Real Life Solutions

When incorporating frugal living tips into your life, be sure to include the internet. There are many frugal living tips that you can incorporate into your live while using the internet to your advantage.

In todays world, using as as many frugal living tips as you can find can make a huge difference to your bank balance, and this is now easier than ever thanks to the internet. Here are four ways you can get online and help make the task of saving money as simple as possible.

1) Use Price Comparison Websites

There are more and more price comparison websites popping up all the time. These are great for saving money, especially when you’re buying things such as insurance, as it won’t take you long to look something up. Never buy car, health or home insurance without checking these sites first, and it’s still worth checking even if you’re currently tied into a policy (you can switch as soon as it ends)!

But it’s not just the big things that count. Some of the best frugal living tips include using price comparison websites to search for the price of groceries and other common items you buy. It’s well worth it, as every little saving will soon add up.

2) Sign Up To Daily Deal Sites For Your Area

This is one of my favorate frugal living tips! You’ve probably heard of Groupon, a site that delivers daily deals for different areas. These are often things you don’t need, such as manicures or other beauty treatments. But sometimes you’ll find excellent offers that make it worth signing up. Do a search for various deal sites that serve your area, but before you spend any money make sure you search their names to check that they’re legitimate.

3) Sign Up To Coupon Mailing Lists

Many different companies will have their own mailing lists online, so get signing up to the stores you shop at frequently and you’ll probably get some great coupons sent directly to your inbox. This is far easier than signing up to traditional paper mailing lists, with the added benefit that you can cancel them with one click if you find they aren’t as useful as you’d hoped.

4) Use Forums To Keep You Accountable

Last on the list of online frugal living tips is to sign up to a money saving forum to meet likeminded people. This will stop you going mad during those moments where you feel as though you’re missing out by being so frugal. You can even post public saving goals and challenges to help keep you accountable.

One Important Thing You Need To Remember

There’s one thing you need to remember throughout all of this: a deal is a not a deal unless you wanted to buy it anyway! What that means is that you shouldn’t go spending extra money on “deals” you find on the internet, unless you already had a use for the item or service. If you do, you’ll actually end up spending more money than you would have originally. Use these frugal living tips wisely!

To find out how to get organized and put these strategies to use right away, visit: The Definitive Guide to Home Organization for Busy People today and get your life and home organized and clutter free forever!

When children or teens are depressed they often have a lack of hope for the future.

Teenage suicide and suicidal ideation is a profound expression of hopelessness. It is often experienced as an overwhelming feeling that what they do is never good enough and inside, they are never good enough.

A vision board helps depressed children or adolescents to start imagining their dreams and goals for the future. The very process of making the vision board together will open a door for your child or adolescent to talk about their experiences and to start to address the negative thoughts that are in their head. Some teens may prefer to do it completely on their own, but you will have plenty of grist for the mill to talk about when you see their finished board.

Below I will share some tips on how to create vision boards for children:

The vision board can be a bulletin board or simply a white Styrofoam board. The process is to make collages of photos, magazine clippings, written affirmations, lines from poetry, and quotes which all represent their “outcomes”. They can also include special cards, letters, and certificates, written by others that say positive things.

In the centre of the vision board should be a photo or picture of your child or teen. It needs to show through their facial and body language that they are feeling happy. We suggest the most recent photo if possible. This reminds then where they were and they can be and feel happy again. Revolving around this centre-piece are visual images of goals that the child wants to achieve that will contribute to feeling happy again. For example, feeling happy at school, having a closer inner circle of friends, feeling joy and creativity, a special project they want to be involved in, or their dream job or career in the future.

It can also include other goals such as working somewhere, learning to play an instrument, getting back to playing tennis again or another sport, submitting their poems to magazines or designs to companies, showing their artwork at exhibitions. It therefore is a mixture of inner and outer manifestations that the child wants to create and new beliefs that they want to install in their brain.

