I am admitting I know nothing about baby gear.

I know I missed my What I Wore Wednesday post yesterday, but--the holiday. Post vacation catch-up at work and home. Excuses excuses. I'll treat you to Vacation Edition next week.

In the meantime: We have actually begun the long-delayed process of figuring out what baby stuff we want to buy or register for.

I am so, so sick of reading reviews for baby stuff. It all blurs together. People love and hate the same product, vehemently. They complain about the same feature over and over again in all the different models--so where's the one that gets the feature right? Apparently the whole thing is just a crapshoot.

Maybe we picked out a crib, maybe a car seat. I thought a stroller, too, but now we're thinking maybe we don't need a stroller right away so are looking at other, non-newborn or travel-system options.

It's so hard to decide what is useful and what is junk and what is absolutely necessary and what will never be used. Obviously it's not like either of us have any idea what life with a baby will be like, so how can we decide what items will help make this life more efficient and pleasant? Everyone has contradicting opinions on the matter, too.

How can you be a good steward of your money--and the money of all the people buying stuff off your baby registry--when you have no freaking idea what you're doing?

(Registries could be a whole 'nother rant, I suppose. Asking for things you want but (often) can't afford but that you somehow expect other people to buy for you. And people get so judgey about the things you ask for on registries. Could everyone who feels obligated to get me a gift just send me a wad of cash instead? I promise I'll set it aside in a special fund and will use it to buy baby things without dealing with the guilt of wondering what you think about the things I want to buy. But asking for money is so terribly tacky. Argh.)

Happily, the DDH and I tend to have similar ideas about the process: try to keep the list of stuff to a minimum, and try to find good quality items of the things you decide to get. To that end, on our Epic Baby Gear Reconnaissance last night, we happily skipped right past mountains of clothing, fluffy blankets, and gaudy, noisy plastic gewgaws, and spent way too much time looking at cribs, car seats, and bassinet-thingies.

Much simpler to buy for.

Things we're looking for:

1. Car seat. A safe one. That can be carried around so that we have that option, not because we necessarily see ourselves leaving T-Rex in it all the time. But let sleeping babies lie, y'know? Anyway, I've heard they won't let you take a baby home from the hospital without one, so I figure it's pretty much The Most Important item to have.

2. Crib. Not so much for the newborn phase but the corraling-a-mobile-baby-who-sleeps-mostly-through-the-night stage. Or whatever else you might need to have a handy baby/toddler cage around for.

3. Something for T-Rex to sleep in in our room for the first several months to a year. We're looking at pack'n'play bassinet things, just bassinet things, side-along sleeper things.

In-bed co-sleeping is simply Not An Option for us for a variety of reasons. Which, considering that I sleep violently and the dogs love sneaking into bed in the middle of the night (though I guess we could lock out of the room), is probably wise.

But I'm also not sticking the Critter in a crib in a room downstairs on the other side of the house. We want him in the room and nearby, convenient to deal with in the middle of the night.

4. Maybe another one of those pack'n'play/bassinet thingies for confining T-Rex in the living areas of the house. I'm certainly not toting the same one up and down those tiny enclosed stairs every day.

Note that as much of the concern is keeping him from getting run over by the dogs (or having Jayne drop his balls on the baby's head) as anything else. Something with a raised changing area would be nice, too, but mostly I want to be able to set him down without him getting trampled by a jealous Beagle or slobbered on by a Lab who doesn't understand why he won't throw the ball.

5. Moby-wrap/ring-sling/fabric carrier and a more structured one that the DDH would be willing to wear. I need to find some somewhere that I can try on, but this seems the most sensible (and cozy and adorable) solution for taking T-Rex out and about in the early months as well as for carting him about the house while I try to do other things. The DDH said he can't be bothered with the weird complicated cloth ones, but he'd wear one that buckles. Especially if it's camo-print. He tried a camo print one on in the store and gave it his stamp of husbandly approval.

6. Breast pump and paraphernalia (bottles, bottle-cleaning brushes, storage bags...I don't even know how these things work). I'll need a good one if I'm going back to work.

7. Cloth diapers and paraphernalia. THERE ARE TOO MANY CHOICES. But I'm determined to at least attempt cloth diapering. The DDH says he doesn't care and the day care we're looking at will use them if we provide them. So. Need a stash of those.

8. Mini high-chair thingy. We found some that will strap to a kitchen chair, including ones that recline for a newborn. I would rather bother with that than a full high chair, and it occurred to us we'll need to set the kid somewhere while we eat.

