Organize 365 Podcast

Well the time is here! Abby is finally getting a back surgery we knew would need to be done despite all the cortisone shots and physical therapy. I don’t share this so you can plan when your next family member needs you for a surgery. I’m sharing all my planning thoughts and iterations because where else do we hear this stuff? How do you learn how others plan? This is for any event you have coming up that requires a lot of shifting and planning. I’m going into a time where there will be a plan and I can not just “not feel like it.” I have to do what is on the plan in order to have success.  Operation “Take Care of Grayson” What does this mean for me? Full time primary care giver to Grayson. Honestly, I’m using the lens that this is a unique opportunity to spend these months with Grayson and support Abby. The first thing I knew I needed was to think about how I was going to entertain this active big 4 year old. I have a routine I am going to try out based on tiny details of care that Grayson needs and what he’s used to. And I’ve thought about a lil lunch box I can pack for on the go, what all needs to be in my purse at all times for Grayson, and a backpack in the back of the car with things we may need when we are out. The routine is in small chunks of time that I can start to give back to Abby as she recovers.  Next Layer: The Family When going into a time of new demands on your time and capacity, you need to look at it in reverse order to figure out how to still meet as many personal and family obligations as possible. So next my brain went to the rest of my family. How will I care for Greg, Joey, and help Abby through recovery. Greg has this trip to the Keys planned to take with Joey and his dad. It’s important and I encouraged them to still take it. It’s during the first week after Abby’s surgery. I’m asking Greg to take on a few tasks to make sure we all get fed and Grayson gets to and from Daycare.  I’ve been reading up on this surgery and the recovery process. I have tried to consider the physical things Abby may need to aid her in her recovery. But I have also been considering the emotional toll this may have on her. Might be tough watching me play mom to her child for a while. I will do my best to include Abby to keep her spirits up. And the physical therapy! Likely I will have those scheduled before the surgery takes place.  I’m sneaking in an adult field trip before surgery to fill my cup and one after Abby’s surgery to give me something to look forward to. I also looked at work and rearranged the things I need to be in person at, to the mornings, when I will be in the office. I’ve decided to work from home for the first week. And Saturday showed itself as a day I can take advantage of being in the office because Greg can be home with Abby and Grayson on Saturdays. I will be working on my dissertation starting now because I have time and then Saturdays. Please cross your fingers all the research I’m going to do in advance about Prospective Memory will be worth it because I have not got the green like on this yet. But it’s a risk, for times sake, that I have to take.  How Will My Planning Day Workbook Look This Time? So after taking 32 minutes to tell you all about my planning, I opened the Planning Day workbook. I walked through the workbook and shared, off the cuff, my thoughts about how I will plan according to each page. Ha! I was actually caught off guard on a couple of upcoming things like birthdays and our anniversary. Yeah, Abby needs an oil change and I checked but my car is good for a while. These are the things you should be thinking about going into something this big, what can I get done now to make this upcoming busy time more smooth? I am trying to think of everything. I will continue to mull over my calendar and rearrange things as necessary. This is a ridiculous amount of planning that my future self will thank me for doing. This is the kind of detailed planning we do in Planning Day!  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Planning Day Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 25 April 2025

We work fast! So excited to share the Embrace Add on that we created in collaboration with Heather S. As you heard in the previous episode, Transformation with Heather S., she has a 6 step process to help you really process life, understand where you are now because of events you have gone through, and ultimately move beyond those emotions. Emotions can hold us back from moving forward.  Step 5 is realizing you are worthy! And now you need to ask yourself,  “What you want from life?” And finally, Step 6 is getting to a place of realizing your value. And since you have so much to offer, ask yourself “what can I give or  contribute to life? How can I use my gifts?” What if we just started to dream again? Even if you have done Embrace in the past, you are a new person than the last time. You have lived more since then and it may be time for you to rediscover what you are uniquely created to do. You can now get the Embrace add on which has water colors, special markers, water color paper, and other goodies to process your emotions through art therapy. Heather will take 2 hours to walk you through the prompts and activity to get the most from your Embrace experience.  EPISODE RESOURCES: Embrace Add On Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 23 April 2025

In this episode, I introduce you to Heather S. She is a mental health counselor who is married and mom to 5 children. They have their own little “farm” they call home. Heather was in a hard season of life when she heard Sara Dean interviewing me on the Shameless Mom Academy Podcast and I was talking about the Sunday Basket®. Heather was a grad student, her dad was ill and Heather was his primary caregiver, not to mention she had a 21/2 year old at the time. Her brain felt very busy and she thought the Sunday Basket® could help. Heather believes that planning and organization is one of the best gifts we can give ourselves.  Sometimes, as women, it seems as though we are expected to know how to keep a house.  It’s ok if you don’t know how and you need to hire someone or purchase a course to teach you. We both agreed that organization is self care! There’s one component of being a household manager that negatively impacts a person and it’s the emotional. It’s based on how well we think we are at the managerial and cognitive pieces of running the home. And there’s a lot of negative internal chatter about it! The Sunday Basket® quiets those comments.  Heather had been successfully using a DIY Sunday Basket® with her large family, so Heather and her husband agreed to invest in the Organize 365® Sunday Basket to get additional support. She shared about how she does Christmas. She shared her hacks on how not have to wrap presents the night before, how she makes her kids lists, and how to not overspending! And wait till she explains her sick box, genius solutions!  And since that was such a success, it made sense to invest in the old All Access program to get their house in order to sell. It made $20,000 in sense! Once they decluttered and met with their realtor again, they added $20,000 to the selling value of their home by just painting and decluttering! Then they moved, Heather got her Masters, added some dogs, and a child!!  The last half of our conversation was about Embrace, currently the self-guided retreat until I am done with the PhD. She pointed out how important it is to do the journaling and coming to terms with your past. Through journaling we can all notice what we say to ourselves, the lies we tell ourselves, and look at what we wrote to decide if it’s true. We can journal to explore what we want. And specifically with Embrace, it made so much sense to Heather because she’s done that hard work of journaling and reflecting. And there is are many scientific benefits of pen to paper. The reality is you can’t get to “What is my unique purpose and how can I share it?” until you have accepted that you are worthy and have great value to give.  She lost her father shortly after having her 5th child. How does one grieve and celebrate a new life at the same time? Heather had to use her planning and journaling skills to work through that grief while still taking care of her family the way she wanted to.  She scheduled her grieving time and you may need to do the same. Take the time to process your past to get to the place where you can feel worthy of organization. You can then realize you have so much to offer this world. And finally with embrace, explore how you can impact the world with your unique gifts and talents. Heather has this great 6 step art therapy journal prompting process that she takes her clients through.  She really shared a lot about the process and I believe so many people would benefit from doing the internal work before diving into Embrace. We are all worthy and valuable.  Heather’s advice is, “We need to start with the internal work. Sitting and taking time to do the internal work first will let you stay motivated and on track to do what you need to do.”  Heather shared her desire to do so in collaboration with Organize 365® someday.  If you liked Heather and her ideas, you DON’T want to miss the next Coffee Chat!!  EPISODE RESOURCES: Embrace Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 23 April 2025

We’re spending all this time invisibly planning. I desire for it to be more visible. For home, I have always planned in these trimesters, 120 day chunks. You can hear all about it in ep. 132. I call these chunks summer, fall, and winter. When the PhD is finished (hopefully in Dec.) I will have planned 9 chunks. Each chunk of time starts with this natural break in the hustle of life and gives us these organic bursts of energy to declutter, organize, and reset. It became very clear to me the energy of each season during this PhD journey. What did I plan? How did it go? And how am I leaving this PhD phase of life?  Summer (May-August) Sing it with me “Schoooooool’s out for summer”...these are the more relaxed months of the year. The invisible work you would have done for this chunk was planning how to keep the kids busy, summer vacations, and this is usually a personal development time for me. The PhD is all personal development. Summer of ‘23 was “Busy” because I’d applied and been accepted into the PhD and lil Grayson turned two so he was into everything! I had each minute planned with the goal of getting my PhD that I basically missed summer! This summer was the hardest. I took less time to plan because Greg and I went to England. And I don’t regret it! Grayson was 3 and he was on to me. He KNEW when I was home and he wanted to play. But I’d made the choice to pursue this PhD and I had to choose it over Grayson for this season. So I moved almost everything to the office. Another lost summer. Fall (September-December) Fall seems to be an easy chunk of time for me. This season you have planned for back to school and the holidays. Things seem to go easier and thank God for football. Because Greg loves football and that means I don’t have guilt getting in a few more hours of studying or completing more assignments. I’d only taken 2 classes which lightened the PhD demand on me. In fall of 2024, I had to ask myself “How do I not do again, what I just did in summer?” I took a trip with Greg, I only took 2 classes and focused on the holidays.  Winter (January-April/Mayish) Winter starts with all of us coming back from Christmas/Holiday breaks. In 2023, I planned to change all my habits and routines to be a PhD student, you can hear all about that in ep. 519 and/or the Monday PhD episodes I did around that same time. I knew it was going to take me 25 hours so I blocked that time off my calendar. It's no good to set a goal but not set aside time to achieve it.  For my 2024 winter chunk, I’m calling it “treading water”. This was a really hard chunk of time because Greg had rotator cuff surgery, we’d remodeled Joey’s condo, and we were planning to remodel Abby’s space downstairs next.   How I’m Ending My PhD Phase I’m calling this last chunk of time “the grind”. I have finished the classes portion of completing the PhD.  As I see the finish line in sight for the PhD, I am walking away so happy and proud! I’m proud of myself for the mental capacity I’ve grown. I am so proud that I put earning a PhD as one of my priorities. I would cheer anyone on in my family to do the same for themselves. It forced me to set better boundaries with my family. I encourage you all to do Planning Day and I do it for myself too to make sure I am pouring into my marriage and family, that I am prioritizing self care, to travel, and breakdown a big project I want to accomplish. Sometimes you get that project done in one 120 chunk and sometimes it’s multiple chunks over the course of 3 years. Just make sure you prioritize your family and have good communication so they have accurate expectations. None of this happens accidentally, like a PhD, you have to plan for it! EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Home Planning Day 120 - Productivity #6 - 10 Ways to Find More Time Ep. 519 - Organizing my PhD journey Part 1 Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 18 April 2025

PLANNING…it’s the one thing that you can control in these unsettling times. Planning Days are now 20% OFF! The best part is, when you sign up for the subscription, that price is locked in for future planning days. Planning will help you to make better choices and establish routines and new habits. Routines and habits take a little more time to become second nature. Routines and habits change your character of who you are over time through intention and discipline. That’s what we do in Planning Day.  There are three types that Organize 365® offers; Home, Friday Workbox® and now the little sister…Teacher Planning Day.  Planning days help you to look at your time and plan ahead for the next 120 days for the Home or 90 days for Work. You will establish routines that will lead to habits that end up freeing up your cognitive load. You will look at how you are currently spending your time and think about how you want to spend your time. Each planning day comes with a workbook to work through what your next 120 or 90 will look like.  You all may be familiar with Home and Work Planning Days but I want to share with you a little bit about what to expect in the Teacher Planning Day.  You will look at the personal development goals you have for yourself, not the ones given to you by your administrator.  You’ll look at theme days, your planning time, and how to be productive.  I’ll go over the Teacher Workbox with you and we’ll talk about the pink slash pockets and what you want to do for personal development or ideas for your classroom. The purple slash pockets used for 3-5 projects you want to complete. With the blue slash pocket you’ll think about a communication goal, your team, and maybe a goal you all set together. And then the green slash pocket, I’ll explain how to use it for administrative tasks and your checklists.  OOOPS…we made a mistake and I have decided to roll with it. I know how planning will help you to feel in control in a time when you may feel uneasy. So the Complete Home Organization Bundle accidentally got included in this sale. I feel so strongly that planning is what we all need right now so I’m keeping this on sale too. If you have been interested in the bundle, now is your time to get it. And at this price your planning day is almost free.  You will get the Productive Home Solution® as well as a Sunday Basket®, the Paper Solution, Binders, and the workbooks, check out the link below for full details.  If you wanna be around other go-getters, driven,  and positive people then Planning Day is the day you don’t wanna miss. Once the Planning Day has happened pricing will go back up. So take advantage of this deal and get in the driver’s seat and get the Planning Day that is right for you!  EPISODE RESOURCES: Home Planning Day Friday Workbox® Planning Day Teacher Planning Day Complete Home Organization Bundle Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 15 April 2025