Help them to set their sights high; dream a little, but also be realistic. They will need to show the visual manifestations of what they want in each of these four areas:

1. School
2. Sports/activities
3. Family life
4. Social life

Examples include making new friends, improving their sport or getting something they really want.

They think about what they want to achieve in the next five years from now. For a younger person it might be 1) obtaining GCSEs or 2) going on a special trip or adventure.

For adolescents, it might be: 1) what kind of person they want to be as an adult, such as a loyal and honest friend or a hard worker, and 2) what kind of job they would like to have.

Encourage them to imagine what sort of qualities they want to have in the next five, and then ten years. Since the dominating thoughts of a child with depression have been disempowering, hurtful, painful and negative, it is important to write very strong affirmations which will eventually eclipse the irrational destructive and toxic beliefs and gradually transform themselves into physical reality, helping the childs mood to become more on an even keel again.

The positive statements on the vision board should reflect the opposite of the negative thought patterns that they have. For instance, if your child has low self-esteem and suffers from a lack of confidence, then the statement could be something like “I am becoming more confident” or “my confidence is growing each day”. Another example is “I am” or “I am becoming” more… joyful, self-assured, positive in my thinking. These are important statements to help your child think of and write down.

It is very powerful to sit with your child and in a quiet place with beautiful peaceful music, and say “lets just try this exercise, nothing to lose. Imagine yourself already feeling as though your dreams have become a reality, your prayers are answered, or you have already reached your goals. This lifts one to a much more elevated mood.

Explain to your child that an affirmation can become even more powerful when it is turned into a song or chant. This is called an incantation because it is said with a focused purposefulness accompanied by body movement. Sometimes people proclaim this loudly when drumming, dancing or whatever movement they prefer.

Children and adolescents also can find and use quotes of their favourite person in history, current day celebrities or great role models in their life. Usually these great people have been resilient through trials, tribulations and adversity. They can choose their role models who are celebrities or famous people from both past and present who also suffered from depression (e.g. Mandela, Gandhi, Winston Churchill, Einstein, Mother Theresa, Mozart, Abraham Lincoln, and Melanie C of the Spice Girls, Princess Diana, etc.).

Using the information above will help you to create vision boards for children that they will be happy to look at and aspire to.

Be sure to visit ‘How To Help Your Child Beat Depression. is a great resource that gives practical advice on recognizing depression in children/teenagers and offers essential tips on how you can cope with the challenges.

With our busy lives each and every day, streamlining and simplifying is vital. Here are 6 simple ways to do just that.

1) Clothes

Above all else, it’s important to know what you have and what you need. Go through your closet and drawers and pull out anything that doesn’t fit you or make you feel fabulous. Make an inventory of what you have now and then make a list of the items or outfits you need. Try to stick to a certain style or color palette so that items will mix and match more easily.

When buying shoes, purses or other accessories, aim for pieces that will work with a number of outfits as opposed to just one thing.

Try to group pieces in your closet in a way that works best for you. Perhaps hang all of your pants together, blouses, skirts, etc. Or maybe instead it would work best to hang complete outfits together.

2) Cosmetics

Does your cosmetics drawer or cabinet look like a bomb went off? Could you lay your hands on your favorite hot pink nail polish in seconds or do you end up buying another bottle because you can’t find the one you already own?

For makeup, cosmetics, hair products, etc., the only way to make sense of it all is to containerize. It doesn’t have to be a bunch of fancy matching boxes although those are fun too! Shoe boxes work just as well or the disposable food storage containers.

Gather everything you currently have and toss away any obviously old, no longer usable product. Now is not the time to lament money spent and wasted on stuff you didn’t use. Bacteria can grow on old cosmetics and be dangerous. Just toss. Once you are sure that you have only kept the newer, safe products you will definitely use, then sort according to category. For instance, consolidate all nail polishes, all lipsticks, all hair products and so on.