9. We're debating about a stroller. We don't think we'd use it much until he's a tad older, but if we're going to want one eventually we might as well ask for one now, yes?

10. Oh! A diaper bag. That will round out this list to ten. I don't have any particular requirements for a diaper bag, since it seems they're like purses--you'll collect new ones as they catch your eye or your needs change. I may or may not have a slight obsession with bags--backpacks, purses, tote bags...I just want a diaper bag that's reasonably sized, reasonably attractive, and doesn't cost $180 freaking dollars. Or more.

I sort of feel like other than clothes (and it will be winter so I guess we can't leave him naked all the time) and outlet/cabinet baby-proof locks and blankets and toys and books (all things, other than the baby-proofing stuff, that we're going to be given in spades and/or can buy used), that's mostly it? Oh, also clothes for me, I guess, by which I mean nursing bras/camis/nipple pads or whatever.

Am I crazy? What are we forgetting? Do you have any recommendations for any of this stuff--or for other stuff? What did you find most useful when your kiddos were babies?

I am crafty: Altoids tin repurposing.

Perhaps you can blame my mother for my love of Altoids mints. She gave us a tin in our stockings each Christmas. I savored those mints, striving to stretch my supply until the following Christmas. When I was old enough and had spending money of my own, I invariably bought Altoids. I've tried just about all the flavors and varieties (my standard favorite is Wintergreen).

However. I am also a packrat, and have thrown away few of the containers I have collected over the years. Okay, I've thrown away plenty, but I've also saved plenty. They're just such useful little things!

One of my favorite uses for old Altoid tins is the mini kit. Sometimes I just toss supplies into an empty tin and call it good; a few I've labeled with Sharpie. But I'm an adult now, so I really ought to make nicer looking kits.

Here are two uses for an Altoid tin: a mini first aid kit and a business card holder.

I have a separate container for my most commonly-needed OTC meds (namely sudafed and ibprofen or, while pregnant, tylenol), but I do also carry in my purse a stash of bandaids (mostly for shoe blisters) and, ah, gas relief medication.

I used to carry these items in a plastic baggie, but recently the bag ripped and I ended up with smooshed and torn bandaids all over the bottom of my purse. The solution? This nifty Altoid-tin-turned-first-aid-kit.

Since I also have some business cards for my Real Job but don't have a paycheck that would fund the purchase of a thirty-dollar Fancy Business Card Holder, I decided to use an Altoid tin for that purpose, too.

First, the materials:

The white paper is just spare scrapbook paper; for the red
cross I actually used an envelope from Target rather than
any fancy sort of paper.

• an Altoid or similar tin for each use
• paper for decorating the outside of your tin
• Mod-Podge (or thin out some white glue with water)
• brush for applying Mod-Podge

Wipe out the inside of your tin(s) with a damp cloth. It may still smell minty fresh, but you probably don't want suspicious white powder all over your business cards (or bandaids, for that matter).

Trace the top of the tin onto paper.

Make sure to trace onto the "back" side of your paper, if
it has sides.

Traced.

Cut the paper to size.

Repeat steps 2. and 3. if you want to cover the bottom of your tin as well.

Apply a layer of Mod-Podge to the top (bottom) of your tin. Be generous, but not so generous that excess will ooze down the sides and glue your tin shut when you press the paper on.

Press your paper to the Mod-Podged top (bottom) of the tin.

It should line up pretty evenly; if not, trim with scissors or
an exacto knife.

If you want any other decorations, draw and cut them out. First trace an outline of your tin onto the paper you plan to use so you can ensure that your decoration will fit.

Outline.

To do a red cross for a first aid kit, draw a cross onto the back of some red paper. Each line of my cross is 1/2" long, if that makes sense. Use a ruler to keep it straight!

Remember again to draw on the back side of your paper.
You can see how many times I messed up the poor cross.

Cut out the cross/other design.

Cut out and flipped over.

Apply a layer of Mod-Podge to the top of the paper on your tin. Feel free to do this as thick or thin as you like--a thick layer will provide a more textured finished product, while a thin layer will be sleek.

You do want your paper to get pretty well soaked.

Apply your cross or other decoration.

Position it how you want it now.

Apply more Mod-Podge on top. Don't worry--it will dry clear, I promise! You want to make sure the entire papered surface is coated in at least a thin layer. Once hardened, it will protect your paper from tearing or light water damage (use outdoor, waterproof Mod-Podge if this is something you intend to get wet).

White now, clear later. Promise.