Happy Monday! Today we’re talking all about habits like what ones do we have, how they are  established, some really interesting studies about habits and routines, and how you too can reprogram yourself to have productive habits. Brown University defines a habit as a repeated action that becomes an automatic behavior with little to no thought. Life Long Intentionality Setter  As a child, I was in charge of my fun. I remember going to the stationary store and getting planners about three times a year. Anna pointed out the coincidence of Friday Workbox® Planning Day happening three times a year as well.  I like to maximize my time. I get my planner out and fill in the tasks that need to be accomplished and then I start thinking about what I want my routines to be. I intentionally set routines to include somethings I’d like to end up as a habit with the understanding these things will make me more productive and achieve my goals. I feel like a person can successfully add a new habit each Planning Day. On average it takes a person 66 days to establish a new habit.  Effortless Self Control Habits are stronger than your beliefs. You may believe fruits and vegetables are better for you. However if you habitually eat cookies…that habit will likely continue unless you make environmental changes. Remove the cookie jar and put healthy food in its place. Now when you habitually visit where the cookie jar was you will grab a piece of fruit.  And with our habits we have lower emotional reactions. We talked about a study where students’ habits were questioned. They determined 43% of their day was habitual. Your emotional response to waking up early on daily is reduced when you have done it for a long time. And once you decide to clean your kitchen, the routine is habitual and you can sing along to music or think about something else because you have a routine to how you clean your kitchen.  Context Clues also support effortless self control. If you have a habit of putting on your deodorant after you brush your teeth, your toothbrush is the clue. But let’s say on vacation you have all your toiletries in a bag. You brush your teeth but because your deodorant isn’t in plain sight, you go sight seeing and remember you forgot to put on deodorant.  Prospective Memory This is the theory I’m thinking I will do my dissertation about. It’s something you are reminded you need to do but in the future. Say you are talking to someone about the grocery store and that reminds you that you need to pick up a card for a wedding next time you are there. It’s like you are trying to remember things for the future. They are related to a location or a time. You could be reminded about the card by time as in the wedding is a 5pm and you need the card by then.  Are You Maxed Out on Habits? A person can only do so much everyday, even the amount of habits they have. Are you programmed correctly? Planning Day, with Organize 365®, really helps you to analyze your time and look at what you are currently doing. You may see some changes you need to make and then plan how you will do it . To do lists and diaries have been found to be inefficient because there’s no place for holding things like a card for an upcoming wedding or ideas you are simmering on. When you write one task on an index card and throw it in your Sunday Basket®, you are able to categorize, make a plan of completing those tasks, and delay decision making until necessary. I hope you can join us May 3rd for Home Planning Day or June 6th for Friday Workbox® Planning day to get productive habits in place so you have more cognitive space for other areas of your life.  EPISODE RESOURCES: https://www.brownhealth.org/be-well/why-habits-can-be-good-thing https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/04/230417155750.htm  https://www.apa.org/monitor/2020/11/career-lab-habits https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/ejsp.674 Wood, W., Quinn, J. M., & Kashy, D. A. (2002). Habits in everyday life: Thought, emotion, and action. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83(6), 1281–1297. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.83.6.1281 Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 14 April 2025

This important update is being recorded on April 8th at 3pm. I hope there haven’t been too many changes by the time you listen to this episode. There have been so many economic changes and the atmosphere is starting to feel a little uncertain like it did about 5 years ago when Covid reared its ugly head. There are 3 types of responses to what’s going on. Those who know too much and they are thinking way too far in the future, those who stick their head in the sand and don’t want to know about any of it, and those who know just enough to make positive, proactive, profitable choices for their homes. As a CEO I am in the last category. I’m in preservation mode to preserve Organize 365® and my employees' jobs. I tried to give you different perspectives of what is going on from the overall economy, from a CEO, and as a household manager.  Job Security & The Stock Market There are three things people are worried about right now. Two of them are job security and the stock market. Come to find out federal jobs aren’t secure! In 2008/2009, people didn’t think it was possible to lose your house. In 2020, people didn’t think we could be locked in our homes.  I told you in a previous episode that I don't understand the stock market so I don’t have much advice. Greg and I decided long ago to invest in the stock market, Greg takes care of that. Our children are invested in the stock market. And historically the stock market always comes back.  Supply Chain There was never a toiler paper supply issue. We had plenty of toilet paper because it’s made here in the U.S. Size was the problem…it was only available in industrial sizes for like schools and stadiums. But where we are going to see supply chain issues will be from items that come from China. We are in an economic war. My recent order from China is going to be tariffed at 121%!!!  That’s right! Half of this episode is about sourcing my supplies and how & how it has changed. Due to the tariffs, expect to see fewer choices at come point and quantity available to decrease if it comes from China. I explained a lot about how the tariffs came to be, how they added up, and what they mean for the American supply chain. I offered solutions to keep your household supply chain supple.  How is Organize 365® responding?  As a CEO that looks into the future, I always have an 18 month to 2 year supply of physical products. Organize 365® isn’t going anywhere! We aren’t passing the tariff expenses to our customers, we don’t have to, as I explained, because of the way I have financially structured Organize 365®. And we aren’t ordering from China for now.  I am anticipating working with an American company for our Sunday Baskets® in addition to other products and may continue to work with them once this whole thing blows over. I speculate it will be a good 18 months till our economy stabilizes again.  We’re running leaner with daily operations. And we’re thankful we didn’t raise expenses by moving like we wanted or getting the ERP system.  And most of all, always wondering as economics are changing, how can we meet our customers where they are. So, we have decided to offer upcoming planning days for home (5/3) and Friday Workbox® (6/6) and Teacher planning day (7/9) for a 20% discount from $250. You will get the planning prep day, additional videos, the 4 hour planning day live webinar with replay access for 6 weeks, and the workbook. Stop spiraling, think about the root cause of the supply shortage you experienced during Covid, and start planning. The sky is not falling. Planning is the one thing you can do that will give you more time, help you make better decisions, make your money go further, and make you feel like you are in the driver’s seat.  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Home Planning Day Friday Workbox Planning Day Teacher Planning Day Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 11 April 2025

In this episode, I introduce you to Julie D. Julie and her husband have, in their home, a daughter, a son, and Maggie their dog. Julie heard someone talking about the Sunday Basket® and was intrigued and figured she could figure it out. Julie wasn’t looking for organization as much as she desired systems. Before the interview, Julie drew out a mind map. She wanted to make sure to share ALL of the products and ways that Organize 365® has benefitted her life. Make sure you catch the episode to hear all the areas that have been impacted in Julie’s life.  Julie came from 20 years in the retail space where she used to be in charge of 13 week projects that consisted of resetting a store or setting up new stores. The way the Organize 365® systems break down 90 (for business) and 120 (for home) days, was familiar to Julie. That is how they would organize the resetting of the stores. They’d make a plan and then run that plan for the next chunk of time.  Your home is like a small business right? So your family members we joked are like employees uninterested in the success of your small business. It’s harder to get them motivated to keep things organized. We talked about how men from the Boomers generation who witnessed a stay at home mom, AKA the primary parent taking care of the home and children and a dad “bringing home the bacon.”  So their expectations were similar for their families. The systems let her do just that as they’d planned. The kids program has helped her to have them do some of the organizing. She’s invested in the kid program to which the kids know a lot of “what Lisa says.”  Julie has thoughtfully implemented all of the Organize 365® systems.  She has multiple Sunday Baskets® and even got her mom and big sister to invest in Sunday Baskets®. She loves spreading the “gospel of Organize 365®.” It was a way for them to do life together till her mother passed away. Of course, she inherited her moms. She feels the Sunday Basket® is so important in her life that when they remodeled her kitchen she had to make sure she knew where she’d be able to put it once it was finished. During the remodel, she had a Sunday Basket® dedicated to the remodel and it was convenient for her and her contractors. It kept the remodel moving along and organized.  Julie’s son, John, has level 3 autism and that has added to the demand for systems. She values the Warrior Mama binder to have in DON (determination of needs) meetings. She made a point to put a picture of John as a baby on the front to remind administrators and physicians in the meetings that her son is a person and he has come a long way. She’s got a Friday Workbox® for her daughter in regards to Julie being leader of the parent council (Canadian speak for the PTO), being the pizza mom, girl guide leader, and as the registrar for speed skating. Once she realized she wasn’t going to continue being the leader of the parent council, she could see taking off that train car gave her more capacity for something else. She’s got a financial binder for each kid to keep track of receipts and medical visits. And John throws her plenty of challenges too, but, she has peace of mind that she’s basically created playbooks for everything so when the wheels start to look like they may fall off she knows how to prevent it and get back to smooth sailing.  Julie often wonders how 20 year old Julie would have benefited from the Organize 365® products and systems. She was in a chaotic period of time and wonders how things would be different. What’s different now? Julie has more peace of mind and capacity to prioritize her crafts. She’s able to “do more projects that make me feel like me.” This is one line item in the budget that will not go away.  Julie’s advice is, “Do a blitz. Then it’s not a huge commitment to some ongoing system you have to learn.”  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution® Household Manager 21 Day Bootcamp Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 9 April 2025

The PhD is almost over and I’ve been thinking about “What do I want?” When I committed to the PhD, I knew it was a lengthy commitment of time and hefty commitment of money. There are things we agree to in life and we know the long term commitment it will require! And now that the PhD finish line is in sight, I know it’s project time again!!  I love a meaty project and I’ve identified what I want to do over the next 120 days. I want to redo my living spaces, WITH a budget in mind so it doesn’t get crazy like it did last year with one project expense leading to another project expense.  Do you struggle with this too?  Up until I abdicated grocery store shopping and cooking, I hadn’t really been on the list. I’d always put my family’s needs before my own. If I wanted something, I’d think about the price, and I’d decide we could use the money towards something else the family needed. I’d also give them my time before using it for myself or business.  We took care of the kids’ living spaces last year. Joey’s plumbing got an upgrade which meant his bathrooms got an upgrade too. Then Abby’s space basically got completely remodeled, but honestly her life was demanding it. And now I feel like we have finished launching them.  And then I got to looking around my living space. And I am choosing to use available time and money for myself and Greg, I’m on the list again.  My Wish List on a Budget When Grayson came along, Greg and I started sleeping in separate rooms so I could help with the baby. And we like it, so, we are keeping it that way. Remember, use your home for your current phase of life! I want to cement Greg and I into the empty nest/grandparent phase. In my room, I look around and see all hand me down things.  I’ve dreamed of what this space could be and here’s what I came up with. I’d like to have a household manager command center, an office space dedicated to running our house!  I’d like to bring up all my Sunday Baskets® and binders upstairs and put them all in one bookshelf for easy access. And new bedding that makes me feel like a girl.  I want to rearrange the room to be able to open the curtains and make room for said bookshelf. And I want more light in this room for projects and scrapbooking. I’d like as much upstairs as possible because if I want to get anything done I have to hide from Grayson. He loves to play with me and I love to play with him but, but…I like to get projects done too! My dreaming didn’t stop there…   Rezoning in the Woodruff Household I’ve decided the room between Greg and I, which used to be the nursery and then a guest room,  should be reimagined into a gift wrapping room. On a previous episode, I suggested HDX shelving with a long counter top to be used as a gift wrapping station. I have not stopped thinking about that and I finally will have time to make this transition happen. I’m no longer using the kitchen as our home office so I’ll move those resources upstairs. I’d like to make communal items more easily available to Abby on the first level like band aids and things, maybe in the laundry room. I just need to go through the laundry room period now that Abby has her own and I’m doing all of this reimagining and functionality of our living spaces.  Speaking of the laundry room, there’s more project supplies that I will move upstairs that aren’t for Grayson and I. Gifts for Grayson will go up because he knows the laundry room is my hiding place. AND, all in one washer dryer upgrade. It arrives tomorrow!!  I can’t believe I hit the purchase button. I did the cost analysis and it’s not good but boy is my lil heart excited! We got to talking about it in the small business mastermind and everyone encouraged me to get it saying how much they loved theirs. Also I’m keeping the dryer so I can get two loads done at once. So that justifies the cost a little too.  I wanted to get Abby her own washer dryer so I could get mine back. In the process of sharing my washer door would get stuck and then it started to stink! Now the washer smells despite my efforts to correct it. It annoys me! So it’s on it’s way! And Lastly, I think I’ll clean out the closet downstairs. Most of it will end up in my household manager command center and then Abby can get more storage. I hope you’ll join me for planning day to get your next projects planned for your next 120 days! EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Lisa’s Favorite Things Home Planning Day The Productive Home Solution® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!  

Transcribed - Published: 4 April 2025

Elaine Willing was on the Monday Connection episode and we have been working together to get this PCS Planning Course just right. You’ll get a workbook, training videos, and a community in the Organize 365® app. Elaine worked on a way to mentally process PCS. She’s figured out how to stop the spinning in your brain with the mention of PCS and turn it into productive actions. Hear all about it in yesterday’s episode!!  The workbook helps you to process your emotions and proactively make a plan for the relocation. PCS’ing can be a lonely isolating process that only builds in complexity as your family grows and you “survive” another duty station. We realize the need to get to community quicker in these moves. The places Elaine has been pained to leave were those when she had a supportive community.  You guys!!!  I am so excited to be able to offer the PCS Planning Course AND on top of that…it’s 90% off till May 9th, 2025 because that is Spouse Appreciation Day! This is not an April Fool’s joke!!  Please tell everyone you know about this course to help soldiers and their families PCS with less stress. And as I shared in the coffee chat, there is an option to have our base get a virtual or in person training for the PCS Planning Course. You will get lifetime access so even if you are not in a PCS season, take advantage of the pricing now so you have it available to you when you need it again. *4 Hr. Virtual Planning Day for your base via zoom. *6 Hr in person (in the 48 continuous states), on base training. Includes the PCS bundle. Two hours will be interactive with me in a questions and answer or book signing interactive capacity.  *With this in person opportunity you get the PCS Planning Course, Workbook & The PCS  Productivity Bundle.  PCS Productivity Bundle: Portable Sunday Basket, 2.0 slash pockets (pink, purple, blue, green), and 2.0 Productivity tabs. Your pink slash pocket is for travel, purple slash pockets is for all things related to your home, blue slash pocket for your family and pets, and green for finances including an expense tracker so you get things paid for that should be by the military. **If you have questions and/or interest in one of these opportunities please email [email protected] EPISODE RESOURCES: PCS Planning Course PCS Productivity Bundle Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.  