3) Kitchen Pantry

Create specific areas in your kitchen depending upon your cooking habits. Baking, canned goods, spices and sauces, oils and vinegars, dry goods (such as sugar, rice, pasta, flour.) Creating these areas, you will cut down on the amount of space where you will be searching for things. For instance, you will know if you need vanilla extract to look in your baking area.

Also recommended are lazy susans that turn easily so you can see what’s there without knocking stuff over.

4) Pre-packed Snacks

Rather than having to stop everything you’re doing each day when your kids ask you for pre-lunch and after lunch snacks, come up with you-pack-’em packages in advance.

For instance, using small baggies, make individual snack packs of goldfish crackers, pretzels or dry cereal. Keep them on a specific shelf in your pantry.

Perishable snacks like grapes, baby carrots, or cheese, can be stored in a specific drawer in the fridge.

5) Snail Mail

Mail can become a pile of chaos in no time at all if not tended to promptly. Bills can get mixed up with store flyers and other junk mail. The only way to avoid the trap of the bottomless pile of mail is to deal with it each and every day as it arrives.

Immediately toss anything that is junk mail. Flyers for stores you never go to would be one example. Open and shred all of the credit card offers and other personalized pages.

Sort all bills and file in one central place. If you create a current bill file and are conscientious about using it, then you won’t have bills scattered around in numerous places. If that happens, you run the risk that you will misplace some and they won’t be paid on time.

For any invitations received, decide if you care to attend, then jot the date on your calendar or in your planner.

6) Banking

There are many easy ways to streamline and simplify your banking. First of all, take advantage of direct deposit if at all possible. This will alleviate the possibility of lost checks and the need to physically go to the bank which will in turn save you time and even gas money.

Avoid having too many different accounts at different financial institutions. Often, if you have your checking, savings and other accounts at one bank, you will be able to receive one statement which will cut down on the amount of paperwork you have to open and file.

Stop by Get Organized Now – and check out the amazing collection of 2,175 ideas, tips and techniques for organizing your home, getting rid of clutter, organizing your time, your schedule, your money, your paper, your family and much more!

There are many benefits of meanu planning that people just dont think about.

Menu planning is a life saver for most families.  Just imagine creating an easy meal plan and knowing what you are going to be serving up for meals each day of the week? You will save time, money and your sanity.  

You  can visit Meal Planning Central for a free meal planning report and free resources too!

1) Get Dinner On The Table Faster

If you know what you are going to fix for dinner, and you have everything you need at your fingertips, getting the food on the table becomes a snap. You don’t have to spend 2o minutes searching through the freezer and cookibooks trying to figure out what to make. If you are stuck at the office, and your spouse knows what’s on the menu for the night – he or she can even get started on the easy recipes without you. When you have hungry family members, getting dinner on the table as fast as possible will make your evening much more enjoyable.

2) Run To The Store Less Often

How many times do you run to the grocery store to buy something to cook for dinner. I don’t know about you, but it takes me at least 45 minutes every time I do that. Menu planning allows you to get all your shopping done once a week, and make sure you have what you need to prepare every single dinner for the week.

3) You’ll Eat Better

You have the best intentions to prepare wholesome, healthy meals for your family. Then you get home late, everyone is hungry and there is nothing in the fridge. You head for takeout or call the pizza delivery guy. The is is asnother one of the  benefits of menu planning, if you plan your meals and have what you need at home you are much more likely to actually cook healthy dishes for your family.

4) It Saves You Money

How much food do you throw out each week because you just didn’t get around to cooking it? Plus every time you go to the store there are a few extra things that just make their way into your cart and on your grocery bill. One of my favorite benefits of menu planning is that  if you shop less and only for those items that you actually need, you spend a lot less money on groceries each week. We won’t even think about how much we spend eating out each week.

5) It Saves You Time

In addition to saving you money, meal planning also saves you time. You only have to go grocery shopping once a week, and there is no more walking around the kitchen each evening for 20 minutes frantically trying to figure out what’s for dinner tonight. Everything you need from the recipe to the ingredients is right at your fingertips.

