Professional Organizing – This is a real profession?

I have always organized myself without any help although I never really saw it or labeled it as being organized. When I heard that someone was a “Professional Organizer”, I thought “You’re kidding! That’s really a job you can have?”

Well, my eyes have been opened to the fact that a girl can grow up but not know the first thing about cooking a meal and a boy can grow up not knowing how to mow the lawn so you can definitely have people who don’t have a clue how to organize themselves. It’s not necessarily a reflection on them. It may be the way they lived their life while growing up. If the care giving parent never does the things many of us consider normal activities, these things will be foreign to the child when it grows up unless it pursues them after exposure somewhere other than at home.

So the answer to the question is YES! Professional Organizing is a real profession and many people really need help with this just like they need help learning to cook, clean house, drive a car, write a check, mow the lawn, etc.

Unfortunately, “Mission Organization” has people thinking that organizing is nothing more than throwing most of your stuff away and buying clear containers. Both of these actions can be very expensive and definitely NOT what organizing is about.

Actually, organizing is about function and accessibility in the space you want to organize. Most organizing can be accomplished without spending any money at all. You just have to spend time and think about how you do things.

Here are the top 10 tips for getting organized.

1. store like items together
2. keep it where you use it
3. we use 20% of 80% we own (maybe some things can go?)
4. seasonal storage
5. GO Up in tight spaces
6. KISS - keep it simple sister
7. Make it accessible
8. Contain it
9. Use technology (when possible)
10. Unnecessary duplicates can go

"Jewelry Cleaner" RUINED My Necklace!

Have you ever had a piece of jewelry you love RUINED because you cleaned it with standard jewelry cleaner?

A friend of mine did this. Man, was she upset!

Most jewelry sold in the U.S. is high fashion jewelry and must be cleaned differently from fine jewelry.

High fashion jewelry can usually be cleaned with just a mild soap and water mixture. If you use a standard jewelry cleaner on the piece, it will be irreparably “tarnished” because the plating used is not as deep or strong as the materials used in fine jewelry. Standard jewelry cleaner used on fine jewelry is not made to use on high fashion jewelry.

If you are not sure whether a piece is fine (gold & diamonds), high fashion (plated, glass beads, sterling silver, rhodium, crystal, turquoise, etc.) or costume (plastic beads, painted metal) jewelry, use a mild soap and water mixture and maybe a soft toothbrush. Rinse it thoroughly, pat dry with a towel and lay out for air to circulate around it for final drying.

Faux pearls can only be cleaned with a damp cloth.

Tarnish a problem? Put a piece of chalk in each drawer and door area of your jewelry box. It will absorb the moisture which is causing your jewelry to tarnish.

Neck Coolers – 20,000 and Counting!

North Texas Stitchers, a group of little old ladies in Plano, has shipped over 20,000 neck coolers to the troops in a 2 ½ year period. Their first shipment (that was counted) was on June 7, 2006.

These ladies meet every Thursday to sew, crochet and pack neck coolers, pocket bears, pillows, soap on a rope, prayer rocks, helmet liners and head coolers.

All of these items are shipped to our soldiers all over the world just to show them that many of us in the states appreciate their service and what they are doing for our country.

We are now receiving requests for the neck coolers from other non profit groups who wish to send them to the troops themselves. It's really tough to keep up with the demand!

Our only fundraiser is selling the colorful neck coolers to the public. For every $5 cooler sold, we can send 5 sand colored ones overseas.


Neck Coolers 20,591
Bears 7,913
Head Coolers 869
Pillows 2,754
Prayer Rocks 3,247
Soap on a Rope 4,344
Helmet Liners 1,356

If you would like to help or want more information, click here.

Fever Blister (Cold Sore) - 27 years of Relief!!

I suffered from fever blisters starting in 5th grade. They would creep up and take over at least 1/2 of my top and bottom lips. They looked bad, felt bad and made it VERY hard to eat!

Sometime in 6th grade my mother took me to a doctor about them and all he did was give me three shots of penicillin on separate days. The shots did absolutely nothing for me but took plenty of money out of my mother's wallet!

So I continued to suffer with the pain and disfiguration regularly until I was about 25 years old. I met a woman across the street from me and we became friends. I broke out with my normal huge mess of fever blisters sometime during our friendship and she was somewhat amazed because she had never been around anyone who had fever blisters in the massive quantity I did. She proceeded to tell me that she had read somewhere, in a magazine that she was unable to relocate, that fever blisters were caused by a deficiency of L-lysine (an amino acid) in the body and that poultry is where you get it (in your diet). She also remembered that the article said the lysine was most concentrated in boiled eggs.

Well, this was before the "supplement" craze had taken hold like it is today so L-lysine was not easily found in "supplement" form. Also, I was in the "young with family and poor" phase of my life so I couldn't have afforded the supplement anyway. But, I LOVED eggs in any form.

I proceeded to experiment by eating more boiled eggs, to start with, right then while I had the fever blisters. It took a couple of days of eating about 3 or 4 boiled eggs each day but on that 3rd day, I noticed a major difference in the amount of pain I was having. So, I continued to eat 3-4 boiled eggs per day to see if it made a difference in how long it took for the fever blisters to go away.

Normally it took about 2 1/2 to 3 weeks from the time the fever blisters appeared on my lips to the time they were finally gone (no scabs, nothing). By eating the eggs, the time was shortened by 50%.

Something you need to know about fever blisters/cold sores is that if you don't begin to treat them until after they have fully erupted into a blister, you're in for a long healing process. If you can catch them before they completely form, you can get rid of them within a day or 2 but you have to stay on top of it. Unfortunately, they can go "full blown" in about 4 to 8 hours so if you don't realize one is coming on until you get to work that day (and don't have any L-lysine in your purse), you will have a problem before you get home.

After a while, I got tired of having to cram so many eggs down and started looking for L-lysine in a "pill" form. I had no idea how much lysine was in an egg so I didn't really know how much to take so I had to experiment with it to see how much I could take. My body is one of those that is resistant to or inefficient at utilizing vitamins and minerals so I can take big doses of things many people cannot (not the toxic ones). You must know your body and experiment with low doses then increase them until you find the dosage that works for you.

The L-lysine in supplement form works just as well for me so I keep a supply handy at all times. Right now, I am using 500 mg caplets and have very few breakouts. I only take them when I feel a fever blister coming on. I had an "event" last week and it took 6 of the 500 mg caplets but the fever blister was completely gone by the end of the day.

My husband, parents, son and nephew all use L-lysine to take care of their minor breakouts as well and it works just as well for them as me but they usually do not have to take the large dose I do.

Please pass this on to anyone you know who suffers from fever blisters/cold sores.

Do not construe this as prescribed medicine. I am not a doctor.