Transcribed - Published: 1 April 2025

Happy Monday!  Today I get to introduce you to Elaine Willing, who is officially on staff as teh lead for our new PCS (Permanent Change of Station) initative. At Organize 365®, we’ve developed a course to help spouses, supporting their soldiers, to find community faster and make each move a little easier. I first met Elaine through her father in law at a home school co-op conference. He was sent to get a picture with me. Elaine found Organize 365® about 10 years ago when she was maxed out and looking for solutions. Then I got to meet Elaine and the rest is history! I share in her desire to help military spouses through the PCS process. Elaine has supported her husband for many years, is raising her three boys, and now it’s her turn to do something that fills her cup! She sees how spouses just kind of circle in the lower levels of Mazlow’s Hierarchy of Needs and never get to rise to the level where you explore your purpose, what you are uniquely created to do. Elaine knows all too well about PCSing (13 times) and understands the struggle with #alltheemotions, #allthepaperwork and is eager to get to spouses organized and in community sooner. The Emotional Toll  Elaine was very vulnerable in sharing her experience, to this point, being a military spouse. She shared aspects of her life I had never thought of! I never considered the friendships they have to build quickly and let go at a moment’s notice. The grieving process you go through as you leave your current station (although she joked that sometimes you are relieved to leave if it just wasn’t a good fit) and anxiety or excitement about what lies ahead with a new duty station. Think of how much you trust the people you put down for your children’s emergency contact…Elaine has to find that stranger quickly, as all the forms continue to request it, as she gets her family settled in each new location. There’s a different at home cadence with each location based on the soldier’s new job. My jaw was on the floor as she explained to me how she got to fly home to see family. Yes they get free SA (space available) flights, but I’m not sure that’s a flight I want to take. And their stations overseas, they’ve only had one car which made daily activities challenging with little ones in tow.  All the Moving Pieces Oh the checklists we’ve accumulated and compiled to assist with the repetitive nature of PCS’ing. There are checklists for utilities, vehicles, homes, packing the house, and what not to pack.  I included 10 steps to an organized move. When military families move, lots times they are living out of a suitcases for 30 days. You better believe there’s a checklist for those suitcases. Some bases are equipped with a lending closet for basic things like maybe some toys for your kids or small appliances that weren’t necessities.  And then where do you get groceries in your new location (tricky for Elaine with her family having food allergies), house keepers, after school activities, sports, babysitters, and even for you to find friends. There’s a checklist of services you’ll need to find and establish. A lot of the post-move checklists you could review on the plane ride to your new duty station. The very last checklist “Just tell me what to do” for when you are drained but know you need to keep going.  What to Expect Over the many moves, Elaine has found a way to mentally process PCS. She’s figured out how to stop the spinning in your brain with the mention of PCS and turn it into productive actions. The workbook helps you to process your emotions and proactively make a plan for the relocation. PCS’ing can be a lonely isolating process that only builds in complexity as your family grows and you “survive” another duty station. We realize the need to get to community quicker in these moves. The places Elaine has been pained to leave were those when she had a supportive community.  Two Opportunities to Build Community: *4 Hr. Virtual Planning Day for your base via zoom. *6 Hr in person (in the 48 continuous states), on base training. Includes the PCS bundle. Two hours will be interactive with me in a questions and answer or book signing interactive capacity.  *With this in person opportunity you get the PCS Planning Course, Workbook & The PCS  Productivity Bundle which includes a Portable Sunday Basket, 2.0 slash pockets (pink, purple, blue, green), and 2.0 Productivity tabs. Your pink slash pocket is for travel, purple slash pockets is for all things related to your home, blue slash pocket for your family and pets, and green for finances including an expense tracker so you get things paid for that should be by the military. **If you have questions and/or interest in one of these opportunities please email [email protected] EPISODE RESOURCES: PCS Planning Course PCS Productivity Bundle Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 31 March 2025

Your home is like “home base” in tag, it’s the safe spot. In 2024, we spent resources on Joey and Abby’s homes. In 2025, I want to do some renovations on the second floor of our home, where Greg and I spend a lot of time. I wanted to share how I plan to attack those renovations but first I felt it appropriate to offer this bonus economic episode to give insight to all this Tariffs talk and the swift changing of the government right now. I based my choices off of the large picture and this is how you can too as the household manager! Hire It Out vs. DIY There is a direct relationship between the money you have to invest and the amount of time a project will take. Either you hire a contractor to complete the task with a timeline shorter than you could’ve done. Or you do it yourself but it will take longer usually.  And then there’s a hybrid option somewhere in there. I have decided on the projects I want to complete upstairs, however if I hire it all out like I did with the kids’ projects I’ll be broke soon!  Next episode I’ll tell you all about it.  YOUR House When considering your household budget and anything you want to do you need to look at what is going on in your household budget. Just because the economy is bad doesn’t mean your household is. The example I share here was the Organize 365® budget (remember our homes are small businesses) in regards to shipping costs, de minimis value, and taxes. I also shared how physical nexus and economic nexus affects Organize 365® sales and taxes so you could get an understanding of the complexity of what seems like a simple purchase or subscription from our community. You GOTTA hear the episode. And I say that to encourage learning. Always be moving forward.  Everyone may not be happy about this adjustment but when I looked at the entire shipping process and considering what the customer has to pay, in addition to their receiving end, it does not make sense to continue shipping internationally. If I don’t make this adjustment and Organize 365® does under, then there’s no money anyway. Better to adjust and make unpopular decisions. You may be looking ahead and realize that in order to celebrate your child's graduation like you may have for a previous child you need to cancel the annual summer vacation. As the household manager, in order to keep the budget afloat, this decision may make the most responsible financial sense. This is where you need to cut costs first, at the household level.  Economic Outlook Are we in a recession or not? I talked about my opinion of the stock market.  It may be an indicator of the emotional climate but not the economy. Right now, everyone can feel how volatile the economy feels. The President is making changes more quickly than people are used to. There is a lot going on with Tariffs and we are toeing the line with financial war. This is not in our control. My best advice, with all the economical uncertainty, is to attend planning day so you can plan out and allocate money for the next 120 days AND look over the next 3 years.  What Do You Need? As a household manager, looking at the current economy, I would not embark on the PhD. I know for my household budget and looking into the future over the next three years, now would not be a financially responsible time to tie up funds for that. However, I offered multiple ideas for how to continue personal development. If you can’t attend a conference this year like you normally do, try a different mode of learning. I know I want to do some renovating this year as my time is becoming available. If there is a financially hefty project you want to do, you may need to contribute some blood sweat and tears this time, in addition to or instead of hiring someone to complete the task. Can you invest more time and still get what you want? EPISODE RESOURCES: Home Planning Day  The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 28 March 2025

In this episode, Monique is here to tell you all about her experience at Small Business Mastermind. You know how I always say I am where work comes from? Well Monique is where in person events have come from in the past and you’ve probably heard her on the podcast. She’s been a professional organizer, certified by Organize 365®, for 12 years now! She has attended our events as a customer, as staff, as an organizer, and now, a small business owner looking to grow an online business. From the moment everyone arrived at the hotel, everyone just jumped right in. Due to the private chat set up in the app before the mastermind they all had a chance to connect. They were able to connect prior to the mastermind.  Monique shared her surprise that more attendees weren’t organizers. But they all were women creating business.   Day one started with an  energy in the room like a bunch of old friends reuniting, even for me because of all the Voxer conversations I’d had with all the women. And because of all of those conversations and the extensive survey everyone had filled out I knew the main struggle for everyone attending was green work.  Everyone was asking “How do you get it all done?” We had a lengthy conversion about Executive Assistants and Chiefs of Staff and how you know which you need. Monique shared how she got so much value out of the first session. Everyone looked at their admin tasks and they calculated a dollar value for that task. It’s like I shared about economic stage 6, it may make more sense to pay someone to do something you are capable of doing because it takes you out of your business. Monique said that was one of the most impactful things she learned. We joked, once we had that session Monique was ready to go home and conquer her business!  I’ve shared transparently that on day 2, I didn’t really know what I was going to teach but I had no doubt that it was going to be meaningful. As we try new things, if we keep the person we are doing it for in mind, it will be impactful because we want better for them. That’s when I decided to do 12 minutes with Lisa to really drill down on one struggle or thought or project.  I didn’t know till Monique shared but as people came out they all shared what they asked and what we came up with.  Monique brought to the table an online business that she wanted to grow. I advised that was a tough road if she wanted to go down it due to social media being such a beast like a part time job itself, all the noise online in general, and all the back office automations and such she would need would take years to build out. But Monique really did want to incorporate her coaching, paper organizing and productivity. But it’s funny both Monique and Lisa D. couldn’t remember their original idea they came to me with because what we imagined together was so much better and a perfect solution that they were so excited about. The day ended with the women attending Friday Workbox Planning Day live.  I’ve never had applause at the end of Planning Day.  Monique is offering an amazing package to come to your house for a week and organize. But we all know how easy it is to fall off the wagon after a reset like that. So you will also get 3 months of coaching on the systems and staying organized. So once you get it organized it can pretty much stay that way! She’s only taking 10 clients per year so make sure you get your package booked today!!  We pay people to do a lot of things for us like watching our kids, cleaning, our accounting so why not for organizing our homes and coaching to support this change? EPISODE RESOURCES: Small Business Mastermind The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 26 March 2025

What have you thought of this series so far? At the beginning of this episode, I recapped economic stages 1-5. It’s important to understand them and how to advance if you’d like. But also if you find that your economic stage was once 4 and you are back to 1, you are not alone. It can happen to anyone and honestly I think all of America is in stage one, trying to reduce expenses to match their income. The economy changed which affected our small business AKA our homes. It’s important to understand and own the economic impact our home has on the global economy. Thinking about stage 6 should prompt you to look at your expenses and set expectations for what you can expect financially.   Stage 6: A business bigger than yourself; but there’s no playbook If you choose to go to stage 6, get ready for a life long journey of development. You may make some expensive mistakes or have some hires not work out.  In stage 6, your business becomes bigger than just you and your household budget. You are looking at your budget and realizing you can increase your expenses to (in the long run) make more money. It’s time to start interviewing people, explore their uniquenesses, and hire accordingly. And get ready for your income to decrease. In growing your business and getting structure in place, just know you will likely have little to no income for about 3-5 years. I wish there was a playbook that could have warned me. Take heart, in America, the 4 positions that can provide exponential wealth are doctor, lawyer, sales, and business owner. So if you are embarking on stage 6, there’s a lot of income potential due to all the extra help you have in your company now.  Stage 6: Taxes And with structuring your company, you will become a W2 employee, at least that is how I set up Organize 365®. My income was capped by my salary. I have learned more about the IRS than you ever wanted to know. There will be new tax implications on your business’s income. And your business income is not solely yours anymore. Due to the structure you put in place, you will pay yourself, your employees AND employment taxes.  You get to learn about human resources and you’ll be where benefits come from! Remember, life long journey of learning and development.  Stage 6: It’s so fun! Even if I had known the growing pains I could expect, no one could have stopped me. I love having a company, a team, and leading them!!  Details aren’t my strength and it makes me really happy to hire those tasks out. It’s time to get your home in order to give way to the time and attention you need to direct towards your business. Get that home train running smooth to allow capacity at work so you can really make an impact. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Friday Workbox® POTT START Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!  

