Redecorating.

When my roommate moved out in the middle of 2011, I made a few changes around the condo. Nothing major, but I added some of my own personal touches. And now, I'm at it again and I have to tell you, decorating is FUN.

I started out with a big, empty wall. I knew I wanted to do a picture frame collage (thank you Pinterest) but wasn't sure which frames, which pictures, etc. I started grabbing random things I've collected over the years and putting them in a pile on the floor. Last week I finally got tired of said pile and grabbed a glass bottle of wine and decided to do something with it. I'd say the final product turned out better than I hoped! The pictures below tell the story of how I did the project, but honestly it was super easy. All you need is wax paper, tape (painters and scotch), a sharpie (try blue or black!), nails and a hammer.

Lay out your design on the floor, trace it onto wax paper, and then hang on the wall. If you are patient, leave it up for a few days. If you are not (I am not), leave it up for a few minutes.

I am missing 3 pictures for the bottom frame, but I know exactly which ones I am going to put in there.

   

Some of my favorite people & memories from 2011.

Organizing your Outlook Inbox

Hello blogging fail, my name is Katie. It's nice to see you. Why haven't I posted lately? Probably because I spend all my time doing 1 of 5 things and therefore would blog about 1 of 5 things.

1. Playing tennis (undefeated and division champs in women's doubles!)
2. Laying on my couch watching countless episodes of Happy Endings, Gossip Girl, Grey's, Hart of Dixie or the latest Jodi Picoult book-turned-movie (great Saturday viewing right there)
3. Talking about how awesome my life is and how great my friends are (been there, done that)
4. Complaining about how no one will date me/I'm impossible to date (been there, done that also)
5. Working (7:30am in the office 6 Fridays in a row!)

Clearly I've already touched on all of those things. So instead, I'll launch into a post about my psychotic organizing tendencies, this time surrounding how to organize my email. Since I started my job in November 2010, I wasn't really sure how to organize for 2011, so I just made a 2011 folder and threw everything in that. Actually, I just made a 2010 folder and threw everything there. You have no idea how much it pains me now, in November 2011, to still be working out of a 2010 folder, but such is life.

Eventually as I got more comfortable with my job, my role, and the 'types' of emails I was going to be receiving and sending, I established a pretty good filing system. Our inboxes have a max limit on the internal server, so I have to continuously move them out of my inbox and into their separate folder.

Is this boring yet? Too bad. Now I'm working on how I'm going to do a better job organizing in 2012 (and how I can ensure that I don't receive an email in mid-November 2012 telling me my folder is now full and I need to break it up. UGH, the horror!)

So, I've decided that instead of dividing first by year and then by topic, I'm going to divide by topic and then by year. My job consists of 3 separate pieces, we'll call them A, B, and C, so I'm going to make 3 .pst folders for each topic, plus one called "Company Info" and one called "Katie" for personal stuff. All personal emails (for now) will get dropped into the Katie folder with no sub-folders. All company-related emails that don't actually pertain to my job but are still important will get dropped into the Company folder with no sub-folders.

I plan to make a 2012 sub-folder for A, B, and C. Then, depending on topic, I'll have sub-folders. It will look something like this:

So there you have it. Yes I greyed out all information that could be tied back to my actual job and company. Yes maybe I'm paranoid. SO WHAT.

So basically, this will (hopefully) minimize the need for folders every year. Although I'm not really sure it makes that big of a difference, I guess I'll try it this way for 2012 and see how it goes. 2013 will be the real test year, because I'll have to decide which way I like better. Maybe I'll keep 2 inboxes in 2013 so I can do it both ways. Told ya I was crazy. Wanna know what also throws a wrench in all of this?

iPhones with work email, that's what. So now my inbox is divided into the same A, B, and C and when those folders get too full then I move them to their respective places so that I can reference them while on my iPhone. I repeat: my life is hard.

Was this even mildly interesting? I taught my mom how to use her Google Reader last night, so maybe that will be my next "I'm Anal and Spend Way Too Much Time Organizing Shit" post.

Dear Life, I need a BREAK. XOXO, KEH

Last week, I sat down on my computer and typed out a post about what it means to be busy, and how I stay so busy all the time. Then, the next morning, my in-real-life-friend and fellow-blogger Buckhead Betty posted about basically the same thing. This is not the first time we have posted similar things around the same time, and I figured she'd summed it up nicely for both of us.

Being busy is a choice we make, and to me it doesn't seem out of the ordinary to have plans, oh, every night of the week. For some people that might seem weird, and when you ask me how I do it, my response is usually somewhere between, "How do I do what?" and "I HAVE NO IDEA I'M SO BUSY I CAN'T THINK ABOUT IT!!!" Typically though, it's not busy to me. It's life!

But sometimes, life has had ENOUGH. I have spent the last 3 months going, going, going. Nonstop, without coming up for air, without so much as breathing fresh oxygen. I have done happy hours and volunteering and meetings and church and dinners with friends and babysitting and tennis matches and softball games and tennis practice and "relaxing" massages and hosted dinner parties and attended dinner parties AND AND AND. You get the idea.