Allow to dry. Depending on climate and how thick you layered the Mod-Podge, this will take 30 minutes to several hours.

Still not quite dry, but almost.

Fill your finished tin with your supplies!

Secret bandaid tin!

For the business card version, I simply trimmed the corners of the business card since the tin has rounded edges,

Chic?

then applied with Mod-Podge as described above. After I did this, I discovered that I would have to trim the corners off all my cards if I wanted them to fit inside the thing. So I did. Hopefully people I give them to will think it's spiffy rather than odd.

If you got Mod-Podge around the edge of your tin,
you may want to leave them open to dry so you don't glue them
closed on accident.

Ta-da! Now I'm not exactly the first person to do this sort of thing to an Altoid tin; I'm not even the cleverest. But I do love them for storing things that would otherwise get beat up in my purse, and now everyone knows more-or-less what's inside--in a nicer way than if I had just labeled them with Sharpie. ;-)

For more tin repurposing ideas, check out The Art of Manliness's Twenty-Two Manly Uses for an Altoids Tin, Tested's fancy techie uses for Altoids tins, and Artists Helping Children's 15 Cool Crafts using Altoids tins.

I am productive.

Work's been crazy. I have some posts in the works that hopefully will get published soon.

Life lately:

Wednesday, my hold on Catching Fire (the second book in The Hunger Games trilogy, for those of you hiding under rocks or with bad memories for book titles) came in and I picked it up at the library.

I read a chapter at lunch on Thursday.

Friday, I ended up not getting a lunch but instead getting to leave work about an hour early. I came home, sprinkled baking powder over the family room carpet in a futile attempt to make it smell less like dog pee, started some pizza dough going in the bread maker, made a very belated lunch, and sat down to read Catching Fire while I ate.

Four hours later, there was still baking soda on my floors and dough in the machine, but I had finished my lunch--and the book.

I love getting swallowed up in a story. I rarely have the luxury of doing so for hours at a time anymore. My soul needed it.

Also, my hold on Mockingjay needs to come in now.

***

Over the weekend, I turned our guest bedroom from a junk graveyard to a welcoming resting place in preparation for some visitors next week.

It's a bit of a novelty for me to have a guest bedroom in the first place. I grew up with three siblings and three bedrooms; my sister and I shared a room not too terribly much bigger than my furniture. Guests were relegated to a pull-out sofa in the living room.

Then my dog ate my grandmother's expensive Italian leather shoes. After that, they stayed in a hotel when they came to visit.

The DDH and I, however, have five bedrooms all to ourselves (and The Roommate), because the DDH bought this house in order to rent out the rooms to other students. So now I have a master bedroom, an office, a craft room, and not one but two guest bedrooms. Or, now, one guest room and one Roommate-room, and soon to be one guest bedroom and one nursery.

These aren't true before pictures, as I took them Sunday, when I had already spent an hour or so Saturday mostly-clearing the bed. I also didn't think to take pictures until after I had reorganized and neatened the bookshelves. Let's just say that when The Roommate moved in, a lot of what was stored in what is now his room simply crossed the hall to this room and has languished there ever since.

The bed used to be worse. Much worse.

Admittedly the stepstool is there because I just finished dusting
and straightening the bookshelves. But the vacuum had been
stored in that exact same place.

Too much furniture in this room. You can't even see it all
because I couldn't photograph from the fourth corner.

But look at these nice afters! Wouldn't you like to come stay with me?

The Neuschwanstein poster is straight; the camera is crooked.

Much better.

I can actually take a picture from this angle now!

Ta-da!

Ok, so it lacks curtains. And pillows. And the walls are just white. But look! There's stuff on them! And not on the bed/tables/headboard/floor! You can get into the bed from either side, and all the superfluous furniture has gone on to bigger and better things.

I was going to frame that horse breeds poster on the bed and hang it on the blank wall, but the DDH had a better idea. He bought some wood, made a frame, and stretched a canvas map we had lying around to make a lovely art piece for the room--not pictured, because he hadn't done it yet. And because his level is at work so he can't hang it until he remembers to bring that home.

So with the map and the Neuschwanstein poster that I bought at the actual Neuschwanstein*, there's sort of a travel theme going, I guess. And look at all these lovely books:

This is where I keep all my "kids' books:" YA/children's novels,
kids' Bibles, picture books, and illustrated reference books.

The MIL and the sweet boy I babysit both donated to our
picture book collection.

There are a lot of books on horses.

