Organizing

Julaine's Miscellany

Miscellaneous Tips

  • A plastic ketchup bottle filled with raspberry, chocolate or caramel sauce and use it to embellish a dessert plate with zigzags, swirls, or polka dots.
  • Christmas Tree Lights - go from bottom to top and back down again. Easier to remove provides better coverage.
  • Life Savers - place candle inside to create stable base on a cake.
  • Paper Towel Stand - ribbon organizer
  • Reuse old plastic soap bottles as ice blocks. Fill to an inch from top, freeze. As ice melts squirt out of bottle for washing hands, rinsing, etc. Use to keep groceries cool. 
  • Measure dry ingredients over a clean sheet of waxed paper. Spoon onto a measuring cup and level the top with a straight edge (or butter knife), sweeping excess onto the paper. 
    • Once you've measured, pick up the paper and funnel the excess back into the cannister. Save the paper for the next time. If you like, or use it to line a cake pan. 
  • Use a bulletin board in laundry room to hand up useful items i.e. clothing, toys that have been removed, extra buttons, hotel sewing kits, mini scissors. 
  • File Rack - store cookie sheets and.or cutting boards in a file rack.
  • Spring - a heavy gauge spring can act as a horizontal file to keep your papers upright. 
  • Twist tie keep cables organized
  • File folder labels -cord labelers
  • Napkin holder - bill organizer
  • Track your energy levels - each hour and record them from 1 to 10
  • Binder clips - attach two 3/4 inch clips to the bottom of a card or photograph for a stand up exhibit.
  • Old ketchup bottle - use it to disperse pancake mix into the frying pan.
  • Wrap aluminum foil around door knobs when painting.
  • To get baked-on crud off a glass pan or oven rack use a ball of foil.
  • Ice Cubes - Drop a clean mint leaf, a strawberry, raspberry, grape or a twist of lemon peel or even a peppermint candy.
  • Colour & Mood
    • Calm - stone, sand, wood and watery blues and lavender
    • Cheerful - yellow, orange, pink, blue and green (vibrant & punch7)
    • Dramatic - saturated tones - re, espresso brown, burnt umber, gold, blank
    • Nostalgic - blue, green ochre, wood browns, warm, enduring colours, gold, silver, nickel and brass
  • Filing Cabinets - Use a citrus based shipped and a metal brush to remove the enamel paint.
  • Water Hyacinth -Infiltrating Lake Victoria so look for products made from it
  • Storage - use a shoe hanger for barbie dolls, plastic jars for puzzle pieces
  • Rubber Bands - use as a divider on a glass/jar - pens, etc.
Storing Toilet Paper
Use an old freestanding paper towel holder.
Recipes
Ask family members to rate recipes from 1->10. Anything below a five should not be repeated.
Kitchen Storage
Use metal dividers to store pans vertically stack cookie sheets on a shelf to create a handy sliding drawer.
Sort wooden, plastic & metal utensils in separate containers.
Living Room
To plan a photo display, use low-tack drafting tape to hang template (same size as photos). Make sure to measure from mounting hook to the top of the frame and mark location on template. When satisfied with placement, hammer nails through templates. Remove templates and hang photos.
Office
Mount a power strip to the underside of your desk. Then mount a coated wire rack beside the strip for the cables/cords. Bundle wires with twist ties. Use tags to identify which machine wires come from.
Perpetual calendar to remember important dates.
Entryway
Mount a chair rail on the wall and attach pegs to hang frequently accessed items.

Organizing in 5 Steps

  1. Maintain daily habits (and the habits of those around you).
  2. Identify the messiest, most chaotic areas.
  3. Change the environment. People do not change.
  4. Consider options (there are endless options).
  5. Make it unique. Make it fun. Make it yours.

Basics of Organizing

  • Identify the significant pieces
  • sort by (one or more)
  • components
  • sequences
  • priories
  • Detail to the required degree

Next Action

What is the next action?
spreadsheet and notes

Organizing Email

I just finished reading Upgrade your Life: The Lifehacker guide to working smarter, faster, better. Wow, I am impressed. There are several great ideas. My favourite are the tips for organizing your email program. A short synopsis can be found on the LifeHacker website.

Basically, you restrict yourself to 4 folders - Inbox, Follow Up, Hold, and Archive. Amazingly simple and amazingly productive.

Newsletter emails

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Here's one way to handle the situation: I've noticed that many people who sign up for my own newsletter are using email addresses that look like this: name.of.newsletter@domain.com. Or sometimes name.newsletter@domain.com, where "name" is the person's name. It's usually done with a custom domain and sometimes a webmail service.
 
At first glance, this seems like a whole lot of trouble, creating a brand new email address for each newsletter. But it's probably a lot simpler than that, and can be very effective in combating spam.
 
Firstly, you don't have to create a new address. You can just use the email address as an alias or as a forward to another primary 'subscriptions' address that remains private. And when you decide to unsubscribe, technically you don't even have to unsubscribe — you can just delete the address. And if you're curious, you can keep it set up just to see if that particular service you subscribed to ended up using your email address in ways you didn't agree to.

Naming Ideas

Naming is hard but it does not have to be. Every idea benefits from a good name, check out Onym's list of resources for naming.

I always need names for a bunch of computers. I found this site that provides a whole bunch of categories.

But that list was missing some of my favourites. I like to use trees:

Boreal Forest

  • spruce
  • pine
  • poplar
  • aspen

 Then I found the Populate site, which is full of lists of names.

Here is some advice on choosing a name for your computer.

How to Create Meaningful Names In Code.

Just to let you know, this page was last updated Thursday, Nov 21 24