Transcribed - Published: 21 March 2025

Happy 7th Birthday to the Sunday Basket®, let’s all break out in song. Just kidding…I am so excited to tell you the Paper Organization Certification course is 20% off till April 1st. Once you have finished the certification and get your license, you can charge for your services and receive 30% commission on products you sell.   Once upon a time I was a very frustrated mama. Joey was only 6 months old and Abby was 2. Lil Joey didn’t like to nap very long and I had a pile of actionable papers but no time to go through them much less accomplish anything. One night the Sunday Basket® was born. I knew the more planned, organized, and efficient with my time I could multiply the amount of tasks I could conquer. Links below to hear the evolution of the Sunday Basket®. Once the Sunday Basket® took off and people were implementing it in their lives they were longing for more training. So I started to offer workshops. But I knew in my heart of hearts that with the growth of my company, there would not be enough Lisa one day. That’s when the opportunity to become a certified paper organizer started to be offered.  Some people can DIY it and implement it successfully. Some people, like me, prefer 1:1 explanations and don’t mind paying for the speed of implementation. And yet others want to be tricked into it with a little get together, snacks, music, and friends. I used to be a part of Creative Memories, a scrapbooking company. I loved our monthly Friday night workshops and envisioned the certified organizers taking a playbook from Creative Memories. We had such rich connections and were really doing life with each other. And with simply learning to ask “Can this wait till Sunday?” you have a safe place to hold all your actionable papers till Sunday and externalize all the things you want to do.  When people come to the paper organizing retreats that are just one day mind you, they walk away with friends. It is a non-judgmental space. It’s a safe place to ask questions about the paper you have with you.  Lots of times another attendee has organized the type of  paper in question. And it’s through those conversations that friendships are developed.  Depending on the stage of life you are in, it can be really hard to make friends. I think of how my mom and myself have made friends over the years. I have never really been in the phase of life to plan or attend girls nights out. Those Creative Memory workshops were that for me. And the Paper Organizing Retreat or the other in person event may be that for you. 50% of the people attending are usually settling an estate which can be isolating and lonely and sometimes it’s their spouses. You can’t make friends in the walls of your homes. 5 years after COVID, it’s time to get back to in person events. People are in need of people more than ever right now. And it’s us, the people and community of Organize 365® that makes it so unique. So if you are interested, you have the heart of a teacher or a friend, and you want to become a Certified Paper Organizer now is your time!!  You will be certified in the Sunday Basket®, and the Financial, Medical, Household Reference, and Household Operation Binders. Once you are certified, you can even add on certifications like The Friday Workbox®, Teacher Workbox, and The Productive Home solution. We need more certified paper organizers! If you want to take it a step further, become a professional organizer; we have a course for that too called POTT START, check it out. If you just need to talk it out or ask more questions please reach out to customer service at [email protected].   EPISODE RESOURCES: The Paper Solution Certification POTT Start for Professional Organizer Certification 521-Lisa's Organization Story 2002 522-Lisa's Organization Story 2007 523-Lisa's Organization Story 2012 524-Lisa's Organization Story 2017 525-Lisa's Organization Story 2022 Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter   Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.  

Transcribed - Published: 18 March 2025

Today on the Connections Episodes from Organize 365®, I’m talking to Corie Weathers, author of “Military Culture Shift”. Once Corie was married she and her husband desired to invest in marriages, in a private practice. That was until he decided to pursue being a chaplain in the Military. And so began a life long adventure of serving and PCS’ing with two boys. Corie is currently gearing up to PCS soon and vulnerably shared how she feels about it.  Corie’s strength is not in adjusting to change. As a therapist, Corie advises others to adjust their expectations and look for the things you are excited about in the new location. It’s important to grieve the loss of your current lifestyle, feel it, process it, and then climb out of those feelings by looking for purpose in the new. And while it is a military family’s choice to serve, she pointed out there are a lot of sacrifices and choices you forfeit. Corie is deeply committed to serving the military community.  Military Culture Shift We talked about the culture shift among military families over the years. It used to be that 1 in 4 people knew someone serving and now it’s 1 in 200 that know someone serving in the Military. Americans had a better understanding of the sacrifice service men and women and their families make, on a daily basis. The overall support system used to be greater. Because military families know the struggle of moving so often, when you arrived in your new location, you could count on the community to embrace you. The spouses acted as the backbone and placed on the back burner for their families. They volunteered so their active duty servicemember could focus on the mission. Honestly, the Military relies on the volunteers. It’s volunteers who help the families settle in. Also as spouses, you need to get your family established, then you could explore work opportunities. But by that time it was almost time to move again.  In the 80’s the marketing had a fatherly figure kind of message as in you could count on the military to supply all your needs.  That shifted to “we take care of our families so they can take care of themselves” kinda vibe. They were trying to break the dependency of families on them for every need. Families were starting to get used to 2 income households so they didn’t have to rely on the military so much and because spouses wanted to work.  Spouses face many challenges in relocating and often that second income is undependable. Where the spouse has a license or certification, in some cases they aren’t recognized in other states or countries. We got into a deep discussion about possible solutions and whose job is it to develop and implement those solutions. Social media has filled some of the gaps but due to more spouses working, volunteerism went down and community decreased.  Military Initiative Funding We also talked about how funding gets assigned to different buckets. And the appropriation process to make sure the money gets spent as intended. And what happens when money is supposed to be set aside but comes up short and then some programs don’t actually get fully funded. It directly affects those that protect us. We talked a lot about the process. And that goes for every bill that becomes law, not just for the Department of Defense (DOD) initiatives. And when families fall on hard times due to programs not getting funded, now they no longer have that tight knit community to lean on.  Corie’s Challenge: “Who is going to be the people group that implements this thing that is so important to me?” We agreed that it’s time for everyone to look at the issues with fresh eyes and come up with outside of the box ideas as solutions. As states are starting to have more control, it’s time for us and private institutions to step up and provide actionable solutions for those who protect our freedom. Could you be part of the solution for an issue personal to you? EPISODE RESOURCES: Military Culture Shift by Corie Weathers Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 17 March 2025

In this episode, Lisa J. and I sat down to recap the Small Business Mastermind;  If you remember,  she owns a farm in Australia. Lisa J.’s farm and life has been improved by the products and systems from Organize 365®. When she heard there was an in person opportunity to work with me, she jumped on the opportunity!! Lisa J. was also excited to be in a room with like minded accomplished women but what she didn’t expect to walk away with was so much more self confidence in business. I put out a survey asking the attendees what they were hoping to learn. Glad I asked because I was on the wrong track as far as what I had planned to teach. I love learning about other people’s businesses and consulting them how to move forward and grow and I wanted to address what they needed. I decided to hop on voxer with everyone and get a better understanding of who they were and their businesses. This also got them talking with their teams and more focused on what they wanted out of the mastermind. Once they arrived, I opened with me introducing them to the group. And then we talked about all the ways I analyze time. It was time for lunch and I needed a break because Imposture’s Syndrome was setting in. These were amazing accomplished women. What could I teach them?   Coming back from lunch they introduced themselves to the group and talked about their strengths and weaknesses. I talked about the Kolby Index test. Once they took that and heard them explain themselves, it opened the door for authentic conversations in a safe space, advising each other how to overcome their weaknesses, strengths they saw in each other, and true camaraderie.  That was a huge success but how would I continue to provide value to these women going into day 2? I knew what to do, 12 minutes - one to one with me. I remember from my coaching days that by 8 minutes people would be so overwhelmed with actionable to-do’s that they wanted to go start strategizing on ways to implement those ideas. I also knew we needed a couple of minutes to say hi and hug. But then what would everyone do while I was tied up in these one to one’s? I had Tanya available for remote work conversations, Steph for Chief of Staff conversations, and Anna was available for information and documentation conversations. They could shop or tour the warehouse and of course check out Joey’s car.  Lisa J. said they all agreed that the 12 min one to one’s were genius because it gave a deadline as to when the conversation was going to end so you really needed to be prepared going into the coaching session. She said everyone should have been recorded leaving the one to one’s because of the confidence they exuded.  One of the biggest benefits was all of the networking all of the attendees got to do during the day and at night. They all stayed at the same hotel, chose to have meals together, and explore the area a little. Due to being connected before the mastermind via the app, they were able to get the backstory of everyone and know what they needed help with. They are now a group of 20 friends doing business together and making connections in business. From our one to one, Lisa J is working on a retreat for farmers where they can work on the transfer of their farm to another owner or a younger generation. Can’t wait to catch up later this year. If you too are looking for guidance and a network of like minded business owners, get signed up to attend the next Small Business Mastermind! EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Friday Workbox® Transformation with Lisa J.  Small Business Mastermind Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 12 March 2025

You have found pockets of time to make a little extra money here and there. Now you are enjoying making the extra money and even are relying on it. This new stream of income is usually a little unconventional in the sense that it’s not W2 work. Your family loves how flexible it is because you are still available for them and there’s extra money. You are challenged by how flexible it is. You still have all of your previous responsibilities but now you the additional ones the new stream of income demands too. It’s time for a “reorganizing of the company.” Just the Facts This is just the facts people, no one is debating that women do more house work than men. Men normally go to work for 8-10 hours and the rest of their time is considered to be leisure. How much leisure time do women claim to have? Women on the other hand (generally speaking) do the house work and take care of children or pets, doesn’t leave much leisure time. And once you have a side hustle that is consistently bringing in money for your family, YOU have more responsibilities and almost no leisure time. This was mirrored in my childhood. Dad worked then golfed…a lot! And mom took care of the home, my sister and I, and she created a business in our basement. She was always working. As a business owner, which we established you are now, you are thinking about the daily operations of your business, ways to develop your business skill set, ways to grow the business, additional services or products you want to offer, and possibly being responsible for workers. Fire Yourself Let’s revisit stage 1. Remember you didn’t have a lot of extra money but you did have time? You were the one painting the walls or making the things you wanted. It may be time to evaluate all those tasks and hire someone to do them instead. Does it make sense for you to spend a day painting your walls OR would the time be better spent on your business because now you can afford to pay someone instead? Even if your family is counting on the money you bring in, could you do one more organizing job to pay to get that room painted? You spend more time in your business AND you get the room painted? It’s the same thing with hiring a house keeper or book keeper.   The Tradeoff There is always a trade off right? Either you spend time or money. I say spend your money on tasks that don’t take you out of your business hours and instead use that time to get more experience in your business. In Home Planning Day, you can evaluate just the next 120 days. What do you want accomplished? How much will it cost? And who will do it? Then all you have to do is run that plan.  It doesn’t mean you are boujie because you hire someone in your home.  The first hires I always recommend are a house keeper, book keeper, or an executive assistant. And my first hires were contractors for only like 5 hours a week.  A. That person is likely grateful for the work. I was so thankful that people let me clean their homes so I could send my kids to private school. You could really be helping someone out.  B. Hiring someone to do those tasks not associated with your business or the non CEO tasks reduces your task switching and increases your focus on your business.  In stage 5, you are focusing on finding body doubles to give you more time to commit to overseeing your business and be more cognitively available for your family. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Home Planning Day Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 12 March 2025

You’re a business owner - Congratulations!!  In stage 4, there needs to be a mindset shift. You are no longer just doing this little side hustle, you are an entrepreneur! I will never forget when a  friend said to me that I was a home organizer. That was it!! The common thread of all my side hustles was some aspect of home organizing. But I identified as a stay at home mom. However, she was right and that’s when my mindset shifted because now my unique talents had an identity. Did you know that 39.1% of all businesses are owned by women? Those women, on average, are 42 and have been in business for 11 years. The most common reasons people start new businesses are to pursue a passion, seeking financial freedom, and to increase flexibility in their life.  Do you do this? Now that your household is counting on this income, you need to get the math straight. The trap a lot of us fall into is still thinking like a W2 employee. Before we got a $2000 paycheck and all of that was for our house. Now, as an entrepreneur, you need to account for your business expenses AND taxes. So if your business had $500 in expenses and you need to save $500 for taxes, all your house really gets is $1000. In stage 4 you may need to evaluate your services or product offerings to make sure you are working smarter not harder. Because you are both the business owner and the admin, it can make it challenging to hit income goals. Entrepreneurs As an entrepreneur, you are officially dedicating time outside of your W2 employment and all your time is no longer for household tasks and leisure.  This can include volunteer/charity work where you are dedicating your time to benefit people outside your home. And the longer you are in this work, the more you will narrow down the services or products you want to offer, keeping the ones with the best money exchanged for your time. That’s the beauty of entrepreneurship, flexibility. You also have flexibility in your time.  This can be a double edged sword because since you are likely working from home, all your household tasks are there, begging for your attention.  When you go to your W2 work they don’t expect you to clean the bathrooms. But at home… How to Organize Administration and Track Profitability And you may think your business isn’t taking that much time. But you probably aren’t tracking how long it takes for your administration tasks. Just like in your home, you use the Sunday Basket® to get it all done, you need a Friday Workbox® at work to get everything done. You are wearing a lot of hats in your business now. There are 4 types of work I teach you about in the Friday Workbox® and they are color coded.  The pink slash pockets are a safe place for ideas you have for the business, future products or services, and personal development you’d like to consider. The purple slash pockets are for projects with deadlines or products that are making money. With all of your paid work is plenty of invisible unpaid work too. And all of those tasks fall into administrative work which is in green slash pockets. Administrative work is bookkeeping, invoicing, emails, leads, tracking expenses, monthly P&L, and more. And blue is for the team we will talk about in stage 5. In stage 4, it’s time to legitimize your business by organizing all of your tasks and creating an LLC. Administration is the key in stage 4. You need systems in place to free up capacity to be more productive and profitable.  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Friday Workbox® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 7 March 2025