6) Quality Family Time

When you think back to your own childhood, family dinner is sure to come to mind as a time when everyone got together to eat a meal and talk about the day. You can recreate that experience for your family and spend some quality time each week over a home-cooked meal.

7) It Is Easy

Last, but not least, menu planning is easy when we let us give you a hand. Our easy recipes are family friendly and our grocery shopping lists make your trips to the supermarket a breeze.

As you can see, there are many benefits of menu planning. You can also visit Meal Planning Central for a free meal planning report.

(ARA) – These days, we’re all trying to make small changes in our everyday habits to live a little more “green,” from switching to energy-efficient light bulbs to carrying reusable shopping bags and composting kitchen waste. But many don’t realize that one of the easiest ways to be more eco-friendly is by de-cluttering and donating gently used items that you’re no longer using.

“We know millions of families across the country are already clearing out their clutter with spring cleaning,” says Tony Shumpert, vice president of recycling and supply chain operations for Savers, Inc., a thrift store chain. “By donating these items, instead of simply throwing them away, you can give back to the community and save quality goods from polluting the earth. In fact, we operate one of the largest recycling programs in the world, keeping more than 500 million pounds of goods out of landfills last year alone.”

But if the thought of going green has you turning red in exhaustion, consider some of these tips to make the task easier:

* Bring a friend in to help with spring cleaning. Not only can the two of you spend a great afternoon together, but your friend can also give you an objective opinion as you sort through items to keep or donate.

* Be organized about getting organized. Start in one corner of one room, and make your way around the room in a circle. Don’t move on to the next room until you are finished with the first. If you need to take a break, go for it, but always return to where you left off.

* Designate a specific place for donations. Your “clutter corner” should be in a handy, but out-of-the-way location in your home. Encourage family members to place items – clothes, toys, housewares – that they aren’t using any longer into the bin. For parents, your children will see that gently used items shouldn’t be thrown away, and something they don’t want any longer can have a new life with someone else.

* Be realistic about what you think you want to keep. If you haven’t worn that shirt in more than a year, it’s ready to go. Another way to determine what to donate is to put items you’re not sure about into a box. Seal it and store it. If you haven’t opened that box a year later, donate the entire thing. Chances are, you don’t have a clue what’s in the box and don’t need it.

* Know your nearest donation drop. Once you’ve designated items to donate, you don’t have to spend hours tracking down a location to drop your items off. Simply visit www.communitydonationcenter.com to find a nearby Community Donation Center where you can drop off your goods. This site also provides a list of nonprofits in your area with donation home pick-up service where they’ll come straight to your door to collect donations.

“Even donations not suitable for resale, or that just don’t sell on our shelves, find a second life with Savers,” says Shumpert. “A portion of these goods are sent to developing countries where they support micro-economies and help improve the lives of people in other parts of the world. Remaining items are sold to domestic material wholesalers who recycle the products into new materials such as wiping rags, car insulation and much more.”

Another bonus to donating your gently used goods – Savers partners with more than 140 nonprofits and pays these organizations for every item they collect. These partnerships turn otherwise unused goods into sustainable funding that supports the nonprofits’ programs and services.

When you donate your unused items to Savers’ nonprofit partners, another person can put them to use, which helps save space in landfills, and charitable organizations in your area will benefit as well. And you can feel good about taking one more step toward living a little greener.

Stop by Get Organized Now – and check out the amazing collection of 2,175 ideas, tips and techniques for organizing your home, getting rid of clutter, organizing your time, your schedule, your money, your paper, your family and much more!

What does getting organized bring to mind for you? Does it mean putting in many hours and blood, sweat and tears before you will become more efficient? Does it mean lots of hard work to accomplish important and necessary tasks? Do you procrastinate when it comes to getting organized because you feel it is too daunting a job? Organizing does not have to be thought of as a chore.

Here are some fun organizing ideas that you can use to make getting organized a bit more fun.

