Category: Back To School / Kids

12 Answers to “Why Do I Have To Make My Bed?”

(Love this!  Originally posted in 2014, when my sons were 10, 14 and 16!)

Klimczak household, 7:30 am in a recent Thursday morning,Single_Bed.svg.med

“Why do I have to make my bed?”, the 10 year-old grumbles. “It’s just going to get all swirled up again tonight.”

He’s right, of course.  In my head, I say “I know, honey. I understand your frustration. I often rail inwardly at the seeming futility of housework – why do I need to clean the kitchen when we’re just going to mess it up again at dinner time?”

But this is not what I say out loud, of course. What I do say out loud is “because its time to make your bed. It’s what we do every morning. Then you need to put your dirties in the hamper so I can start a load of laundry”.

He sighs.  I sigh. He is right, but so am I.

As a parent, I need to encourage and cultivate habits of self reliance and responsibility with my kids.  On other mornings we have talked about why we clean our rooms and make our beds every day.

  • Because it shows we have pride in our selves.
  • Because it shows we care about our stuff.
  • Because it’s nice to slide into smooth, crisp sheets at the end of the day.
  • Because we never know who may stop by, and you don’t want to look like a slob.
  • Because it’s what we do.
  • Because it’s the right thing to do.
  • Because it will give me one less things to nag you about later.
  • Because I said so.

As a professional organizer, I tell him to make his bed because:

  • It’s important it is to create good habits and routines.
  • We all have chores to do every day.  Some chores are for survival, some for maintenance and some for progress. And if we do the maintenance tasks regularly, the other ones are easier.
  • Studies show how making your bed every morning helps you be more productive for the rest of the day.
  • Productivity comes more easily to those people who can find motivation inside themselves instead of outside

But come on, let’s face it. He’s 10, and that’s a little heavy for 7:30 am on a Thursday.

So the parent comes back, checks on progress, helps the 10 year-old finish the job he started, makes the bed-making a game with lots of pillow tossing and giggles, and models the right behavior.

Only you and I know that we do these things not necessarily because we want to, but because we need cultivate good habits and self motivation, in ourselves and in our children.

Because some day when he and I are both older, I won’t be there to nag him every day.

Because even these little things matter.

So, friend, go make your bed.

Refresh and Restart For September

Recently, a friend – a fellow mom and business owner – wished me a Happy New Year, and that is really how I feel about September.  The schedule change, the life transitions, the brisk weather – I always feel renewed!  Use this time of renewal to clear mental and real clutter, and get a better handle on your time management, just like our students do!  Here’s how:


Re-Commit to Good Routines.

I love summer, but all facets of my life, personal and professional, benefit from Back-To-School consistency with waking and bed-times, meal times and nutrition, and more structured workdays.  Use this new season as an opportunity to return to routines that work, or tweak your routines and make them work even better!


Go to bed.  No, seriously.  Go to bed.

This is an uphill battle for me most days.  As a parent, I daily try to convince my teenagers to listen to their tired bodies and go to bed, instead of staying up late just because they can.  And personally, I wish I could say I get enough sleep, but sometimes I don’t. Most nights, I’m in bed at a reasonable hour, but some really great books have kept me up lately!  This week, now a little colder and darker outside, I will listen to my own tired body, close the book or IPad, and hit the pillow earlier.

We think better, work better, feel better and act nicer when we are well rested. Go to bed.

Remember the care and consideration you spent on that First Day outfit? 

September is a great time to take a look at your wardrobe, and make a few changes!  Cooler temperatures and Autumn colors have us shuffling through our closets in search of something to wear.  Take time to clean summer clothes, review and purge accordingly, and put them away into seasonal storage on a high shelf or in underbed storage. Shop in your closet for surprises (those great scarves I bought last Spring), and favorites. Refresh your wardrobe without leaving the house or spending a cent.

Re-new friendships and strengthen relationships!

I always loved going back to school because it meant I got to see my school friends more regularly.  We can learn from this as adults, too!  It is always a good time to reach out to a friend.  Whenever you find yourself wondering about someone and how they are, reach out!  And I mean via facebook, email, texting or a greeting card, in addition to the obvious “call them”!  Wouldn’t it be nice to know someone is thinking of you?  Your loved ones feel the same way.  Connect!

Out with the old, in with the new.