Mein liebstes Maerchen Buch, a puppy from the DDH,
and a sketch of balloons by a college friend.

***

There was originally more re-capping that was going to occur in this post, but it's been three days since I intended to write it and this is all I remember.

Everyone loves a good before-and-after picture set, though. So that's enough. ^_^


*Proof:

Famous fairy-tale castle and somewhat-less-famous me.

What are you up to these days? How do you accommodate guests?

Do you have too little space or, like us, too much?

I am dressed (don't ask much more of me)!

I've been in a bit of a rut, outfit-wise, for a few weeks, but this past week or so I finally hit on some inspiration and a few outfits that look good.

Have I shown you this one before? It's from back in February:

Shirt: Either H&M in Freiburg (because
there's not one in Oklahoma OR New Mexico,
cry) or Old Navy--I have two red shirts and don't
remember which one this was; Dress: Old Navy;
Leggings: Target; Necklace: Kohl's.

Sometimes I like the dress-over-a-shirt thing and sometimes I don't. This one was okay, except apparently the shirt added a bit of bulk around the middle--a lady at church asked me when the baby was due. :-(

I really feel like I've described this outfit before, but I don't see it in my old posts. Hmm.

Anyway, I like this dress because it's so comfy-casual-summer, but that crossed bodice style, though popular and though I always end up buying items with it, really doesn't work that well with small boobs. A size that's big enough both to be long enough and to fit me around the waist/shoulders/hips/wherever inevitably gapes at the boobs. So the shirt underneath helps solve this problem as well as warmed it up for winter.

Shirt: Old Navy; Jeggings: American Eagle;
Necklace: Target.

I have had this shirt for.ev.er. My sister has a matching one. She ripped a hole in it and tried to pull a switcheroo on me. I sewed up the hole in hers and stole my uninjured one back. THAT'S HOW OLD THIS IS, I was still in high school and shared a room with my sister.

I love this outfit. I love blousy tops with jeggings/skinny jeans (skinny jeans have the advantage of pockets). I also get a lot of complements on that necklace--I swear it was just on sale at Target, it's nothing special. I wore this out with my purple pumps and around the house with my ballet flat slippers and it's just so comfy and yet put-together. Win.

Shirt: Old Navy; Sweater: Old Navy; Pants:
Target; Belt: Target or Old Navy; Dog Collar:
Southern Agriculture.

Jayne wanted to get in on the fashion picture action, too.

Even though I burrow into a cardigan every day at the office, very rarely does it occur to me to actually make it a part of the outfit. This makes sense in the summer, when I'm not wearing it outside of the office, but it was cool enough for a cardigan out and about.

It's amazing what buttoning the thing up and slapping a belt on the outside of it will do to an otherwise normal and boring outfit.

Camisole: Kohl's; Shirt: Old Navy; Skinny
Jeans: Old Navy; Belt: stolen from a jacket
that I got at SteinMart.

Wow, this picture makes my hips look huge. It didn't feel like that was the case IRL.

Here again is an outfit I've worn numerous times: black v-neck shirt over a red camisole, with my very favorite dark skinny jeans. But it occurred to me that the sash from a red jacket I had would work tied around the middle, and it did. It brought definition to my figure and flair to the outfit.

And then it was freezing in church and I wore my scarf and trenchcoat the entire time so no one even saw my awesomeness. And then when I had to take the coat off to donate blood I also took off the sash because restricting my breathing when I knew I would get light-headed seemed like a bad idea.

But I wore this again with a pair of black slacks to the office and was happy with it.

Dress: Target; Cardigan: Old Navy; Belt:
Target or Old Navy; Tights: Target;
Necklace: Target? Express? Somewhere.

Monday we had a Very Important Lunch Meeting. These are intimidating, because our clients and potential clients are all wealthy, successful professionals--lawyers, in this case--and dress like, well, they have a lot of money, in high-quality suits and things. I usually try to wear a dress or some other outfitty thing because my singular suit jacket that I bought at Target for Youth & Government back in high school is...pretty sad. So rather than try and fail with an obviously cheap "professional look," I go with an outfit that's obviously not trying to look like a suit, where the cheap clothing maybe isn't as noticeable.

And didn't I look awesome? It's impossible to tell in the picture, but the dress is a dark gray with a hatch pattern of lighter gray stripes, and then a black cardigan, gray silver-studded belt, black leggins, and my gray leather boots. I liked it, anyway.

So there you go! A ridiculously long look at what I've been wearing.

I am organized (and can wrap presents)!