One of the inspirations for me to pursue my PhD was “The Secret of Home Economics” by Danielle Drelinger and I got to interview her for this episode. Danielle and I were able to discuss some of the topics but, honestly, you gotta read the book!!  Danielle wanted to write this book, because she covered education as a journalist. She knew she wanted it to be about education, include all races, all genres, all economic classes, and cover history. Thus was born “The Secret History of Home Economics”! Origins of Home Economics Pre World Wars  The first thing I wanted to discuss was the role of home economics pre-wars. From the 1800’s leading up to the wars, home economics was really for any person, AKA not gender specific. Home economics was more the actual tasks and how labor intensive they were due to lack of electricity, running water, and staff.  That staff was often immigrants and black women once slavery had ended. A black student I know, from a different PhD program, joked that they have always done laundry. Not even a question to outsource it, black women remember were slaves first but then hired help. But even in those days, it was common to outsource your laundry. It was outsourced to locations that had running water and other conveniences. Importance of Home Economics During the Wars - Science of Food The discussion shifted more towards home economics during WWII. It was during this time that women entered the work force in America. Home economics was teaching these women how to cook and maintain their homes with the additional demands of working. Women were creating clothing patterns to make work clothes and teaching clothes how to mend and make do due to limited supplies. They were also experimenting with food to keep their families fed and feed our soldiers. Home economists wrote cookbooks for each arm of the military. The Angels of Bataan, planted to supplement prisoners of war rations in the Philippines. At home, they had victory gardens to supplement rations too. Canning discovered through home economics was discovered and became popular to ensure food supply.   And the industrial revolution brought home appliances to help with labor intensive tasks like laundry and ovens that had temperature regulation. Along with conveniences came higher expectations. This is where I pointed out that I am working on the definition of housework because some of the “male tasks” seem more to me like “household ownership”. And it’s peculiar how the definition of home economics became mostly a woman’s role after the war.  The Deliberateness of Stay At Home Mom Depiction The men had come back, they fired a majority of the women, and men were back to work. Now stay at home moms were in charge of emotionally supporting their children and the care of their upbringing and all the text books reflected that. “Kids need their moms and moms need to be available all the time.” It was then I realized that I have a degree in Family and Consumer Sciences but the only thing that schooling taught me was early childhood education! The bureau of Home Economics that once was making patterns for adjustable bib overalls for women in the workforce was now selling patterns for shopping coats for women to wear while shopping for groceries.  How Should We Move Forward?  Danielle feels strongly and I agree that the name should be changed back to Home Economics. A majority of people Danielle speaks to feels this is a class that should be added back to the curriculum of school - to teach basic life skills. And considering all of the subdisciplines, we should be offering a more holistic teaching of home economics; like eating healthy more affordably and consuming more responsibly. You guys…you gotta read or listen to the whole book! EPISODE RESOURCES: The Secret History of Home Economics The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.  

Transcribed - Published: 3 March 2025

In stage 2, you were starting to think about small pockets of time that you could make random amounts of money because there isn’t enough income to cover the expenses that you have reduced as much as possible. There may be something that has become more steady and you are making more than $600/year. This is a Schedule C on your taxes, where you submit a 1099 or claim the money earned. In 2009, I had 11 schedule C’s that I eventually combined under one LLC.   Do You Like Chicken Cacciatore? I do! My mother-in-law gave me her recipe. I found I liked to bake it a little differently than her. I re-wrote her two sided index instructions, down to one side, the way I make it for my family.  I like that it’s no longer stored in my brain. I just grab my instructions and make dinner, in fact anyone in my family could do the same. This is the same idea as an SOP (standard operating procedures) for your business. You should write down the process to complete the tasks for your job/household manager role. In the event there is someone new taking over one of your tasks, audit the steps to make sure it’s accurate before you hand it off to the new person, child or spouse.  Passion Turned Side Hustle Now let’s say I make it for my neighbors and they love it. Let’s say they start to pay me to bake for them. I start making pretty good money each week cooking for them. I could also be baking my family the same meal at the same time. My invisible work I originally did for my family has become paid work that I now report to Uncle Sam through my taxes. It’s important to track all of my expenses in making the meals like mileage to the grocery store, the grocery bill, portion of my gas bill for using my oven, and when I start to expand to other people the mileage for delivery. This information is added into the monthly P & L, which you can track in the Organize 365® Income & Expense Binder. If you aren’t a good cook, you could babysit, clean homes, tutor, dog sit, Uber, Door Dash, bookkeeping, Fairy Godmother for a family, or direct sales **but make sure you are profitable. What do you have a passion for and you are good at? Will people pay you to do that? Be confident completing the job (that saves them time) and accept the money for a task you may do for your family for free. I suggest any side hustle you could charge at least $20/hr up to $60/hr or an amount per day like $100/day.  The Value of a Systems If unpaid work is not optimized, then you cannot add in paid work because paid work (side hustle like baking for your neighbors) will always supersede unpaid work (your personal house work and baking Chicken Cacciatore). The complete Home Organizational Bundle; Sunday Basket® for weekly checks and balance, The Paper Solution for information management, and The Productive Home Solution to set up your house to effectively serve your family for the phase of life you are in, and planning days to audit your systems. Good operating systems in place allow unexpected events to feel like speed bumps instead of falling off of a cliff. Now you are ready for stage 3. Your systems are in place, you are documenting your income and expenses, and you have freed capacity to focus on making your side hustle more profitable. Now you can bake Chicken Cacciatore for everyone! EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution® Complete Home Organization Bundle Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 28 February 2025

In stage 2, you were starting to think about small pockets of time that you could make random amounts of money because there isn’t enough income to cover the expenses that you have reduced as much as possible. There may be something that has become more steady and you are making more than $600/year. This is a Schedule C on your taxes, where you submit a 1099 or claim the money earned. In 2009, I had 11 schedule C’s that I eventually combined under one LLC.   Do You Like Chicken Cacciatore? I do! My mother-in-law gave me her recipe. I found I liked to bake it a little differently than her. I re-wrote her two sided index instructions, down to one side, the way I make it for my family.  I like that it’s no longer stored in my brain. I just grab my instructions and make dinner, in fact anyone in my family could do the same. This is the same idea as an SOP (standard operating procedures) for your business. You should write down the process to complete the tasks for your job/household manager role. In the event there is someone new taking over one of your tasks, audit the steps to make sure it’s accurate before you hand it off to the new person, child or spouse.  Passion Turned Side Hustle Now let’s say I make it for my neighbors and they love it. Let’s say they start to pay me to bake for them. I start making pretty good money each week cooking for them. I could also be baking my family the same meal at the same time. My invisible work I originally did for my family has become paid work that I now report to Uncle Sam through my taxes. It’s important to track all of my expenses in making the meals like mileage to the grocery store, the grocery bill, portion of my gas bill for using my oven, and when I start to expand to other people the mileage for delivery. This information is added into the monthly P & L, which you can track in the Organize 365® Income & Expense Binder. If you aren’t a good cook, you could babysit, clean homes, tutor, dog sit, Uber, Door Dash, bookkeeping, Fairy Godmother for a family, or direct sales **but make sure you are profitable. What do you have a passion for and you are good at? Will people pay you to do that? Be confident completing the job (that saves them time) and accept the money for a task you may do for your family for free. I suggest any side hustle you could charge at least $20/hr up to $60/hr or an amount per day like $100/day.  The Value of a Systems If unpaid work is not optimized, then you cannot add in paid work because paid work (side hustle like baking for your neighbors) will always supersede unpaid work (your personal house work and baking Chicken Cacciatore). The complete Home Organizational Bundle; Sunday Basket® for weekly checks and balance, The Paper Solution for information management, and The Productive Home Solution to set up your house to effectively serve your family for the phase of life you are in, and planning days to audit your systems. Good operating systems in place allow unexpected events to feel like speed bumps instead of falling off of a cliff. Now you are ready for stage 3. Your systems are in place, you are documenting your income and expenses, and you have freed capacity to focus on making your side hustle more profitable. Now you can bake Chicken Cacciatore for everyone! EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution® Complete Home Organization Bundle Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 28 February 2025

In this episode, I introduce you to Kim B. who just celebrated her 44th wedding anniversary!  Kim and her hubby have lived in their farmhouse for the past 35 years. Her daughter is all grown up and busy raising 4 young daughters of her own. When her daughter told her about Organize 365®, Kim was all ears. Kim has always been organized but always open to ways of more efficiency.  In April of ‘21, Kim retired. We talked about that transition. There are no good sources or guides to tell us what to expect in these times of transition. Kim has stayed very busy with helping on the farm, watching her granddaughters 3 days a week, watching after her father’s finances and visiting him at his living facility, and of course learning all kinds of skills she never had the time to before. She took a charcuterie board and sour dough class. What’s next? Scrapbooking! After learning more about Organize 365® products, Kim crafted her own Sunday Basket® to make sure she’d use it. But she shared that, 4 weeks later when she got the Sunday Basket®, that the actual Sunday Basket® took her organization to a whole new level and the folders stand up! She loved that in the real Sunday Basket® she can place things like ink cartridges and pill bottles in it for Sunday. She even convinced her sister to get a Sunday Basket®. Kim feels good that when it comes time for her daughter to care for her and her husband, it’ll be easier due to the organization she’s doing now and the Medical, Home Resource, and Financial binders. She has more peace of mind knowing where paper work is for easy access and that the right paperwork is in order for the future. She took one week, working about 8 hours each day, and organized her storage. She’d set aside a few bins that she needed to have her husband go through. One night she treated it like date night and they went to the storage room together and “walked down memory lane” by going through those bins. Yes they got rid of stuff but even better he was happy they did that. Because in the beginning he wasn’t too fond of her getting rid of things. Kim loves her life and is thankful that she can focus on things that are important to her and time with her family. Kim’s advice is, “You just do a little bit at a time, one day at a time.” As her mother used to always say about everything she did for the holidays. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution®  The Productive Home Solution® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!  

Transcribed - Published: 26 February 2025

Ok now it’s time for Swiss Cheese Organizing Family Edition, this Friday, February 28th @ Noon EST!  It’d mean a lot to have you attend live but there will be a replay. By attending live you will have the opportunity to ask any questions. Swiss Cheese Organizing in any home or business is ineffective. Just like I taught in the business edition webinar, the order in which you organize is way more important than the time you invest in organizing. And even more so with children under foot. Children provide a very unpredictable variable to life and how long your spaces stay organized.  I’m going to teach you to organize your summer organizing efforts. Get your kids spaces set (like age appropriate toys and clothes) and your summer calendar set so you can have a little fun too. Once the replay of the webinar is available, the Summer Planning Guide will be available too. It’s a grid I used to use to see all of summer in one snapshot. I will be offering a video to take you through setting up your Summer Planning Guide too. That way, once school starts again, you’ll be able to focus on your household organizing.  You can access everything at Organize365.com/summer2025. What’s everything? Sign up to attend this webinar plus see what all is being offered this summer for planning and organizing in Organize 365®! I’m talking to parents, homeowners, business professionals, teachers, military men and women. Start planning now with the Swiss Cheese Organizing Family Edition, don’t forget to sign up!  EPISODE RESOURCES: [email protected] Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 25 February 2025

You are in stage one but you have decreased your expenses as much as possible and still there’s too much month left at the end of the money. What do you do? Hello Stage2. You start to look for small pockets of time when you can make random amounts of money. You want to increase your income but you are not yet ready to commit to a part time job of sorts.  Profit and Loss In business, you do a monthly check of profit and loss. How much did your business make, how much did your business spend, and are you in the green still? You do not have a budget because business fluctuates month to month. After you have been a business owner for some time you may see patterns when your business brings in more and when your business is not profitable. And we need to be doing this in our homes too. Remember the most powerful small business is our homes. If you are anything like our house, we have a lot of fun in November and December and then spend Q1 paying it all off. And you may just find you need to find extra sources of income to plug that hole of expense. You may have already had the experience but it’s an expense because the money needs to get paid back. But you don’t have enough.  Random Amounts of Money I remember the first time I learned about random money that I could get, being a full time stay at home mom with no desire to have an official job, was when a friend recommended for me to take part in diaper studies. I don’t think I ever paid for diapers. I didn’t always make money but I also was not spending money on diapers. I also made random money doing surveys in persona and online. And retail arbitrage. I’d shop the garage sales and in a few months I’d resell the items I’d bought because my kids were ready for the next stage of toys. It was income neutral but again I wasn’t spending money. I made money selling things on Ebay and Craigslist and eventually in direct sales.  Stage 2 is all about finding little pockets of time to make random amounts of money. It’s things that need to get done but also ok if they don’t. These tasks are 100% flexible. How can you make a little extra income to get P&L neutral? It’s a mindset shift on how to add income instead of reducing expenses. And for whatever reason stage 1 is no longer where you want to be.  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter    Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!  