Out with the old:  It’s also always a good time to clear clutter!  This week I dropped off a couple of bags of donations, arranged donation of some old cell phones and cords, and sold used items on-line.  I cleaned out, cleaned up and made some space.

In with the new:  I love back-to-school for new gear and gadgets, but I don’t really need anything right now.  I did spend my morning clearing memory, installing updates and cleaning up my tech.  That’s all new!  And it feels great!

Learn something new.

Keeping up with your kids on a new technological gadget?  A language? A musical instrument? A cool new app, or a new way of doing something?   You-tube, google or your local library are all great places to imagine and explore new skills!  In addition, I already have a lot of new information right in front of me – I am working through my professional reading pile:  here’s irony, I have two time management books next on my pile, guess I need to find some time to read those!

With the new season comes meetings and events and an influx of new ideas to process and act upon.  It’s energizing!  Learn something new all the time.

How will you choose to embrace the new season this week?  Let’s Go!

Our Food Was All “Some Assembly Required”… Or “How I Spent My Sunday Afternoon”.

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We are all back to school and routines now.  The calendar is full and busy, but manageable. I have to admit, though, the 013extra-long holiday weekend last week messed me up in one area – Dinner.

Don’t misunderstand me – an extra-long weekend is always a good thing!  I just felt unprepared for the week.  We had plenty of food, but as I discussed with my teenager, everything was “Some Assembly Required” food.  We often survive busy school nights on weekend left overs, so we got into trouble when there were NO weekend leftovers!

So I tried a new strategy yesterday, menu planning on a larger scale than ever before.  Considering this week’s menu plan and the contents of my kitchen, I wrote down 11 food items to make in one Sunday afternoon.  Here is the list:

  • Oatmeal-butterscotch-dried cherry cookies, for lunches and for care packages for two beloved college students004
  • Banana bread, also to eat and send away, and to use up the overripe bananas in the freezer
  • Peach and plum crisp, for Sunday dessert005
  • Hard boiled eggs, to peel and have on hand for snacks and quick breakfasts
  • Tuna salad – all protein for me for lunches this week
  • Egg casserole, for the high-schoolers to heat up in the morning before school
  • Bread crumbs, for the meatballs and to have on hand
  • Meatballs, for a new recipe later in the week
  • Pork Roast and broiled potatoes for Sunday dinner
  • New recipe, Cheddar and Bacon bread, because let’s face it – you can’t go wrong with cheese or bacon!
  • Browned ground beef, for taco casserole Tuesday.006

What I learned from this process:

  1. I enjoy cooking, and I’m so glad I dedicated some time to making delicious, convenient and nutritious food for all of us this week. However….
  2. Five hours in the kitchen was a VERY long afternoon, and then there were still dishes to do after dinner. Next time I will cut back on my expectations and the allotted time.
  3. Start with clean counters and an empty dishwasher. The clean counters are obvious, but the empty dishwasher would have saved me clean-up time.
  4. Line up everything needed on the counter, with recipes, pans and ingredients, to make sure you have everything you need.
  5. Make double batches. A double batch of anything is no more trouble than a single batch.
  6. In addition, double up your prep. I used my Cuisinart and chopped onions for 3 recipes all at once. Not one tear shed!  I used my food processor to shred 2 pounds of cheese and to pulverize the bread into crumbs, too.
  7. I will ask for more help, either with cutting / chopping, or with clean-up. 
  8. I am already thinking about what to make the next time I do this, probably in a couple of weeks.

007If your weeknights are busy, considering cooking meals on the weekend to eat during the week.  Make your plan, lay out your supplies, crank up your favorite Pandora channel and get cooking!

Work Now, Play Later.

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Work Now, Play Later.

Most of you know that we should Work Now and Play Later.  Some of you may even do it on a regular basis, or as a matter of routine.

But it still bears repeating.  Work now, play later.

Whatever your work is.  Professional work, homework, working out. Volunteering, parenting.  Housework, yard work or any other phrase that ends in the word “work”.  Maybe all of the above.

Work Now, Play Later. 

Work now because sometimes life gets in the way.  Sometimes WE get in the way.  And sometimes something really great comes along unexpectedly.

Work now and play later because sometimes life gets in the way. 

 

  • Emergencies or accidents happen.
  • Technology fails us.
  • The power goes out. The wi-fi goes with it.
  • The hospital calls.
  • The car breaks down.
  • The alarm doesn’t go off.
  • A loved one needs you right now.