Remember that disaster of a craft room I shared last week?

Specifically this one.

Well, I have made a bit of progress! Look:

Progress as promised.

The other angles still look very similar. The trash bag of trash has been replaced with a giant box of trash. But look how I cleared off that dresser! And I didn't just move it into a different part of the room, either. I did this:

Into one drawer, I put all my shipping-wrapping supplies (butcher paper, bubble wrap, and packing peanuts):

Shipping supplies.

Can you say packrat? Yeah, well, be proud that I limited myself to three gallon-sized Ziplocs filled with packing peanuts. It's better than keeping the actual shipping boxes filled with them, trust me.

Into another went all the gift-wrapping boxes and gift bags:

Handy.

Again, packratting. I think I've bought one thing of tissue paper and three bags...ever. I just save every single one I get and send them back out into the world filled with gifts...or use them to give stuff to the DDH and then steal them back from him to store. Whatever.

Aaaaaaand in the bottom drawer on the little dresser that's stacked on top of the dresser (I have an awkward surfeit of furniture) went all the tissue paper and the ribbons:

Ta-da!

I have a different quart-sized Ziploc bag for each color of tissue paper. Some colors are sorted more precisely (dark blues, light blues, turquoises) while others are all together (pink, colored patterns). White tissue paper has a gallon-sized bag instead of a quart-sized (you can see it under the ribbons).

This keeps the tissue paper from getting ripped when stored and makes it easy to quickly find colors that complement the bag I'm using.

I've used this method for several years, but I used to have all the boxes, bags, and tissue paper piled into an old comforter bag--which was handy because it was portable, but I had slowly allowed the organization to falter, my stock was beginning to outgrow the bag, and I couldn't find a good place to store it where I could get to it easily.

Theoretically once this room is finished there will be clear work spaces that will be perfect for wrapping gifts, and all my supplies are in one handy place (because a craft room will be well stocked with scissors and tape, obvs).

I keep the Christmas gift-wrapping supplies with the Christmas supplies, though once this room is done they may get moved in here. (Did I say I had never bought any gift bags/tissue paper/wrapping paper? I lied. I have never bought non-Christmas-themed wrapping supplies. I'm a sucker for Christmas wrapping supplies, however, and have a giant box of them. Which is silly, since I give Christmas presents to like four people in person).

Also, the only actual wrapping paper I own at this point is Christmas-themed, so I haven't had to figure out a storage solution for that. As the DDH's birthday is at the end of November, very rarely do I give non-Christmas-wrapped gifts--hence all the bags and tissue paper, which are flexible. 

But yay! Maybe getting this room fixed up by the end of the year isn't such an impossible goal, after all.

I am cleaning up.

Slowly but surely.

You know how I mentioned in my blog post that one of my goals for the year was to clean out the craft room so it was functional?

Did you ever maybe wonder why I thought that might take a year?

I'm about to share a big deep dark secret with you, guys.

The DDH and I (now +The Roommate) have a five-bedroom house (the DDH used to rent the rooms to college students). And the front corner bedroom, with the two big south- and west-facing windows and the deep(ish) closet I claimed for my craft room. I had a big table to spread out on and drawers filled with scrapbooking supplies, paint, ribbon: the usual sort of DIY-crafty type suspects. I even used it for its intended purpose for about six months.

But now?

This is what the craft room looks like:

Yeah.

And let me point out, I had already spent probably three or four hours cumulatively in there cleaning over the past few months.

It used to be worse.

At one time this was a useful and even organized room.

But then my parents brought some drawers filled with my stuff from high school.

Then they brought a half dozen giant boxes of random stuff.

Then they brought a few more.

And then my mother-in-law gave us a pile of furniture that will all, eventually, be useful and store the supplies that I end up keeping.

And then The Roommate moved in and I had to hastily move all the boxes stored in the guest room into the craft room.

Now I have to sort through my entire life from elementary school onward. Pounds and pounds of school papers and cards and notes from friends and trinkets and presents and toys and just everything.

And in the meantime meantime, I keep collecting more DIY crafty-type supplies: empty jars and containers and old t-shirts and cloth scraps and ribbons and what have you, and I can't even get to the drawers where I would eventually like to store them in neatly organized bliss.

Bit by bit it's coming together. Any time I have a few moments I'll set the timer for fifteen minutes and just work. The place has good bones now, with drawers and shelves and places to store and organize the stuff I packrat away. The giant overstuffed black trashbag you can see in the pictures has been dragged to the curb and another big box is already half-filled with things to toss. So we're getting there.