This past weekend, I had more of the same planned. Cinco de Mayo festivities, a work dinner hosted by someone super important in the company, a softball game, a birthday party, etc. Thursday night didn't go exactly as planned, and then Friday got here. And I wanted to curl up in a ball under my desk and cry, and sleep, and cry some more. I went to the work dinner, and promptly went home afterwards, crawled under my covers, and slept a glorious 10 hours. I went about my Saturday running errands, making lists in my head, forgetting what was on the lists...you know, normal Saturday. I headed out to an early dinner get together. I prepared a salad.

And after the salad was prepared, I sat on my kitchen floor and proclaimed that I was tired. Really tired. Really, really tired. And then I got up, I put on my big girl pants, and I went to my dinner. And after that, I went out for my friends birthday. But you know what? I had 2 beers at the dinner, and 1/2 a beer at the birthday party, because my body said NO MA'AM. My body had finally had enough. I knew I had hit my wall, figuratively speaking of course, because remember, I only had 2.5 beers. I bailed on my friends that night and I went home and I slept. And on Sunday, I did more fun things, and Sunday night, I slept. I cancelled a phone date with a girlfriend, I got comfy on my couch, and I rested. It was what my body was demanding.

So, the whole point of me telling you this is that when your body really needs it, you will be forced to slow down. I started this out by saying I have been going non-stop for the past 3 months. I mean, just look at my blog posts. I either haven't had time to post, or I've posted about all the things I am doing. Neither one screams "balance." But I have been caught up in a new job, new friends from said job, new friends from other aspects of life, and that old FOMO-friend peeking through, and I couldn't bear to say no to any of it.

So to those of you who think I can do it all...newsflash! I can't! But that doesn't mean I'm going to stop trying. I'm taking this week easy. I have a friend coming into town this weekend, and I'm really hoping that she'll feel okay about just hanging out. That doesn't mean we can't go out to places where other people are getting wild and crazy but...it likely will not be me. My body is still in break-mode. But hey, I have the best friends in the world so I have a feeling she'll understand.

I hope you do too. We all need a break sometime, and I'm taking mine. Holla!

Jewels

Everyone has their own way of storing and organizing things. I've always been so psyschotic about having my things organized and put away. It's gotten worse as I've gotten older (and acquired more stuff) but I think there are still some things that I hvae pretty well put together. My jewelry is one of them.  

I keep it all in my bathroom, on the counter and on the wall. My necklaces have hung in some way shape or form since long, chunky necklaces became popular. When I was in college and living in the sorority house, we stuck pushpins in the wall and hung necklaces on those. Now, they hang on a coat hanger that was spraypainted white. I've moved this thing twice, I just love it. It's perfect, and my collection fits on it perfectly.

I keep my earrings in a glass box that I was given at a sorority function one year in college. I have no idea why I held on to this particular piece of memorabilia - I guess it just seemed too "nice" to throw out or give away, but I'm glad I did it! I keep all of my nice, special jewelry in that box. Anniversary presents from exes, Christmas gifts from the family I babysat for, and pieces I stole from my mom's jewelry box are all kept in my little glass box. 

I keep my every day studs on a ring holder on my bathroom counter. I change earrings every day or every other day, and I usually just wear studs to work, so this works out really well because it's so convenient. Plus, it sits inside the tray I re-worked, so if earrings fall off the holder, it's not like they're strewn all over the counter. 

The last thing I keep jewelry in is that little pink heart box. My exboyfriend made it for me when we were still dating, and it was really one of the nicer things he did for me. We went on a date to a pottery place, and I made something for myself and he made something for me. It's another one of those things I couldn't really throw it away, so I just keep using it. It's all about practicality people! In there are my nice necklaces that I wear on a regular basis. I have one that my dad bought me in Aruba, my sorority disc on another one, my single pearl and a strand of pearls, plus a few other random necklaces that I wear pretty regularly. 

So that's it! That's how I store my jewelry, and I. LOVE. IT. It's taken me a while to perfect it, but I'm really pleased with how I keep things. How do you store your jewelry collection? 

Making the Most of Your Google Reader

So, I've had quite a few people ask me how in the world I followed all these blogs and connect with people. How do I remember where I went, and how do I keep up with them?

Let me introduce you to my best friend, the Google Reader. Just like with Gmail tricks, I'll take you on a little Reader tutorial complete with pictures so you can fall in love, too.

1. In Gmail, click at the top right of the screen on the link that says Reader. I circled it in red. I also left my ESPN Bowl Mania page open because I'd like it to be noted that I am currently in 4th place. I'm beating most of my friends and I love it.

2. This is what my  Google Reader looks like. If you haven't set yours up, then under the big Home page on the right, there won't be anything except suggestions from Google. On this homepage, you'll be able to see most recent posts, how many new posts there are, and find posts that you have starred or shared. You can also see on the left-hand column names of people you follow and things they have shared.

3. To start adding blogs and RSS feeds to your Reader, click on the top-left "Add A Subscription" button, and copy/paste the link to the blog or RSS feed into the field. Click Add, and voila. If you scroll down a little further in the column on the left, you'll see the name of the feed. You may want to change it, or you can leave it the same. Up to you.