Transcribed - Published: 21 February 2025

You know how you hear people, on the Wednesday Transformation episodes, say to just get the Sunday Basket® instead of DIY? Yes, it’s because of the mindset that comes with the purchase. The basket is simply the school supply. And it’s the same for the Friday Workbox®.  You may be thinking you have the Sunday Basket® and it’s the same as the Friday Workbox®, right? Wrong. With the Friday Workbox® the slash pockets mean something different, you get access to the online dashboard and course for the Friday Workbox®, and the co-working time every Friday much like the Sunday Basket® Club on Sundays. The Friday Workbox® will help you, the lifeblood of your business, explore personal development and the dreams you have for your business. It helps you to treat your team like the royalty they are and to be loyal to your customers and create ways to surprise and delight them. And most importantly it helps you to see that you are in fact profitable every month, or not, and then there’s time for course correction. So here’s all the deals I have for you!! Friday Workbox: 50% discount, now just $250!!  You’ll get the Friday Workbox®, slash pockets, online dashboard, Friday Co-working time, and the course to teach you how to gain capacity in your business for more, remember life in abundance! Meeting Agenda Course: 50% discount, now just $499!!  It kills me when people say I don’t have meetings so I don’t need it but wait! Yes, you do! This is for all the details of purple project management in informational form and digital documents. Think of links you need for a project, they wouldn’t do you much good on paper in a slash pocket, right? I know, some things just can’t fit in a slash pocket! Work All In Bundle: Best Deal!! $750 discount, now just $997!! Are you ready? You get the Friday Workbox®, Work Planning Day, Income and Expense Binder, and the Meeting Agenda Course. Don’t wait too long to take advantage of this because it’s while supplies last with the Income and Expense Binders and I don’t want you to miss out if you have been wanting to get one. Friday Workbox Productivity Pack: 50% discount, now just $90!! You’ll get three stand alone Friday Workboxes®; Sapphire, Navy, and Plum. You can do what you want with Sapphire and Navy. I suggest treating them like employees or dedicate them to different businesses that you run. I gave plenty of examples in this episode to get you thinking about what that could look like. The Plum one will come with orange slash pockets for each month and purple slash pockets for the project you do cyclically and extras for new projects. For example, in July, you’d have a purple slash pocket for back to school, paper organizing retreat, and any other projects you have for July. Purple work isn’t always new work!  Small Business Mastermind: $2500 Introductory pricing is only until March 10th!! The first session is in March. It will also be offered the first week of June and the first week of September. After this year, this mastermind will no longer be offered.  EPISODE RESOURCES: Friday Workbox Workbox Planning Day Friday Meeting Agenda Course Work All In Bundle Friday Workbox Productivity Pack Small Business Mastermind [email protected] Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 18 February 2025

You know how you hear people, on the Wednesday Transformation episodes, say to just get the Sunday Basket® instead of DIY? Yes, it’s because of the mindset that comes with the purchase. The basket is simply the school supply. And it’s the same for the Friday Workbox®.  You may be thinking you have the Sunday Basket® and it’s the same as the Friday Workbox®, right? Wrong. With the Friday Workbox® the slash pockets mean something different, you get access to the online dashboard and course for the Friday Workbox®, and the co-working time every Friday much like the Sunday Basket® Club on Sundays. The Friday Workbox® will help you, the lifeblood of your business, explore personal development and the dreams you have for your business. It helps you to treat your team like the royalty they are and to be loyal to your customers and create ways to surprise and delight them. And most importantly it helps you to see that you are in fact profitable every month, or not, and then there’s time for course correction. So here’s all the deals I have for you!! Friday Workbox: 50% discount, now just $250!!  You’ll get the Friday Workbox®, slash pockets, online dashboard, Friday Co-working time, and the course to teach you how to gain capacity in your business for more, remember life in abundance! Meeting Agenda Course: 50% discount, now just $499!!  It kills me when people say I don’t have meetings so I don’t need it but wait! Yes, you do! This is for all the details of purple project management in informational form and digital documents. Think of links you need for a project, they wouldn’t do you much good on paper in a slash pocket, right? I know, some things just can’t fit in a slash pocket! Work All In Bundle: Best Deal!! $750 discount, now just $997!! Are you ready? You get the Friday Workbox®, Work Planning Day, Income and Expense Binder, and the Meeting Agenda Course. Don’t wait too long to take advantage of this because it’s while supplies last with the Income and Expense Binders and I don’t want you to miss out if you have been wanting to get one. Friday Workbox Productivity Pack: 50% discount, now just $90!! You’ll get three stand alone Friday Workboxes®; Sapphire, Navy, and Plum. You can do what you want with Sapphire and Navy. I suggest treating them like employees or dedicate them to different businesses that you run. I gave plenty of examples in this episode to get you thinking about what that could look like. The Plum one will come with orange slash pockets for each month and purple slash pockets for the project you do cyclically and extras for new projects. For example, in July, you’d have a purple slash pocket for back to school, paper organizing retreat, and any other projects you have for July. Purple work isn’t always new work!  Small Business Mastermind: $2500 Introductory pricing is only until March 10th!! The first session is in March. It will also be offered the first week of June and the first week of September. After this year, this mastermind will no longer be offered.  EPISODE RESOURCES: Friday Workbox Workbox Planning Day Friday Meeting Agenda Course Work All In Bundle Friday Workbox Productivity Pack Small Business Mastermind [email protected] Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 18 February 2025

Is color coding just busy work?  We were curious if there were any studies to back up our stance that color coding helps with learning. Anna found a few and she’s here discussing them with me. Do you think in color? Anna and I do! We did a quick response activity where Anna said a color and I responded what I associate with that color. The Organize 365® products are colorful but not without intentionality.  Color Coding Helps with Recall Teachers often color code subjects. When you are looking for supplies for their class you know to look for the designated color of items like a folder. When I was in school I used white index cards and then wrote in different colors to remember what I needed. I had to remember because this brain I have, it’s dyslexic and doesn’t understand phoenix. I had to remember for sake of the test!  I had a student that was really struggling to pass his spelling tests. Once we color coded the syllables, he started to pass his spelling tests. Again, color coding helps a person to recall what they have learned. This is the example I really think of when I think of the significance of color coding. I was blown aware at the effectiveness of color coding for that student. And when adults are students, your work is self paced. Color coding your work can help you stay organized and retrieve what you have learned when you need to use that information. When Joey and Abby were little I would color code all their things. Having one boy and one girl made that pretty easy. If you had two boys one could be blue and the other boy could be orange. Reduce your cognitive load! When things are color coded it reduces the cognitive load. Imagine a bin dedicated to toy cars. When you go to the toy organizer you look for that bin and then look for the specific car you want. The same is true with the Sunday Basket®. You are going to retrieve something related to a person in your family so instantly you know to look at the blue slash pockets, thus reducing the cognitive load to find what you need.  The Evolution of Color Within Organize 365® When I first started to ship out slash pockets I was getting them at Walmart, taking out the company’s information and passing them off as my own.One day it dawned on me that Walmart could change what they sold and I’d be up a creek. So I got to work. I took a bet on myself and ordered a huge pallet of 1.0 slash pockets. Would you believe the day they arrived is the day Walmart changed what they were selling?  This order was so large I couldn't fit it all in the garage with my car. So I got an office space. I had no idea what I was doing, I was learning. That’s when the Sunday Baskets® arrived and we had to move to a warehouse.  The last thing I ordered was the 2.0 Slash Pockets. Green for money and admin tasks that move the money. I have always thought blue was for people. And Pink was for me. Pink and blue make purple, right? Purple was for the home the people and I, my family, lived in and the projects I would need to do in and on that house. It was then that I understood the house to be a separate entity from my family. When you get a system from Organize 365®, you get the whole kit. You can mix and match the systems too because the colors translate across all the systems.  All the Organize 365® colors have been intentionally selected. Color aids in organization being a learnable skill! EPISODE RESOURCES: APA citation: Lamberski, R. J. & Dwyer, F. M. (1983). The instructional effect of coding (color and black and white) on information acquisition and retrieval. ECTJ. 31(1): 9-21. Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 17 February 2025

Transcribed - Published: 14 February 2025

In this episode, I introduce you to Tami T. who is married with two children at home. A few years before the pre-pandemic, Tami was doing a lot of driving for her work teaching private (band) lessons in schools. It took Tami about a year to listen to all of the Organize 365® episodes. Tami invested in the Whole Home program that we now know as The Productive Home Solution.  Tami would watch the videos beforehand and listen to episodes, while driving, about the specific space that was next in the program. By the time she got home she knew exactly what she wanted to do in that space. It dawned on Tami that she kept doing the kitchen. By the third time she started the program, she focused on all the other spaces. She’s tackled all of her spaces and even gotten rid of her filing cabinets. Tami attended a paper retreat and organized all her paper but one bin. She’s since tackled that too with the help of a virtual organizer that she found in the Organize 365® directory. She found with getting organized it freed up capacity to be able to mentally process that one last bin.  When the pandemic hit, her organization was really challenged. She had to teach her band classes AND she had two young children at home trying to attend school too. What did she do? She got a Sunday Basket® for each of them so Tami could keep everyone and all the assignments organized. Tami shared that now instead of just being a day or two ahead, she’s now months ahead. Again with more capacity and being planned a few months out, it has given her the time and energy to do some small tasks she’s always wanted to do. For example with all the planning completed she was able to make a program for the band concerts that she can repurpose in the future. And she could schedule refreshments and treats. She’s been able to make a little flyer to promote the performance to faculty. She can make the event better and be more present.  Tami did the kids program with her kids too. They have been able to learn the life skill of going through their closets and organization. The first attempt was a garage sale that didn’t go so well. Now they donate. If they have an item(s) it gets donated on Tuesdays when Tami is driving by Goodwill. Tami, as most moms do, has always had so much on her plate. By the kids learning those skills it actually reduces tasks from her plate. And this she wished she’d known sooner. Put those kids to work learning skills they will need in the future. They took a family trip to Egypt and then Switzerland this past summer. Tami was able to pre plan all their summer activities. They took their trip and when they came home Tami had time to follow up on documentaries about Egypt because the summer was planned. She’s even been able to complete two scrapbooks from their trip. She finds she has more capacity and down time due to her Sunday Basket® and Education Workbox®. Tami’s advice is, “Do the Sunday Basket® first, then the binders and sheet protectors.”  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Teacher Friday Workbox® Kids Program The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 12 February 2025

I’m excited to announce that there will be a webinar on Friday the 14th @noon EST for Swiss Cheese Organizing Business Edition. Love is in the air—and what better way to show your business some love than by getting it organized?  You’ve heard me talk about Swiss Cheese Organizing for home, and now it’s time to bring that same magic to your business. The order in which you get tasks accomplished is more important than the amount of time you spend on tasks. I’m going to talk about your ideas and projects, your initiatives, your administrative role and responsibilities, end of quarter/year financials, and even your personal development initiatives. So, how do you bring it all together in a way that makes your heart (and your business) happy? Join me on Friday to find out! Attend live, and I’ll answer your questions in real time—but don’t worry, there will be a replay too. Let’s bring some harmony to your workflow and get your productivity train rolling smoothly down the tracks!! Swiss Cheese Webinar: Friday Feb 14th @ 12:00PM EST   EPISODE RESOURCES: Swiss Cheese Webinar (Work Edition) [email protected] Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 11 February 2025

Last year, two of our key leaders and I attended a Dave Ramsey Summit. This is how I have gotten some of my best CEO training. I really think about the topics the speaker is bringing up and think of Organize 365® and have I implemented something similar? Have I done that thing? Or maybe is that idea an improvement we should consider? It was great for us to be hearing the same information at the same time and be able to discuss. We even changed our Monday morning meeting a little to catch our staff at a better time of day. And then I thought “Is there anything I need to add to our values?” What is Busy Work? When I thought about staffing and when someone leaves Organize 354®, is there a way to eliminate busy work. Do their job tasks still need to be done or were they busy work? Is there someone else on the team that can do those tasks? It got me thinking of all the busy work teachers do. It’s cute to put the little bubbles at the “end” of each stroke of the letters but is it necessary? I’d do it once, then copy the paper the rest of the year, otherwise it would become busy work. Revisiting a closet you’ve done recently thinking you’ll get the same high will let you down because the transformation is not nearly as dramatic. Busy work is that unnecessary re-working of tasks. As long as your work is not done, even if it’s busy work,  you won’t have the excess time, capacity, and boredom to seek out what you are uniquely gifted and created to do. Operationalizing  The flip side of busy work that can appear as busy work is operationalizing your tasks. I started out organizing my sister and I’s rooms. Then I graduated to organizing the homes I babysat in. I have always loved gifting an act of service. I organized the “craft area” by the fire place at my house and my mom loved it. So I did it annually around Christmas for her. But then my parents expanded the house and she got a larger space. My mom is an artists and that was definitely a challenge to understand what was valuable and not. I asked a lot of questions!! I would help other teachers to organize their classrooms. And eventually organized my clients. But in each of those instances I was growing my skill set. I was learning how the spaces were used and why the items were in there. I was operationalizing how I helped other get organized. You can do the same with repeated tasks. That’s why on Planning Day I tell you to stock up your storage for the trimester. Don’t order one of the same thing each month, operationalize it.  The Sunday Basket Replaces Your Checklists First of all, there is a time and place for checklists. Checklists can be useful if you are trying to establish a new routine. Be careful not to let it become a crutch. Don’t be so stuck on the list that it supersedes your role in the company. And not everything needs to go on the list, just big things you can’t forget. And checklists are good for something you don’t do often. My best example I shared was our packing list for Florida each year. As we grow and change the list does too. We edit when necessary so we don’t forget for the next time we need to use the checklist.  I can remember the last time I used a master to do list. In 2014, I wrote 10 legal pad pages of all my to do’s. I organized them by family member or entity and then prioritized them. I transferred each item to an index card. And I filed them away to deal with on Sunday. It is nice to look at all tasks individually and decide on importance, my time, and my money. I may write down the same task multiple times and that’s ok because I got it out of my head and who cares if I wrote it multiple times. I place them in the appropriate slash pock. I take action on the actionable items. Then once I complete the task I get to toss it in the recycling. Lists never go away, with index cards you can complete them and toss them. The Sunday Basket is safe keeping till you can take action.  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Friday Workbox® The Productive Home Solution Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 7 February 2025