But yeah. It will probably take all year.

I am organized: Entryway

Repurposing is my favorite "green" habit. Old, broken items can become something new and totally awesome--who wouldn't love that?

I am addicted.

There is a category of item that I could shop all day for. I drool over catalogs, I stalk sales, I happily wander stores imagining owning--

Not shoes.

Not clothes.

Not purses.

No, I, my friends, am addicted to organization supplies.

When storage bins go on sale in January, I am happy. When school supplies go on sale in August, I am in heaven. Show me a cute box, a bag with a myriad of carefully designed pockets, a desk organizer with a nifty feature and I. Am. So. There.

There are two problems with this addiction. The first is the same problem I face with food and shoes and clothes and purses: money, of course, that bugbear of dreamy housewives everywhere.

The second is the weird old house I live in, where everything from the doors to the drawers to the closets comes in non-standard shapes and sizes. Nifty little drawer organizers? Do not fit. Cool and practical over-the-door storage units? Do not fit. Anything ever in the history of the universe designed to bring the glory of Order to a chaotic closet?

Does.

Not.

Fit.

Between the two, I have gotten rather creative (I hope) with making up and making do, that I might worship Order without going into hock or getting a degree in carpentry.

Let's take a look at one of my little projects.

Flip through any Pottery Barn catalog, and you will discover the Idealized World of the Entryway. These people who live in catalogs always have spacious mudroom-entryway places, filled with specially designed Entryway Organizers of Awesomeness that contain exactly the right number of perfectly sized nooks and crannies in which to store everything from your galoshes to your school books to your umbrellas to your keys to your mail to your everything you could possibly want to store conveniently close to the door. People who live in catalogs, they have these glorious rooms.

Do you know what I have, guys? I have a tiny stretch of wood floor with half a wall and a miniscule hall closet. (Our garage a. has an addition built above it and thus cannot fit a standard (!) automatic garage door and b. opens onto the stairs to said addition and then directly to the kitchen. So the front door is It).



Exhibit A.

Yet, given a budget of half a wall and zero dollars, and with the help of a handy husband, I managed to come up with this nifty mail and key organizer that does at least something to assuage my longing for an Entryway Organizer of Awesomeness:

Exhibit B.

Look at this handy thing! It hangs on the wall right by the door, it has hooks for keys and a decorative Freiburg shopping bag, pockets for mail for the DDH and me and for coupons, and generally is awesome. Best of all, it cost me precisely zero dollars.

How did this come to be, you ask? Well, friend, I will tell you.

The frame with hooks used to hold a mirror and hung above the couch in one of the DDH's bachelor apartments. The mirror fell victim to an Unfortunate Shoe Kicking Incident, but packrat me could never bear to get rid of such an intrinsically useful bit of wall hanging. It has followed us around for seven years now.

Then, the DDH and I discovered that the mirror bit could be removed, leaving the frame intact. We chopped apart a bulletin board (the frame had broken, but thinking, oh, corkboard is so useful! I had packratted it away, again for several years) and inserted it into the space left by the mirror.

For several months, that is how it hung in our entryway: useful hooks, coupons messily pinned to blank, boring corkboard.

Then I had to shred a bunch of old notes at work. The handy plastic pocket-covers of the notebooks just screamed, I can be used for something! as I was shredding their guts. I took pity on the critters and squirreled them away home.

I added a strip of black electric tape so stuff wouldn't fall out, since the pocket didn't go all the way across. I drew some nifty labels on scraps of scrapbook paper (actually, the boring white paper that you get for free with scrapbook inserts), stuck them in the business card viewer pocket, and voila! organizational pockets.

Please note that the labels are yellow on one side, blue on the other, and green in the middle, as if the blue and yellow bled into each other on the coupon pockets. IT'S SO CLEVER.

When I come home on lunch or at the end of the day, I take care of my mail right away, so my pocket is usually empty (I stuck the envelope in so my pocket didn't look lonely). The DDH is happy to let his mail sit for days weeks months, so it is usually full (supposedly everything in it is organized and this is just where he wants to file it. Why he feels the need to file his junk mail instead of throwing it away, you will have to ask him). When I get coupons in the mail each week, I toss the expired ones and add the new ones to the middle pocket.

You will notice that my keys are the only ones on the hook. Obviously one of us is more into this whole organizational thing than the other. I never tell him "I told you so" when he can't find his car keys, though.

A Thing of Beauty

Linked up with Your Green Resource on SortaCrunchy.