1. The easiest and simplest way to make organizing a fun activity is to put on your favorite music. Pick out a few upbeat songs that get your spirits running high and your body wanting to move. Put on the music, start tapping your feet, pick out an area you would like to organize and begin organizing. This fun organizing idea not only gets your home organized but it also serves as exercise too.

2. Do not try and tackle all of the organizing on your own. Get everyone in your home involved in becoming organized. Make it a family affair. Assign each family member a task or tasks to complete and decide on a time frame to complete. As tasks are accomplished, everyone celebrates together.

3. Create a party atmosphere. Another fun organizing idea is to consider organizing as a big celebration! Put on clothes that make you feel festive and put on a few party songs. Serve pizza and punch and celebrate your achievements. Be creative. Do whatever makes the mood festive for you.

4. Treat organizing like a puzzle. Organizing can be a challenge. However, this can be considered rather daunting and not much fun. If you treat organizing like a puzzle, it can become more like a game instead. The more pieces you fit together (the more organizing you accomplish), the more complete and whole the puzzle becomes.

5. Rewards make a huge difference when it comes to getting a task done. Organizing does take time and effort, but to make it more worthwhile, do not forget to give yourself a reward for your accomplishments and achievements. If you do not give yourself a pat on the back or a reward for getting an organizing goal finished, you are not going to be motivated to continue toward more goals. Pick a reward that is something you enjoy doing or something you really want. When you achieve another organizing goal, plan another reward to work toward.

6. Use fun organizing tools and supplies to boost your mood and your level of wanting to get organized. Plan a trip to stores with organizing supplies to get new and fresh ideas. Look for new storage items you can use to improve your living space and help you become more organized. This fun organizing idea also spruces up the look of any space.

7. Make organizing a friendly competition. A competition between family members or friends can put a whole new spin on getting organized. Set several goals for participants to work toward with varying levels for each accomplishment achieved. Designate a corresponding treat as a prize to attain for each level. Begin the competition. When finished and goals are achieved, hold a reward ceremony.

8. To get children more involved in organizing, play ‘beat the clock.. Assign a ‘put away’ basket for each child. Set a timer for 30 seconds and see who can pick up the most items. Keep score and be sure to award the winner with a prize, such as a movie or getting to stay up later for an evening. This fun organizing idea is sure to get the kids excited about organizing.

9. Associating organizing with something you enjoy can help make the tasks more fun. For example, you can watch your favorite TV show as long as you also sort through the paperwork on your desk. Or make it a fun milestone. If you finished an organizing project, treat yourself to a movie. Decide what works best for you and then work toward the milestone.

Using any of the fun orgainzing ideas above is sure to add a bit more joy into organizing any space.  

Stop by Get Organized Now – and check out the amazing collection of 2,175 ideas, tips and techniques for organizing your home, getting rid of clutter, organizing your time, your schedule, your money, your paper, your family and much more!

Keep these ten outdoor dining tips in mind the next time you have a gathering of friends and family. Outdoor dining can be inconvenient when done haphazardly. Plan ahead and you’ll increase your chances of an enjoyable, memorable event.

1. Check the weather. Don’t take chances on being rained out. If the event is planned well ahead of time, consider reserving a pavilion or renting a canopy in the event of inclement weather. For spontaneous outdoor dining, be flexible and understand that weather often changes quickly and you may have to alter your plans.

2. Keep hot food hot. Be sure hot foods are cooked to above 140 degrees F and kept to at least 140 degrees F if not eaten promptly.

3. Keep cold food cold. An upset stomach is not something you want to remember about your outdoor dining event. Use coolers and lots of ice to keep potentially hazardous foods well chilled and don’t leave food dishes out in the hot sun where bacteria will thrive. Keep filled coolers in air- conditioned vehicles when traveling, not in the trunk, and refrain from opening and closing the lid often.

4. Bring wet wipes. Eating outside is often messy and having the ability to wipe off hands with a moist cloth is helpful when no hand-washing facilities are present. Keep a pack in your car for unexpected outdoor dining gatherings and include a bottle of hand sanitizer as well.

