Organizing My Hair Junk

My mess of a drawer hair bands and clips. It worked okay until I had my fourth baby. Now I just don't have the extra 5 seconds that it takes to find what I want. So, I took a trip to the Dollar Store (which has great storage options) and found some bins to separate the bands from the clips. Here's what it is now:

Organizing tip: put like items together. Just separating these two items (the bands from the clips) does wonders. I could have bought four smaller bins and organized it even more, but it wasn't worth the extra money to me.

Here is what my children's hair stuff looks like:

We don't have space in their bathroom, so this is in one of their dresser drawers, which was converted into a toy space. I got them involved in the sorting and organizing so they know where it all goes - not only teaching them responsibility, but saving me the time it takes to clean up their hair bows off the floor, out of their bed, under the table, etc.

Ten in Ten on the Tenth

It's that time again. For those who are new to my blog, I write a post on the 10th of each month (well, except for the month or two after I had my baby) with 10 things you can do in about 10 minutes. So, the next time you have a spare 10 minutes, try to tackle some simplifying!

1. Deep clean the kitchen sink.
2. Check current events. For water cooler talk or because you're actually interested in them.
3. Dust lamp shades.
4. Match all your socks...throw away your orphans and ones with holes.
5. Tweet.
6. Update your Netflix queue.
7. Go through your condiments section in the fridge and toss those that have expired beyond your comfort level.
8. Go look in your bathroom(s) and stock them up with toilet paper.
9. Clip your finger and/or toenails. Or check out my other post on fingernails.
10. Sit down and rest!

Saving Money and a Jar

Reuse, reduce, recycle. A mantra we've all heard and most of us have come to love. Here's one way to do just that with plastic jars: Money.

A while back I was looking for an allowance system for my five-year-old. I wanted a space for tithing, saving, and spending. While there were some options out there, I just didn't want to spend the money on them. So, I gave my daughters a lesson in reusing what you have. I asked them to decorate the banks so they have some ownership of it. And they turned out great.

This activity killed many birds with one stone: reused something that was destined for the recycling bin, gave my girls a fun activity for a while, and saved me from spending money on one of those store bought systems.