need to get used up? Anything that’s been in the freezer for a while? What’s in the fridge that’s close to its expiration date? Plan to use up these items with this week’s menu.

Take 10 minutes today to make a list of your meals for the week. Be sure to select your meals according to the activities that are scheduled each day. You certainly don’t want to plan a complex, preparation-intense meal on the day that you’ll get home from work at 5:30pm and need to be at your son’s baseball game at 6:00pm! Sandwiches, anyone?

Once you’ve completed your menu plan, highlight anything that needs to get pulled out of the freezer the night before. Then, post your schedule of meals on the fridge as a reminder. Hey, who knows… your teenage daughter might even get the meal started for you now that she knows what you’ve got planned! (Yes, I know… wishful thinking…)

In any case, you’ll be grateful that you spent 10 minutes at the start of the week to plan out your meals. Not only will you eliminate the stress that comes with planning a meal after a long, hard day, but you’ll save money by eliminating last-minute fast food excursions, and you’ll stay healthy by eating more well-rounded meals!

You know how it is… after a long tiring day, it’s tough to prepare a meal, let alone decide what to make. With a plan in place, the decisions will have already been made for you, and all you’ll need to do is prepare and enjoy!

So, do you already have a menu plan for this week? I’d love to hear from you! Please leave a comment below to share your current menu plan.

Courtesy of Nina Restieri, creator of momAgenda and mom of four:

What if, in the last week before Christmas, you decided to cast off all the stuffy responsibilities, and commit to trading tedious obligation for carefree celebration? Intrigued? For a truly joyful holiday finale…

• First, go through your day planner and cross out anything that looks more like a chore than a chance to celebrate. Spend the time with your family instead. Holding your children close and feeling the sloppy kisses bestowed reminds you that the best holiday spirits are found at home.
• Second, instead of worrying about how you’ll look in this year’s trendy holiday dress, skip the style-slaving and opt for something soft or sparkly instead: a snuggly cashmere scarf or a shimmery pair of heels will have you feeling festive in no time.
• Next, forget about turbo-cleaning before the out-of-town guests arrive, and focus instead on adding a few welcoming touches to make them feel right at home: orange-scented incense on the mantle, extra-luxurious towels, a cozy fleece blanket. For such elf-like touches, your guests will surely forgive the fairy layer of dust on the window sill, or the broken toy from last year’s booty adorning the floor.
• Remember, sometimes the best Christmas present you can give your family doesn’t come in the intricate Martha-Stewart packaging your husband and kids could care less about anyway. The gift they’ll truly cherish is a mother who is well-rested, beaming, and has enough energy to get down on the floor and play with their new toys. On that note, why not give yourself an extra hour of beauty rest to compensate for all the busyness of the last few months? You can thank us when the holiday pictures arrive.