As many of you know, following one organizer will bring you to another. In fact, that’s how some of you ended up in my community. So many of you reached out suggesting Kendra Adachi with The Lazy Genius podcast for an interview for the Monday Connections episodes. Thank you so much for the recommendation and we had an insightful conversation.   Lazy Genius Kendra Adachi was a perfectionist to the extreme. She was teacher’s pet, valedictorian, and voted most dependable by her peers. In 2015, she started a lifestyle blog. The podcast, The Lazy Genius, followed not even a full year later. She teaches women to “Be a genius about the things that matter, and and lazy about the things that don’t.” Once she became a parent she learned that rule. She was so used to doing everything perfectly but once her second child came along she realized you can’t be perfect at everything. And that’s how she got to pointing out to women how to find a happy medium between Boss Babe and Hot Mess.  We agreed how nice it is to come on an episode with an idea and through the recording think out loud. Inevitably we end up with feedback from the community that results in solutions or next steps. When I asked her if she worries about running out of episode topics. She replied with the fact that the perspective on laundry changes with your lifestyle. For example, she may be talking about endless stained laundry from toddlers and grow to sharing about how she is teaching her teenagers how to do laundry. We commented on the value our listeners get from hearing how a female is doing things. Kendra shared that 93% of time management books are from male authors. It’s time for women to learn from each other.  And Kendra shared about “Big Black Trash Bag Energy”. You know when you’re just over it and so you get out the big trash bag with the internet to toss everything and just start over? No need. Just start small. Work on one thing.    Women Have Always Ran the World Kendra shared the point of view that maybe there’s a stigma to the importance of the female role and how much men value what women do. And I agreed through the lens that  women have always ran the world but now that women are in the workforce, it’s coming to light how much women are really doing. And sorry guys, it’s more than you. Men get to watch a football game but women feel like they need to be productive making the meal plan or planning car pool while watching that same football game. We have been the CEO’s of the households but now all that invisible work is being identified. We have these never ending tasks that replenish themselves and leads to weary spirits. Planning is essential for women to manage the household and take care of everyone. Kendra pointed out you are inherently a preparer, an adjuster, or a notice-er. And then we talked about the mindsets and lifestyles of being 30, 40, and in your 50’s. And the two scenarios determine how you got about what you gotta get done. You Only Know What You Know I find it so difficult to find other women CEO’s to learn from. We joked those women are too busy to sit down to write a book or record a podcast. My hope is for all women in the 20’s and 30’s to find a community to show them systems on how to be a household manager. You get a new job, you get training. You buy your first house and you’re responsible for the payments but no guidelines on how to care for it. Up to you to hopefully stumble across the Household Operations Binder. Don’t get intimidated by the CEO role. It’s not meant to be this manly corporate role. You only know what you have been taught. Women need to be in community with each other, doing life together. We are the experts in this role!  EPISODE RESOURCES: Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 3 February 2025

It’s 2017, I’m on the plane home from California. I just attended a conference, a mastermind with a virtual friend of mine, Chris Ducker, and I’m writing down the 5th value that I want for Organize 365®. The Power of Community: In community, everyone can learn to be organized, action is easier, and happens exponentially. Organize 365® believes organization is a learnable skill.  I’m a CEO After the investment I had made in that 6 days in California, it sunk in, I’m a real CEO. I was making money and needed to structure my company to be able to purchase inventory. After considering our current phase of life and how I envisioned Organize 365® would grow, I was advised to structure it as a C-Corp. All the details and thought process I shared in this episode. I also decided on the way home that I was going to need to hire 7 contractors for areas that were not my strength. In community with these contractors I grew Organize 365® Virtual Friends I had a really hard time in the friends category really my whole life. I shared a really vulnerable time in my life in Catholic school where the girls weren’t so nice to me. Maybe it was me? I was used to talking to adults. The place in my family where I was born had me surrounded by adults all the time. I had my successful female lineage, my father who owned his own business, and then the smart men on my dad’s side of the family. I was so mature in conversation but naive in interacting with kids my same age. I finally had a pretty solid friend once I was married.  Around 2012, my pit of despair, I was back to no community. My parents divorced and it kind of blew up the whole family, I ditched my friends so I would not be around negativity, we were in a tough parenting season so church had become less, and I wasn’t teaching anymore. I didn’t even have my Creative Memory parties anymore, the women I had scrapbook with once a month for years.  So I turned to authors. I listened to their audio books. I gleaned all they were talking about and trying to apply it to my business. And then I found podcasts. Like, what? It was an endless supply of basically audiobooks.  They were my virtual friends, Pat Flynn with Smart Passive Income, John Lee Dumas with Entrepreneur on Fire,  Chris Ducker with Youpreneur, to name a few.  I would mull over the questions Chris Ducker would ask his guests and then I would practice answering them. But then I got to thinking how the female lived experience is so much different than a male’s. So I searched out women to follow and listen to. Life is so flat when you don’t have friends. I couldn’t seem to make any friends so this was what I had. I was always talking with them, they just couldn’t hear my side of the conversation.  Organize 365® Community Being such a fan of community and understanding community helps others to learn, I knew it had to be a core value of my company. I also knew that the growth I was expecting and the experience I wanted for my customers,  I would not be able to hold the community together alone. I’m still very much involved with the Planning Days, Embrace, and other webinars n such. But you see team members running some of the clubs and other things. Life is better in community, connecting with other humans.  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!  

Transcribed - Published: 31 January 2025

In this episode, I introduce you to Sharon T. who is married and at the time of this interview was caring for her special needs sister, full time. Sharon has always been organized but was looking to “up her game.” Fun fact; Sharon lives in Singapore, joined me at night for this episode, and there they spell organization with an “s.” She was looking for help with both spellings. She found the Organize 365® podcast and felt like language was being given to what she was going through.  She and I talked about how women in general try to straddle home and work life balance. But to what degree is it talked about? There are subcultures with in races, right? I talked about being White Irish, wonder where my sarcasm comes from, and White English, who tend to be more reserved. We felt it important not to generalize cultures. But it did bring up the fact that some cultures talk about the struggle of doing it all as a women and others “suffer in quiet.” This is the language that was speaking to Sharon so much.  Sharon watched her cousin take his last breath in 2019. The doctor said his diet was in part due to his passing. That really forced Sharon to take a look at her life and listen to what she felt she was being called to do and that was to help the special needs community. Diet can affect people positively that have special needs. And diet can support those care givers to take care of themselves. To combat the “Woe is me” mentality. Sharon thought about this as she considered her mom’s caregiving life to her sister. She and her sister started their business, Possible Nutrition.  In 2022, Sharon looked at the pile of papers and decided to finally systematize them with the Friday Workbox® she had treated herself to for her birthday the year before. Sharon loves to write things down and reflect on them. Is it possible? Is it needed? Does it make sense? Then she can share it with her sister or whoever. She finds it very cathartic to seasonally review the business and plan for what is coming up. And it’s so important to document care. As we change so too will our care. If I was going to babysit, I’d have the parents fill out a little form such as nap time, foods, pacifier or not? If it had been 6 months or more, a lot could have changed! It was a dentist's findings that really got Sharon thinking about how our diet really affects our bodies. We need to eat for nutrition and in a manner that facilitates absorption. With the right diet she’s seen symptoms subside quite easily. Well this opened a big can of worms and I started picking her brain about macros and what she considers a nutrient rich diet. Then I asked a burning question about protein. We talked about the order in which to consume your meal. And it’s pretty cool how the order alone can affect your glucose, if it spikes or not and how quickly you resume your baseline glucose level.  There is no universal diet or organizational system because we are not all the same. And life changes which means the way we eat and organize will too! We shouldn’t view our health as our idol rather to be good stewards of our bodies so we can do what we were uniquely created to do.  Sharon’s advice is, “ I think that if you're just starting out maybe say establishing a home or, just getting a first job, start with Sunday Basket®.  We need to get our own personal lives in order before we can look at managing a home, before we can go out there and do anything else.”  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Friday Workbox® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter    On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!  

Transcribed - Published: 29 January 2025

There are two ways you can proactively anticipate. You can act like it’s Y2K again. When the 1000’s place in computers was switching to 2 at the end of 1999, Greg and I proactively anticipated from the stance of lack. We stocked up on water and toilet paper in the event the world ran out. OR you can proactively anticipate with a positive mindset and life in abundance.  You know where you are going and what you want and plan how to get there.  Get What You Want I love holding babies! So when I was younger I thought how can I get to be the one to hold the babies because others in my family too like to hold the babies. I anticipated no one wanted to change the stinky diaper, so I did. Then after I took them to the bedroom or somewhere away from everyone, I’d change the diaper and then steal my cuddles. “Lisa, are you bringing back the baby?” they’d ask. I also anticipated that people like to sleep. So when my aunts started having babies, I’d offer to stay over to take care of the baby during the night. I knew they baby would be up in the middle of the night and my aunts wanted to sleep. What do you want and how can you be helpful? Maybe by giving an act of service that fills your cup too. If you remember last week’s episode, I did this with babysitting too. I wanted to be the babysitter of their choice each summer. I made sure I lined it up in plenty of time for the parents to be able to line up summer camps or whatever on the days I would be watching their children so they could rely on me for transportation and care of their children.  What Can You Do In 20 Minutes? Thank God Abby was a sleeper but my lil Joey only took 20 minute naps. I had so many plates in the air and without a sufficient nap time to address anything, lots of things were falling through the cracks. I had, literally, a foot of paper piled at the end of my kitchen counter. One night I decided to tackle it by sorting it in to 40 categories. By the time I was done, it was late, I needed to pick up my mess but also have it accessible. I threw the sorted and paper clipped papers into a Lonaberger basket till the next day at nap time. I knew I was going to have a small window to accomplish something. I was proactively anticipating this nap and I was ready. Slowly over the next six weeks I was able to get caught up one paper packet per nap time. Having my paper organized I was able to get systems in place so I could keep growing Organize 365® because I realized that is what I was uniquely created to do.  Proactive Anticipation Go Hand in Hand with Planning I have always had the ability to look into the future and anticipate what is coming for the female American Household Manager. I have been in many homes, of all types. I know things like the energy during different times of the year, how supply chain works, and kids! The Sunday Basket helps you to proactively anticipate the next week. Planning days help you to proactively plan for the next 120 days. I found these systems to be effective for my house and then created ways to teach them to others in the Organize 365® Community. Once you find what you are uniquely created to do you need the systems more than ever. At first they give you time to find out what you are created to do. You could dive into the fulfillment of what you discover but then you may have your train go off the rails. The systems continue to provide time to keep doing what you are uniquely created to do, in combination with everything else a Household Manager must do.  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 24 January 2025

Transcribed - Published: 20 January 2025

“We have a hard time just wanting what we want.” Transformational Freedom is my driving force through personal development and unapologetic gumption to pursue the things I want. Our houses are holding us back. When we feel like we are taking care of our primary role of household manager, spouse, and parent, then we feel free to pursue what we want. 4 Generations of Ambitious Women When you have a great grandmother who gets her teaching degree because it’s the only degree a woman can get, you learn to succeed despite limitations. She went on to run a floral shop, a restaurant, and a gift shop which is definitely not what other women were doing those days. AND she divorced her husband! And then you have a grandmother who gets her Home Economics degree because again, limitations. And see her and her husband start a student loan - ish business, you see an example of a woman not waiting for permission. But then goes on to set an even greater example when she remarries and starts up a home economic kit mail order business of sorts out of her home. Like how did people order? She figured it out because it’s what she wanted to do. And a mother like mine. She was so focused on business. She started The Fine Line out of our basement and created cases of clothes she bought one weekend in NYC. She did that for 6 years and then sold it for a profit.  Didn’t Get Permission, I Went After What I Wanted Which gave me the gumption to start my own babysitting business. The examples of women in my life I saw growing up didn’t wait for permission to pursue what they were uniquely created to do. I didn’t wait for permission or see someone else doing it. No, I paved my own path to filling up my summer calendar with baby sitting positions. I saw a need and solved a problem for moms who needed to get tasks done and take care of themselves per my suggestion. I used my unique skills of loving children to make money on my terms.  Transformational Freedom At Organize 365® we say “As you let go of one thing, you are open to receiving the next. We strive to unlock your life’s purpose through the process of decluttering, organizing, and increasing productivity.” You also don’t know what you haven't experienced. I acknowledge that if you haven’t seen, for example, a healthy marriage then you don’t believe they exist and don’t know what they look like. I love the Organize 365® community for this reason. Hopefully you are hearing healthy examples on the podcast and then being exposed to more in the community. Community opens our eyes to possibilities. And because we don’t believe in those possibilities, we cling to what we currently have. That’s why it’s so important to acknowledge letting go of one thing, only to experience something even better. Remember this life is not happening to us, it’s happening for us.  Permission Granted Greg didn’t flinch when I told him I was going to quit because he knew I would make money still. I had replaced my teaching salary with Creative Memories and planned to grow my organizing business to contribute to the family finances. In my organizing experiences, one client broke down when the last area was done, saying she could finally go back to work. What? The emotional weight of our homes on us women is great. Ladies, our houses hold us back because whether or not you work, you view your household manager role as primary. Organize 365® is here to get you decluttered and organized so you can be productive. Here is your permission to explore what you want and to pursue it. Fly out of your golden cage. Return as much as you want but you are free. Permission granted.  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 17 January 2025