4. As you follow more and more blogs, you'll find, or at least I found, that it was easiest to sort them into folders. My folders are Atlanta, Design, Entertainment, Foodies, Friends, Mommy Blogs, Money, Crafts, and Wedding.

5. To add a subscription to a folder, you'll see downward pointing arrow to the right of the blog title. Click that, and at the bottom of that list you should notice an option for "New Folder."

6. Type in the preferred name for the new folder. After adding so many blogs recently, my folders could use a bit of a makeover. Then, voila. After you've made all the new folders you want, you'll be able to just drag and drop the blog names into the correct folder. That way, if you only want to look at wedding blogs at a certain time, you can just let the entries pile up unread and browse all at once.

The world is your oyster with Google Reader! It's a great way to keep track of the blogs you follow, star important tips or tricks you want to remember, and share blogs you read with friends. So hop to it, young grasshoppers! I hope your blog-reading days are immensely simplified!

Airing My Dirty Laundry



source

I'm not sure what is more pathetic - the fact that I am about to dedicate an entire blog post to my laundry, or the fact that I haven't done laundry in a month and my closet still looked like I hadn't made a dent in it. Probably a little bit of both. I've been avoiding my laundry. It piles up in the corner of my closet, and just keeps piling. Don't misunderstand me - I love doing laundry. It's one of those things that once you do it, it's done. I've been known to do my laundry in my bathrobe so that there are no dirty clothes left. I just haven't wanted to do this laundry... mainly because I just let the pile get out of control. 

So last weekend, I knew I had people coming over on Thanksgiving and I knew I needed to get a head start on my cleaning. Then tailgating and way too much tequila happened and my laundry didn't. Neither did my headstart on basically anything, considering I spent the better part of Sunday jamming out in my bed to the sweet sounds of Moulin Rouge. Then, on Monday, my parents were here and laundry didn't happen. And then last night, well, my parents were still here, and laundry really almost didn't happen. And then I realized that it was in fact Tuesday, and Thursday was in fact the day I was having company, and well, if I didn't start my laundry on Tuesday night then there would be no laundry starting, because it takes me no less than 36 hours to finish doing laundry. And usually it takes a solid week before the remnants of my laundry doing are actually put away.



source

So last night I get home from my 2nd trip to Target (first one was alone and I spent $20, second time was with my mom and we spent $75... and they say kids are expensive!), and I decided it was now or never on the laundry. And since I'm working, surely a lot of it will be things that can be dry-cleaned, right? Psh. Wrong. 4 GIANT piles of laundry later, and I was in business.

Now we're getting to why I'm writing this in the first place. For the first 18 years of my life, my mom did my laundry. I'm not spoiled, she just didn't like anybody messing with her laundry room. I may actually be spoiled, but that's not why she did my laundry. And she always separated lights & darks. But that's as far as she goes in the separation process. Then, when they come out of the washing machine, most of the clothes automatically got put out on our clothes line to air dry. Just like in 1922. My family preferred to live like pilgrims. Just kidding. Kind of.

So, back to my laundry last night - I decided I was going to out-smart my mom's laundry capabilities, and I was going to separate into 4 piles: dark, goes in dryer. dark, doesn't go in dryer. light, goes in dryer. and lastly, light, doesn't go in dryer. No more of this searching through wet clothes to figure out if they go in the dryer or not! No more shrunken shirts! I'm so pleased with myself.
Now if only there was as foolproof a plan for tackling the kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, living room, & dining room. Good thing mom's coming over, I'm sure she has one, and if she doesn't... well, she's as good a duster as any. And I'm thankful for that.

To Do Lists

To say I'm busy would be an understatement. Between being out of town last weekend and preparing for that, changing jobs, football season, and just life in general, I feel like I don't have time to get anything done.

Enter to-do lists. Does anyone else have a to-do list that is 8 miles long? When I make my to do list, it's basically a brain dump onto paper in list form. I start out with an attempt at organizing the list, but really by the time I hit #33 on the list, I'm just writing stuff that needs to get done. How do you to-do list? Do you keep your lists separate? All 1 list? A mental list? Do you cross off as you go? There is nothing as satisfying to me as crossing things off a to-do list. When I was working as a personal assistant, my boss used to tease me because I wrote every little thing down only for the gratification of crossing it off. Whatever, if it keeps me motivated then I keep doing it!

Here's a little snippet of today's to-do list for you:


If you need a translation, that says:
- read camera manual
- deodorant
- Halloween costume
- dust (in preparation for leaving AGAIN for the weekend)
- sew camera strap cover
- sew wine koozies
- sew case from Corie
- bday card for Dad
- clean freezer
- filing
- pick up books at library
- bake for Clemson
- wipers to Lauren

It's going against every single grain in my body to not explain each of those in further detail but I'm going to leave it at that.

Except 1. I do not need new deodorant. I am wearing deodorant. I do not stink. I'm going to go cross more things off my list now.

PS - Yep, making lists is a hobby of mine. What of it?