 

Work now, because sometimes WE get in our own way.

  • We’re tired or hungry or unmotivated, and waiting until later just means we’ll be more tired and hungry and less motivated.
  • We forget the instructions to tonight’s assignment, and if we wait, it’s too late to ask a friend.
  • Someone is waiting for your part of a project, so they can start their part.
  • The job takes a lot longer than we expected or even scheduled for it.

 

Work now, because we just never know what great thing could come along.  Working now and playing later means we can:

  • Do a good job and still have a chance to relax later.
  • Say yes to the impromptu dinner invitation, or concert tickets or spontaneous weekend away.
  • Play longer later.  Or take a nap.  Or read a book.  Or go out with friends.  You name it.  Work Now, Play Later.

 

Working now and getting things done means there will be more time to do fun things later. 

Do Future-You a Favor, and Leave a Recipe!

I was at a professional event, and an IT guy mentioned leaving himself a recipe.  After a moment, I realized he was not referring to food, but to a note-to-self, a recipe, a map for his future self to follow to complete a recurring task.  I chuckled at the reference, but I use and absolutely recommend the practice of leaving recipes!

Recipes are great tools for those often-but-not-too-often tasks, the ones that are regularly scheduled but with large gaps of time between, like quarterly or semi-annually.  We do these tasks often enough to remember part of the process, but not often enough to make them a habit.

Let me give you a couple of examples, of the awkwardly scheduled tasks and the Recipe Solution:

  • Once a month, I post my upcoming presentations to Facebook and also to the NAPO-Chicago website.  I wish I could say that I quickly and confidently complete these tasks from habit or memory, but I can’t say that.  Every month, I have a moment of panic, trying to remember if I’m supposed to post to my personal FB page first, and then share to my Professional page?  Or is it the other way around….. and when I send the info to NAPO, did the contact person say PDF not Word?  Hmmm… Or Word not PDF….  Then the panic passes and I look at my note on my IPhone that tells me Professional then personal, and Word not PDF.   Whew.  Once I check my notes, my recipe, the process takes all of 15 minutes.  Done. 
  • I helped with an annual event last week for our school district.  Wisely, we recapped just hours after the event, writing up notes of successes and challenges, while all the details were still fresh in our minds.  We’ll add those wrap-up notes to all the other notes for the event.  Next May or June when we start working on next year’s event, the process will go that much more smoothly. 
  • Approximately 5 times a year, I have the opportunity to teach a class at Moraine Valley Community College.  I love teaching at MVCC, I always meet the nicest people.   And my contact person is very kind.  But she has to be getting tired of me, since for the first 4 classes, I missed some detail of the grading process and held up my students’ grades.  Each time, I have added details to my Recipe, like my log-in info and the correct screen to enter attendance, etc.  I really hope I’ve got it right this time, I’ll find out when I teach my next class in September!
  • Even my father-in-law’s habit of writing the oil filter size and oil weight for each car he has owned on the cabinet door in the garage is an example of a Recipe.  When it comes time to change his oil, he is reminded of what he needs.

Save yourself the scrambling, the head scratching, the moment of panic. Do Future You a favor, take some notes for those awkwardly spaced recurring tasks and leave yourself a Recipe!  Future You will thank today’s You!

Take the Misery and Mystery Out of Packing School Lunches!

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lunch

 

Way back in June, a number of people mentioned how glad they were that summer was here because they wouldn’t have to pack school lunches anymore!  I decided then to write a Back-To-School blog to help! 

 

Here are 5 ways to make School Lunches easier, cheaper and more appealing:

  • Communicate with your Kids.
    • Have an honest conversation about what they will actually eat, and how much time is provided for lunch at school. 
    • For example, my teens have early start times, so breakfast has to be nutritious, portable and easy.  And the freshman has only half a lunch period, due to a biology lab class, so lunch will also need to be nutritious, portable and easy!
    • In the interest of time, my youngest asked for half-sandwiches and soft fruits like grapes, dried cherries or raisins, etc., because carrots and apples are yummy but require a lot of chewing.  I willingly agreed, since less food is wasted and he actually wants to eat his fruit.
    • Packing lunches together offers an opportunity to discuss good nutrition like serving sizes, food groups and pyramids, pros and cons of fresh foods and convenience or pre-packaged foods, etc.
  • Choose the right space and time to pack lunches. 
    • Establish a lunch packing zone with lunch bags, sandwich bags, fresh fruit, napkins, plastic spoons, etc. 
    • Our family is much better at packing lunches after dinner than we are at packing in the morning before school.  So as we clean up from dinner, we pack for the next day. When helps us to ….
  • Strategically plan and package leftovers.
    • Taco night?  Put together some tortillas with refried and cheese, they freeze great and stay cold!
    • My youngest loves cold pasta (I can’t explain it, but he loves it!)  So if I make homemade mac and cheese, spaghetti or other pastas, we portion the left overs into 2 or 3 containers for lunches.  Ham for dinner tonight means ham sandwiches tomorrow, etc.
  • Do as much prep as possible at home.
    • When my kids were younger, I learned the lunch room monitors spend a lot of time helping really little kids open hard-to-open packaging.  Make sure your kids can navigate their own sandwich bags, prepackaged chips or snacks, and water bottle.  And peel the oranges at home!
  • Assemble the lunches for the week all at once, if that helps.
    • Use reusable containers and lunch boxes, if possible.  We use lots of little Gladware bowls for prepacking our lunches!
    • I spent half an hour last night chopping fresh veggies into snack-able sizes. 001
    • Pre-package your own foods, to save time and money.  On Sunday, we fill Gladware bowls with servings of pretzels, chex mx, cookies and dried fruit, then use them throughout the week for speedy lunch assembly!
    • For example: I traveled to New Mexico in June, and in preparation,  my 10 year old and I packed as much of his lunch for sports camp as possible for the days I was going to be gone.   We lined up 5 paper lunch bags, and put his name on them.  Then we dropped in apples, bags of chips and bagged up cookies.  We also made 5 ham and cheese sandwiches, cut them into wedges, bagged them up and froze them.  So every morning, he just grabbed a bag from the counter, tossed in his frozen sandwich and cold juice pouch and was ready for camp.   (He loved it so much, we did the same thing the next week, even though I was home!).

Meet the school lunch challenge head on with a few of these tips.  Happy munching!  

And here are a few more resources on the topic:

 

Tweak Your Morning Routines this Week!

This past week provided excellent practice for heading back to school.  All three of my sons have had morning activities, helping us refresh our morning routines morning-clipart-5-free-summer-clipart-illustration-of-a-happy-smiling-sunbefore school actually starts.  We have discovered some stumbling blocks, and can now clear them before the first day in a few weeks.

Whether you are going back to school or not, I recommend we all take some time to tweak our morning routines this week.  Here is how:

  1. Sit down with everyone involved in your morning routine. Discuss start times, breakfast options, bedtimes, carpooling, etc.  If your schedule is the only one to consider, sit down with a pen and paper, and think about your morning routine.
  2. Look at what works:
    1. My youngest son’s schedule is unchanged, so he and I will stick with our regular plan, in the 7 am to 8:20 time slot.
    2. I have the most flexibility in the morning, since I am up really early but don’t need to be anywhere until I drop off the little guy.  I’ll move my routine around everyone else.
  3. Look at what needs fixed:
    1. We have to rearrange our shower schedule from years past, as we’ll have two high-schoolers with a 7 am start time and my husband still needs to be up and out of the house by 6:45.  (I am just going to stand back, though, and let the three earliest risers figure out their plan).
    2. We need to recommit to better breakfasts.
  4. Get everyone their own clock, and make they know how to use it correctly!  Kids need alarm clocks.  Because Mom is tired of nagging (or maybe that’s just me).
  5. Make breakfast portable.  Not everyone likes to eat breakfast before 7 am, at least not in my house, but they still need to have something nutritious with them.  So healthy and portable breakfasts are going to be very important this year.  With my kids’ collaboration, I’m planning on breakfast bars or granola bars, microwaveable breakfast sandwiches and fresh fruit.
  6. Plan ahead now!  Regardless of your student’s age (or yours), determine bed times and wake-up times.  And start adjusting your current sleep and wake times to line up with the new ones.  For example, we came home earlier than normal on Sunday night  from a weekend away, because early Monday morning was just too chaotic last week.   As mentioned, great practice for back-to-school!

Spend a little time this week improving your morning routine, and reap benefits all year long!