5. Think about the eating surface. You may want to bring along a large vinyl tablecloth to make dining more pleasant. Picnic benches are often nasty surfaces and difficult to clean, so covering the picnic bench or other surface with a tablecloth makes good sense. Weigh down your tablecloth with rocks in the case of windy conditions, or purchase clips or weights to be used for that purpose.

6. Don’t forget the sun block. Even on cloudy days, your skin is quickly susceptible to burning. If there is a lot of reflective surface around, such as pavement or water, sunburn is a risk as well, even in winter. Even if you remember yours before leaving your house, someone may forget theirs, so bring some sun block along.

7. Bring activities for outdoor dining events. If food is cooked on site, it may be a long time before being served. If kids are involved (or even just adults), having activities planned helps pass the time and keeps people active. Bring a ball, flying disk or maybe even a kite if the location is right.

8. Consider net covers for serving food dishes. Purchase inexpensive umbrella-like, fold out mesh covers to keep flying insects out of the food. These covers are often found in discount stores during the summer season.

9. Bring an empty trash bag. Clean up well after yourself and leave the outdoor dining site as you found it, or better, so that others may enjoy the location after you leave.

10. Take note of your surroundings. Don’t concentrate so much on the food, that you forget where you are. Savor your meal, but look around and take in the scenery around you.

In this day and age, with the state of the world economy, being thrifty has become of supreme importance. Being thrifty in our organizing doesn’t have to be a bad thing. There are so many fun and creative ways to encorporate low cost storage solutions into your home and or office space.

1) The most important factor in being organized is to be able to locate what you need when you need it. Rather than just thinking of being organized as having everything in neat, matching boxes, think of being organized as you owning your stuff as opposed to your stuff owning you.

2) Organizing holiday items is something you can get your whole family involved in. Rather than spending additional money on red and green boxes to store Christmas items, you can have your children create special labels for the boxes you do have. They can color trees or Santas or other holiday themed pictures for you to affix to the front of the boxes. Then when you store them, you will be able to see which ones are the holiday boxes just by looking. You can do this for any holiday or even birthday supplies. (Summer is a great time to get your holiday stuff organized! When Christmas rolls around, it will be all ready.)

3) Looking to organize your bathroom? Low cost storage solutions can also be applied to your bathrooms. You can spend just a couple of dollars on a roll of colorful contact paper and cover some shoeboxes. You can have a box for make-up, one for hair styling supplies, anything you like! Another advantage to this is that the contact paper can easily be wiped down with a slightly damp cloth and will stay looking new.

4) The low cost storage solutions of using contact paper can actually be used in many places in your house. If you need more clothing storage but don’t want to spend money on a furniture piece just now, you can cover banker’s boxes (or other cardboard boxes) and use them for dresser cubes. This also allows you to change out the ‘decor’ whenever you want. You can cover smaller boxes to hold office supplies or other home office items.

5) Looking for ways to be nifty and thrifty in your kitchen or pantry? Buy a handful of inexpensive plastic lazy susans and create specific areas. You can have a baking area, a canned soup area, a children’s snack area just for some examples. By keeping these areas together and organized, you will save money because you will know exactly what you have. You will be able to see these items in your cabinet with just a spin of the lazy susan. This will help to avoid things being lost in the back which will eventually be thrown out because they become stale. This will help you to avoid buying duplicates of items you already have and it will help you to be able to meal plan by seeing right in front of you what is there and what you might need to buy.

6) The biggest nifty and thrifty way you can organize is to cut down on the amount of stuff you have. ESPECIALLY if you are paying for a storage unit or have your garage so full of storage stuff that you can’t park your car in there. The fewer items or boxes that you are storing, the better able you will be to organize them effectively. If you have things in storage that are valuable to you either monetarily or sentimentally, then they should be taken care of and respected. They should not be shoved into storage boxes with a bunch of things that aren’t as important.

