Category: Techniques to Tackle

November 19, 2008

Organizing Mummies

With Thanksgiving just around the corner, we have to ask: have you finished storing your Halloween decorations?

Scott Roewer, Washington D.C. based organizing industry expert shared this picture with us. Scott says that organizing and storing Halloween decorations, ghosts, black cats, bats, scarecrows, witches, bones and mummies are just another "normal" day at work. Is this part of your day, too?

Visit Scott Roewer's professional organizing blog, Declutteryou.com, including his wrap up of the recent Peter Walsh/Oprah visit.

So, do you think we're "dead" on with this post? What's your biggest challenge when it comes to organizing holiday decor?

If you've enjoyed this post and want to see more, please subscribe to our daily emails (Feedblitz) or through the RSS Feed (click here). Options are now available for Twitter (Feedblitz) and your mobi through FEEDM8, too.

November 19, 2008

Crafts and Scrapbooking, Home & Home Office Tips, Storage – Misc., Techniques to Tackle
March 9, 2008

SoCal Thrift Store Employee Finds $30,000 Tucked Inside Donated Clothes
No matter how bad you think the world has gotten, it’s nice to know there are good hearted people out there.

A Pomona, California thrift store employee found over $30,000 cash tucked away in some donated clothing. Veterans Thrift Store employee Bararita Nunez found the money while sorting through some donated clothes when she discovered a small box containing an envelope filled with cash.

At first she thought she was thumbing through Monopoly Money, and passed the box along to her supervisor, who in turned contacted the customer. Nunez was given a gift from the family who had donated the clothes on behalf of their late mother.

While our professional organizing company hasn’t found $30,000 in cash, we have discovered long lost earrings, dividend checks, gift cards, traveler’s checks, and smaller amounts of cash hidden away under floorboards, moldings, seat cushions and inside long-forgotten purses, winter coats and shoes.

In some cases, the findings paid for our services for the day.

Have you ever discovered any treasures at your local swap meet, thrift store consignment store?
- source – KNBC.com
- image courtesy Will Blog For Food and Toy Bender
Related Posts:
- Crossroads Trading Resale Stores
- How to keep yourself organized
- Kate Olsen letting go of her skinny clothes at West Hollywood Thrift Store
- Jackson Pollock found at SoCal Thrift Store
- Charitable deductions software
March 9, 2008

Home & Home Office Tips, Organizing Industry News, Techniques to Tackle
March 5, 2008

Storables Offers Paper Processing Workshops
If getting your paperwork in order is on to-do list for tax season, Storables has a series of organizing workshops for managing your files and old-fashioned paperwork.

The quiet giant of organizing retail, Storables will offer an hour of tips and ideas to manage your paper in each of their 8 brick and mortar locations. Learn what to keep, what to purge, and how to organize and store the rest.

The workshops will all happen in one day– Saturday, March 8th – 9:30am. They only have one California location in San Jose, but if you are in the following towns, check of this free event.
- Oregon: The Pearl District (in Portland) and Tigard
- Washington: University Village, Bellevue and Lynnwood
- California: San Jose’s Westgate Mall
- Arizona: Scottsdale
- Minnesota: Edina
For exact store locations and directions click here. The Storables website has great tips for tax season, too– if you can’t get to a store.

With tax season approaching, how are you preparing?
- Image courtesy Storables
March 5, 2008

Organizing Industry News, Techniques to Tackle
February 26, 2008

NorthStar Moving Unveils Star-Studded Moving Services
Thinking about moving? Want the celebrity relocation treatment?

North star Moving, a leading residential and commercial mover in California, has announced luxury partnerships with celebrity pet care provider and Oprah’s personal dog coach Tamar Geller; child care provider to the stars Nurture and Nanny and Operation Organization, a professional organizing company in Los Angeles.

Check out these cool red carpet moving services for celebrities and non-celebs alike:
- The Paris – Celebrity pet care providers pamper your pooch leaving you to sit poolside as muscle-bound men ensure that your hair extensions are packed to perfection. This luxury package addresses all your moving needs while protecting you and your four-legged friends from any unnecessary stresses.
- The Angelina – For the busy family that likes to hit the road, this service takes the kids right out from underfoot and keeps the little darlings safe, happy and entertained under the watchful eye of a modern day Mary Poppins, freeing up mom and dad to focus on moving and/or saving the world.
- The Britney – Designed for the customer looking for a little order and direction in their life. NorthStar Moving delivers professional organizers right to your doorstep and makes sure you can easily find your undergarments even in the midst of a move!
Now this is fun marketing! Our favorite concept is "photo perfect packing" sock drawers. Northstar also "handles paparazzi and security with decoy trucks." Decoy trucks? We love it. Will you?
- Source: Earth Times, PR Newswire
- Image: Chemosphere House (on Mulholland Drive near Laurel Canyon, in L.A.) – Kim DeMarco’s Blog
February 26, 2008

Business Tips, Demystifying the Professional Organizer Experience, Home & Home Office Tips, Organizing Industry News, Techniques to Tackle
February 20, 2008

Archive Your Wedding Gown Like a Museum
We were in West Hollywood yesterday, picking up dry cleaning and stumbled on some information about archiving textiles. While this is not the most exciting news, we do run across this issue occasionally– boxing up wedding gowns and children’s clothes for organizing clients.

Designed to last 200-years, my local dry cleaner is now using archival-quality boxes and tissue paper just like museums, overseen by Federal and State governments for the preservation of historical costumes, and by libraries for the preservation of rare books and magazines. You are familiar with this material already because archival board is used for the backing in framing pictures.

Once your gown has been preserved, it’s up to you to incorporate these tasks into your datebook:
- Every 2-3 years open the box and inspect the gown;
- Wash your hands with baking soda mixed with warm water prior to touching the garment;
- Examine each layer, box, tissue, fabric;
- If you see spots or discolorations, contact your cleaner;
- It is not necessary to remove the garment for initial inspections. Examine top layer of the gown, and in-between a few folds;
- Wash the cotton liner and cover every 10-15 years;
- After initial washing, rewash every 20 years.
- Tissue should be replaced every 25-30 years.
A quick check on Microsoft Outlook does prove that you can make a to-do task in 30 years. So there’s no way you’ll miss it.

Image courtesy Cat and Adi at Next Exit Photography. Christina and Kevin’s wedding ceremony at La Venta in Palos Verdes, Calif.
February 20, 2008

Adult Bedrooms, Crafts and Scrapbooking, Scrapbooking, Storage – Misc., Techniques to Tackle, Walk-in Closets
January 4, 2008

Southwest Airlines Debuts Productivity Ad Campaign
Southwest Airlines is spending millions on a new ad campaign targeted at productivity, and controversy.

The ads haven’t caught on yet, but we think they’re funny. At the Annual Productivity Awards (not to be confused with the Los Angeles Organizing Awards) highly productive young businessman Nick Pudder wins an award, but he’s accused of taking "productivity enhancers" to augment his office and sales strategy. We did a double take when we saw this, will you? If it’s true, we want some.

Here’s the commercial Southwest is airing, as "reported" by Karen Jacobs of Be More Productive News. Check out the other spots on YouTube. How they dream up these things we’ll never know.

Readers– we’d love to know your thoughts. Use the comment tag at the bottom of this post. Would you ever sneak a "performance enhancer" behind your office cubicle? What is your favorite enhancer anyway?

Related Posts:
- Supersized traveler tips
January 4, 2008

Business Tips, Home & Home Office Tips, Offices, Organizing Industry News, Techniques to Tackle