9 Questions to Ask Yourself In Your Closet This Week

I spend a lot of time in people’s closets.  I love saying that, it is quite the conversation starter!  But it’s true!  I spent an hour, just an hour, in a closet last week with a client, and we made great progress in reclaiming her space!Image

(1)   What is already designated to leave?

Remove it! 

Often when I arrive to help a client clean out his or her closet, there is already a pile of “donations” started.  And perhaps a bag of items to go to the cleaners or the tailor, or a pile of shoes that need repaired.  Or maybe it’s just the overflowing laundry hamper (though I personally would not put dirty laundry in a closet with my clean clothes).

Remove those bags / piles / baskets first, and put them in your car to be dropped off later.  Or take the dirty laundry to your laundry room and start a load.  See, the closet looks better already.

(2)   What will I absolutely not wear again before next Fall?

Put it away for the season. 

There are clothes in your closet from the winter that you will probably not wear again, no matter how cold it gets again this Spring (I know, I live in Chicago).  Perhaps they are Fall colors, or for specific events that won’t roll around again until October.  Items like formal pieces, heavy sweaters and scarves, boots, etc. can probably go away.  Make sure they are clean, and then put them in a container tucked on a shelf or under the bed until Fall. Image

(3)   What will I absolutely never wear again, period?

Let it go.  For good.

Come on, you know the pieces.  The ones that you look at, and you get the furrow between your eyebrows, trying to determine…

(4)   Why on earth did I buy that item? (Maybe it was on sale?)

(5)   What was my loved one thinking when they bought it for me? (And remember the gesture, not the fact that they are not paying attention!)

(6)   When will I ever wear that thing again?  (You probably won’t.)

If you can’t come up with good answers to these questions, it is time to ease out the offending items.  Sell them, donate them, give them to a friend who would look better in them.  Just move them out of your space for good.

And ask yourself a couple more questions, to move along those questionable “Maybe’s”:

(7)   If I was in a store right now, would I buy this item again? (thanks Tamika!)

(8)   Does this item really reflect who I am, and will it ever?

If the answers to these are “No”, the items has to go.  Now.  Trust me.

(9)   What would be better stored somewhere else in my house?

Put it there.

Very often, we run across things in a clothes closet that would be better stored somewhere else.  Papers, Christmas Decorations, furniture, reusable shopping bags, you name it – it may even have a home somewhere else in your house already, and you just need to spend the 5 minutes and put it away.

Wow, 9 simple questions and a little time spent in your closet, and your clothes and space are looking better already!  Way to Go!

I’ll Never Be A Secret Agent (And I’m OK With That)

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secret agentI’ll Never Be A Secret Agent (And I’m OK With That).  Or, this article could also be titled “How being organized and predictable makes me a better mom, driver, dry cleaner customer and person.”

I have been thinking a lot about time management lately, to prepare for 2 productivity presentations.

My sons and I like to watch “NCIS LA” together, it’s one of our favorite shows.  The characters, the agents, often discuss how they vary their schedule every day – rarely stopping at the same coffee shop or taking the same route to work, all in the interest of their personal and professional safety.  For them, having a predictable routine could encourage an attack, so they shake it up every day.

I, on the other hand, am apparently predictable.  Or so says my son.  Last week on his birthday, he and some fellow band students stayed late to help with an evening event.  I let his band director know that I would bring cupcakes for the kids who stayed late, to help my son celebrate.  It’s a good thing I did, too, because when I mentioned it to my son, he said “I sort of expected it, Mom, you did it last year for the same reason, I figured you would do it this year, too.  You’re kind of predictable like that.”

Predictable sounds rather dull, but finding out that predictable means I consistently do nice things for my son and he knows he can count on me makes me think predictable is pretty great.

 

I stopped by the dry cleaners this morning, to drop off my husband’s work clothes.

The nice lady I see every week at the Cleaners:  “Good morning.  You’re early today!”

Me:  “Yes, lots of people to see and things to do”.

Nice lady:  “And you’re dressed for working, you must have people to help.”

Me: “Yes!  No jeans or skirts today!”  Then….

Nice lady: “6 pants and 5 shirts this week? Did your husband buy some new pants?”

Me:  “Why yes, yes he did.”   Then, at the end….

Nice Lady: “See you next Monday!”