7) If you do have an offsite storage unit that you are paying for, it’s important to know exactly what is in there. Then you can determine where you might be able to store the stuff at your home so it won’t cost you so much money. You might also decide that the stuff in storage isn’t worth paying that amount of money for any longer.

8 ) You might be asking yourself what is ‘nifty’ about getting rid of stuff. By cutting back on the quantity of things that we have, we can more fully enjoy the items that we are keeping. If we only have a few select pieces or collectibles, they can be properly displayed inside the home. Spending money to collect things that we just end up storing is neither nifty nor thrifty!

Remember, it’s important for you to own your things, not have them own you. Cherish the items that you do want to keep and take care of them properly. By following any or all of the above low cost storage solutions, you will be organized on the cheap!

Have you found yourself getting frustrated at your seeming lack of ability to get organized? Are you wondering if there might be a better way to go about getting your home organized? Fear not! We have a few tips for you that can help you avoid, or minimize, some of the pitfalls.

1. DON’T try to do it all in one day!

It is very easy to think we need to get it all done in one day. The reality is that our homes don’t get cluttered in one day and it takes more than one day to get it decluttered and organized. So do yourself a favor and don’t try to do everything in one day.

DO look realistically at your existing commitments and schedule.

Once you know what you’ve already got on your schedule, do schedule time each day, or as many days in a week as you can to begin the decluttering and organizing process.

2. DON’T try to organize clutter!

If you try organizing clutter, you’ll only get discouraged and give up. You end up moving stuff from one place in your home to another. Or, you end up with a room or a closet or more stuffed to the rafters with ‘stuff.’ The rest of your house may look great, but the reality is a bit different.

DO spend the time decluttering first.

You can donate items to charity, or have a garage sale and sell the excess. Keep only those things that you love and use, and that add value to your life. Let the rest go to benefit someone else.

3. DON’T work randomly.

Working randomly means you start and stop. It means you get sidetracked. It means you’re less likely to be able to actually complete what you start out to do. This way of working; rather than being conducive to successful organizing is more likely to get discouraging because it takes twice as long to reach your goals.

DO work with a plan.

There are three main tools you need to work successfully–a plan, 3 boxes and scheduled time. Your plan consists of your overall strategy, including your list of what you want to accomplish. The three boxes should be labeled as follows: one box for donations, one box for keep and one box for trash. Work for the amount of time you have available on your schedule and follow your plan. Don’t leave the room to put things elsewhere until you are finished for that day’s allotment of time.

4. DON’T get discouraged if it looks worse before it looks better.

For a while it will. Remember, you’re making separate `piles’. The keep pile, the donate/sell pile and the trash pile. Don’t let the extra mess discourage you. It’s progress!

DO take encouragement from the way your different boxes are filling up.

To help keep the piles a bit smaller, at the end of the day, or even at the end of the week, take your donation items to your charity of choice. Also, take your trash out to the trash can. It will help keep the mess down a bit and also help you to see progress as you work your way around the room.

Stop by Get Organized Now – and check out the amazing collection of 2,175 ideas, tips and techniques for organizing your home, getting rid of clutter, organizing your time, your schedule, your money, your paper, your family and much more!

5. DON’T try to work the whole room at once.

Just like trying to schedule a marathon session for your whole house can be overwhelming. Trying to do an entire room at once can be overwhelming too. But it doesn’t have to be.

DO divide the room up into quadrants and work in one quadrant at a time.

When you finish it move on to the next quadrant. This make the decluttering and follow-on organizing much more manageable.

6. DON’T rush out to buy any containers first.

That’s usually our first temptation–to run out and buy containers to organize with. But, to do that before you finish decluttering just adds more clutter to your home!

DO complete your decluttering before you buy any containers.

Once you have finished decluttering, then you know exactly what kind of storage, if any, that you really need.

7. DON’T go it alone.

Do you ever feel like you’re fighting the organizing battle alone? You shouldn’t take on the entire project alone. Chances are, there are things your family can do to aid in the decluttering and organizing.

DO enlist the family.