This is typical.  And as I think about it, being consistent and predictable in my errand running has made it really easy for my Cleaners to take good care of me (and she really is a very nice lady!!).  Interesting.

My oldest son is learning to drive.  Lately, many conversations center on the logistics of driving, but also the spirit of driving.  For example, on the expressway yesterday, we talked about how important it is for all the drivers on the road to follow the rules.  The three lanes of expressway traffic flow much better when slow cars stick to the right lanes, and when the left lane is used solely for passing.  Other drivers depend on us to follow rules and be predictable in our actions, so they can make their decisions, too.

So, looking at my three examples, and taking a metaphorical leap:

  1. Being predictably organized make it easy for my kids and family members to count on me;
  2. Being predictably consistent improves my relationship with others, to our mutual benefit; and
  3. Acting predictably makes for a safer and more positive flow in life.  Unless you are a secret agent.
  4. (I suppose I could be predictably bad, too, if I never showed up for stuff or did things consistently wrong, but that’s not today’s topic.)

Now, I know some instances in life require spontaneity and creativity, and I can step up with both of those, too, I am not advocating only predictable and organized behavior.  I am recommending, however, that you spend a little time today and this week considering how creating and maintaining routines and predictability could improve your performance or relationships.  Meeting the same friend or co-worker for a weekly chat, consistently getting your work submitted ahead of time, creating routines for making everyone’s day less stressful and more enjoyable.  Sounds pretty good to me!  So, I’m ok with never being a secret agent. I have other things to do.

Paper Management Suggestions for the Lady at the Gas Station.

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A woman noticed the magnets on my van, and asked me about my business.

She said “I always say, I need someone to help me with my files.  I always think that it’s just me, and there is something wrong with me”.

No, there is nothing wrong with you, and you are not alone in struggling with your papers. Here’s why:

Image

  • Most of us keep too many papers, and / or keep papers for too long.
  • Most of us name our files the wrong thing, if we even have files.
  • Some of us have barriers to filing, either real or imagined.
  • Most of us don’t maintain our papers often enough.

We keep too many papers, and we keep them for too long:

We keep receipts / business cards / post-it notes / grocery lists far longer than they are useful.

We keep newspapers / children’s daily school work / magazines long after they’ve been read.

We keep papers out of habit, because they started out as “important”, but now they are just old news.

We want to hold on to our papers for “just-in-case”.  HOWEVER, You can purge your papers if:

  • The information exists somewhere else (medical records or on-line banking information);
  • The information is not pertinent to you (flyers for activities that don’t interest you or past events)
  • Purging the paper will have minimal consequences (who reads the privacy notices from credit card companies?)
  • You can’t imagine when or why anyone would ask for that information (utility bills or grocery bills from more than a few months ago, account information from long closed accounts, etc).

We name our files the wrong things, if we even name them at all:

Never name a file Miscellaneous.  Ever.  Either a paper is necessary enough to warrant a file named for it, or it isn’t important and it needs to go.  If you have a “Misc.” file, perhaps it could be more aptly named….:

  • marketing ideas
  • Action Papers
  • general credit / banking information
  • Work To Do
  • You choose…. But make it meaningful.  Name your files, name your papers and get to work.

We have barriers to filing, either real or imagined.  They may include:

  1. Non-existent filing systems (your important papers don’t have a final “Away” in your home or office).
  2. Antiquated filing system (what worked 20 years ago doesn’t anymore).
  3. Physically inconvenient filing: perhaps the file cabinets are under other things, or in a remote corner of your home or office, so papers never get put away, reviewed or purged.
  4. Too-Full file drawers – you have files from 2007, but no room to file the papers from last week.

The solutions are simple: purge the clutter, move the file cabinets, purge or shred the unneeded content.

Most of us don’t maintain our papers often enough.

I know that sounds scary.  As though I am telling you that you have to find more time to work on your papers – ahhhhh!!

But remember, I just told you how to keep a lot less.  Really, we just need to perform maintenance more often but for less time total.  Five to 10 minutes a day to:

  •          Open today’s mail;
  •          Shred today’s shredding (a few pages);
  •          Toss the recycling (a few pages);
  •          Pay this week’s bills (once a week);
  •          Enter a few items into your calendar; and
  •          File the few papers that you actually need to keep.

So, to the lady at the gas station and to you, try one of these ideas this week, and you are not alone in your struggles with paper management!