Children are often eager to help, especially with incentive: more time with Mom; keeping the money their clutter sells for at a garage sale, etc. Hold a family meeting and explain what you would like to accomplish and how they can help.

8. DON’T declutter your spouse’s stuff for them.

Sometimes it can take time for our spouses to agree that their stuff needs to be decluttered too. The less you try to force them into decluttering, the better.

DO concentrate on your own stuff first.

It almost always happens that our spouses see how much easier it is for us to find things of ours and they want the same thing for themselves. If you declutter your stuff first without trying to get them to do the same, they often come around.

9. DON’T add any clutter back once you begin to declutter.

If you continue to add clutter while you are trying to declutter, you’re setting yourself up to try to climb and re-climb a mountain of clutter. Instead of adding to the clutter!

DO declare a war on new clutter.

This means simply that you add nothing more than consumables (food, drink, toiletries, etc) until you have your clutter under control. Be sure to check your consumable supplies first before going out to buy more. You don’t want to duplicate what you already have.

10. DON’T let it get away from you again.

So many times we work hard to get rid of clutter, then let it build back up again. This can happen so easily and quickly! Sometimes we don’t even realize that we are building clutter again. So how do we maintain our decluttered state?

DO organize in a way that works for you.

If it doesn’t work for you, you won’t use it. Then, to maintain your decluttered and organized home, make a rule for you and your family. The rule is: One in – One out. Simple, but it goes a long way towards minimizing a return of clutter. How does it work? For every one item you bring into the house, at least one item goes out to charity or trash or a sale box in your garage. Follow through and you will stay organized and clutter free.

Stop by Get Organized Now – and check out the amazing collection of 2,175 ideas, tips and techniques for organizing your home, getting rid of clutter, organizing your time, your schedule, your money, your paper, your family and much more!

Here are a few suggestions on how to organize grocery lists and shopping so that you can get in and out of the store quickly and effeciently!

1. Get it on paper – When you think about how to organize grocery lists why not start with paper and pen. As you use up the last of any item, write it down on a designated list under the name of the store where you would purchase the item. This will help you find what you need right away. Have this list handy so your family can add to it as the need presents itself.

2. Be prepared- When it is time to shop for your groceries, try and limit it to one day a week. Gather up the lists and any coupons you can use. Have a designated plastic folder or envelope to hold them all, and have it with you at all times. If you should unexpectedly stop at that particular store, you can use the coupon for the items you need.

3. Get help from the kids – Enlist the help of children when you start to organize grocery lists and head out shopping. When you are shopping with older children, divide up the list and have them pick up items from the other aisles. If at all possible, leave the little ones at home. They almost always add to impulse shopping. Plus your focus then needs to be divided between the grocery shopping and making sure the kids aren’t pulling things off the shelves, or putting items you don’t wish to purchase in your cart.

4. Instruct the Baggers – Request that the Bagger pack all perishables together in the bags so you can grab them first when you return home. This also gives you the option of leaving the non-perishables to unpack at your leisure.

5. Carry the recipes with you – Carry your family’s favorite recipes with you on little index cards that have the ingredients listed. You can see what is needed on the recipe card and get the items you don’t already have. Saves unnecessary stops at the grocery store during the week for that one forgotten item!

6. Do a bit of prep work – When you get home and unpack your groceries, do some preliminary meal preparation. Cook meat and then package it into meal sized dinners. Wash all your fruit and veggies. Cut the veggies so you can just put them into the dishes you plan on making. This can be a real time saver for your meal preparation.

7. Create a meal plan. By having a meal plan for the week, along with the items needed list, you should have a quick and easy shopping adventure each and every week.

8. Think outside the box – There is also another solution for grocery shopping. There are various agencies and many supermarkets that can do it for you. If there is just not enough time in your busy schedule, using that service once in awhile, or all the time if you budget permits, might help you get caught up with your To Do list.

With the use of the tips above, you will learn how to organize grocery lists and shopping so that it is quick and painless.