In this episode, I introduce you to Nita M. who is married and employed as a stay at home mom by her two young daughters. Nita first found Organize 365® through the podcast. Nita had just turned 40 in February of 2024, after having a baby in November 2020. There was just an energy that she wanted to get back on track. Postpartum had derailed her normally organized life. She’d been watching another organization show when she saw me being interviewed. Nita has her MBA and she connected with the language we use at work being applied to the home. It also clicked that our kitchens are like restaurants and our storage is like a prepaid store. The analogy of the work and home train resonated with Nita, too. The way you think of your home changes the way you operate. Profitable businesses are always planning, iterating, and looking at the target market they serve; our homes are no different. With these two schools of thought in mind, Nita adopted what her supply chain looks like and is now more prepared. She realized she had to buy toilet paper no matter what so what was the difference of doing it over 120 days or just purchasing it all up front, or set up a subscription through Amazon? When supplies came in, she used to just have them throughout the house, until she realized her guest bedroom closet was being underutilized. Now it’s storage (AKA Nita’s prepaid store) for each 120 days.  I brought up the study by Wayne et al that speaks to the “Invisible Family Load.” Household managers seem to have a positive disposition to the cognitive and management of the invisible load, but a negative disposition to the emotional cost of the invisible load. Nita shared the story of going to an amusement park with her daughters and getting rained out. Her oldest daughter complimented her when she realized how organized Nita was with her car closet. She was prepared with towels and snacks. With systems in place, Nita feels positive towards the emotional cost of “getting” to do all the invisible tasks for her family. In an effort to learn it all and understand my brain, Nita has invested in all the products. She agrees that for a stay at home mom, The Productive Home Solution® would be a natural place to start. Nita liked that she was able to get her foundation settled, then move on to the Sunday Basket®. Some nights as she and her daughter drift off to sleep, they listen to the podcast, per her daughter’s request. Nita cleans on Saturdays, plans on Sundays, and processes her basket on Mondays. She has two portable Sunday Basket®s that travel with her in her second home, her car. She loves knowing how to create the flow, the manipulation of time that makes her life more smooth. She even gave me an idea to check out the delay start feature on my washing machine. Get those machines working before you even wake up! Nita’s advice is, “Trust the process. Lisa knows!” She’s constantly quoting Lisa and this is what she says to her friends.  EPISODE RESOURCES: Organize 365® Podcast Resources The Sunday Basket® The Productive Home Solution® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 15 January 2025

In Organize 365® we say “Resources are not limited, they are limitless. Through collaboration, Organize 365® connects the right people and resources for maximum benefit and sustainability.” We know there is enough for everyone and growing up that is what I saw. I guess it’s true when it comes to our kids, more is caught than what is taught.  Abundance through the eyes of a child Knowing what I know now I could have probably figured out that our family was not rich. But I never felt it as a child. We had what we needed and we got to participate in extra-curricular activities. I watched my mother work her business. I watched my dad ”get recruited” by his friends to be a sales person for them. And when they sold the company to their sons, the sons added my dad as one of their partners because they knew he was valuable and consistently brought in a lot of new sales. It was then we had extra money.  But my dad was good at managing the money so that our family and the company had enough money even in times of lack. As a kid I always felt that we had enough resiliency and ability to overcome lack.  Abundant Energy Our desires and plans don’t always play out the way we want or think, but with an Abundance Mindset, they will come to be. I wanted to be a mother so bad. I had an abundant mindset and had to embrace the opportunity that adoption would provide, which was me becoming a mother. We had situations come our way through the adoption process. I could have clung to each one and thought this is my one opportunity I have to take it! But, I knew that I would be a mother, I just didn’t know how. I was open minded. What is going to be will be and I knew at the end of all of it, I would be a mother! An abundance frequency attracts abundance. Everything is just energy. I gave multiple examples of it in this episode because I see so much abundance in my life. I’m not trying to brag, I want you to see it’s there for you too. The Pie Factory You are only in competition with yourself. There is only one you with your unique skill set. Imagine a pie factory and they are just spitting out pies regularly. You don’t get just one slice. You don’t have to share a pie with anyone. You can have as much pie as you want. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 10 January 2025

Happy Monday!  Introducing the Connections Episodes from Organize 365®. Every other Monday I will be talking to people and the Organize 365® research staff about topics, books, studies, and other valuable materials that are connected to our goals at Organize 365®. Today I picked Anna, our education and research lead. When she first brought up this topic I wasn’t super jazzed, but after learning about the history of new year’s resolutions and why people started setting them…well it led to a great conversation.  When and why did people start setting new year's resolutions?  The Babylonians were the first we see making new year’s resolutions to their gods. They’d set the intention to return farm equipment or pay off their debts in hopes of a profitable crop that year. It was after harvest time that they’d do this as they prepared their field for new crops. And then we see the Romans setting intentions to their god, Janus, who had two faces. One face looked towards the past and encouraged reflection of the past year. And one face facing forward to plan ahead. They’d do this March 15th when, maybe due to their climate, they were preparing for a new crop. And then in 1582, Pope Gregory the 8th developed the Gregorian calendar we use today and he set the new year for January 1st.  Yesteryear’s common new year’s resolutions versus today When I look at the top 10 goals from 1947, I like to think about life then. They were coming out of World War II, they had food being rationed, and manual housework. So it’s no surprise that last on the list was to lose weight. It was a stressful time and people wanted to break bad habits, such as smoking and drinking, which was first on the list.  Nowadays life is easier. We have machines that do a lot for us, ability to live in the suburbs (off laborious farms), less generational living, cars, school buses, and catering to our children more so they are doing less, although we noted this is likely cultural. And we are addicted to our food. So it’s no surprise that top of the list now is to lose weight. Followed by organization because our children are involved in more activities, women now work, social media shows a standard that is not realistic but we are striving for it, and life is just faster paced. Need to be organized to stay on top of it all! One category, besides the ones I always notice like weight loss, money, and organization/productivity, is intrinsic/personal development. This is the introspective type of new year’s resolutions that was on the list. People want to help others and grow in their faith. I will start including this fourth category.  Organize 365® is there for you for your new year’s resolutions Planning day sets you up for almost 3 mini years. The human brain doesn’t like to think past about 100 days. It’s easier to set one new, new year’s resolution each time. You can set up actionable steps to accomplish that goal, too. You can try out new tasks or routines that become habits, stacking small steps that in the end accomplish a big goal.  Anna’s New Year’s Resolution: Drink more water Lisa’s New Year’s Resolution: Continue to implement more habits to support my health EPISODE RESOURCES: Outlived by Peter Attia MD Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 6 January 2025

I was on a plane in 2017 for a 5 hour flight from Los Angeles to Cincinnati when I committed to 5 values that I wanted to have within Organize 365®. This will be a 6-part series to share why I chose those 5 values plus one extra value that I felt needed to be added. I can trace my positivity back to 6th grade at church camp when I accepted Christ as my savior. But when my dad picked me up he said “No you didn’t, now get in the car.” I was always a positive child so I wasn’t mad or hurt, I knew it was just this special relationship I had with God.  Sharing my dad’s belief in me “Dad, I’d like to run daycare centers in corporate buildings.” I explained as dad had asked me what I wanted to go to college for. My dad had so much belief in me at just 17. He proposed that I take the money they were going to spend on college, which was about $100,000, and invest it in me and this business idea. I ran into the kitchen to pitch the idea to my mom, but she stood her ground. My mother was hell bent on me being the 4th generation of female college graduates in our family.  The decline As a little kid I was so positive, there was so much natural optimism. Even at 17 I had so much faith in myself, plus my dad’s belief in me. But then life…I was so excited for the MRS (Mrs. Woodruff) degree and was ready to start our life. But children didn’t come despite our desperate desire and so we adopted. But then more life was handed to me when my parents decided to get divorced, then my dad passed away, and I had to settle his estate.  I did inherit a little bit of money where we were able to remodel the kitchen and afford some more medical testing. I was always fighting a battle with people. They thought I was crazy because of everything I was doing for my kids and their health. Which got me thinking, “Am I the problem here?” (Funny how today’s society supports all the measures I took so many years ago.) I went from positive Lisa to cynical! Another blow was when my supervisor informed me that I wasn’t a good teacher. I made up my mind that I was going to quit. I wasn’t doing good at anything. I had become so negative and not fun to be around. Greg supported me quitting even though we had the most debt we have ever had. I turned in my resignation the next day. It’s not happening to you it’s happening for you The final straw was that first Monday while the kids were at school. I looked around and thought, whose house is this? I was so disconnected from my life. I realized that I, and my attitude, was the problem. Then and there I decided to take my life back and to be positive. I changed all the inputs, like the friends I kept, the shows I watched, the things I read.  I knew I wanted to stay Greg’s wife and the mother to my children. I ended up writing my book “Organization Is A Learnable Skill" to document how I took my life back. I now know that life is not happening to me, it’s happening for me. I sat down and wrote down 40 areas I was going to address. I remembered that belief my dad had in me to start a business and I was now going to do just that. And from that list one of my first programs was born, the 40 Weeks One Whole House Challenge (now incorporated into The Productive Home Solution®). Being positive is a core value for Organize 365®. It’s funny how fast a negative person can infiltrate the staff in a matter of days. I can’t have that and I don’t want to turn that ship around. My experience has been that positivity leads to success. So we are positive at Organize 365®. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Productive Home Solution Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 3 January 2025

In this episode, I introduce you to Allison G. who lives with her husband, daughter, son, and a furry kid. Allison found the Organize 365® Podcast after hearing my name a few times in two other organization/productivity podcasts. Allison felt organized at work but didn’t realize she wasn’t at home. She kept her calendar full and leaned on being busy if she forgot anything.  In January 2022, Allison fell while skiing. That really slowed her down and plopped her on her couch for some time. She noticed all of the physical chaos in her home. Allison has been a teacher for 21 years. Listening to the other two podcasts, she understood the big picture of organization and productivity. But by listening to Organize 365®, she’s been able to figure out how to apply those principles specifically to her life. Allison also turned 40 in 2022, which is one of those pivotal times in a woman’s life when I tend to see them want to declutter, get organized, and be productive.  Allison got the Sunday Basket®, quickly followed by the entire system. In March of 2022, Allison was very diligent and kept up on homework and training. She started with the 1.0 slash pockets for the first 6-8 months. Then she added in the 2.0 slash pockets. Allison says she passively went through The Productive Home Solution® the first time and has started her second round. She feels the reason for her organizational success is she gave herself time and took it slow. We make all these plans and framework for work, but not usually for home. Why? The Sunday Basket® and The Productive Home Solution® gives you a framework to get systems in place at home. After seeing results at home, of course she had to get the Teacher Friday Workbox®. She loves using the rainbow tear pad and planner for her classes. As a teacher, you could see all the paper work and books for all classes as overwhelming. You could look at your lesson plan and just see a lot of text. But when you color code them, now it’s 7 categories or 7 classes. Allison raved over the layout of the products and the quality of the paper. And she can match the slash pockets to the colors on the tear pad.  Allison is no longer faking being organized, she IS organized! She has systems in place at home to find important paperwork, like the insurance policy for earrings she lost. She’s been able to free up time to dream which led to her learning mahjong this past fall. Her family knows all about the Sunday Basket® even though they always call them buckets. She only wishes she’d known sooner it didn’t have to be the way it was before. And she’s gained so much confidence by knowing she’ll finish what she starts and not using her cognitive “power” to hopefully remember things that need to get done! Allison’s advice is, “If you are motivated and excited, get going! But if you think you need time, give yourself time. ”  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Productive Home Solution® Teacher Friday Workbox® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 1 January 2025

I look into my crystal ball and let me tell you what I see. Ok, no crystal ball but I have always kind of had my finger on the pulse of the future. I have a knack for seeing what is happening and how the economy will be impacted. And of course when the economy is impacted, so is the household manager. So what do I predict?  AI is not coming for your home in 2025 Changes happen in houses last! There’s a reason all of the literature I find about housework is so old. No one is studying the home and how to improve it. AI is not going to be sorting your paper or organizing your storage rooms in 2025.  Analog is the answer for information Do you remember when the elderly had to register to get some of the first vaccines? The problem was most of them didn’t know how to access the technology to set up the appointments to get the vaccine. Technology is not always best. And in an emergency situation, it’s critical to have paper to back up what you know to be true so the medical community can trust what you say is true. Paper is here to stay, analog is paper and it’s still the answer. Home is where you are the safest Disclaimer, I know this is not true for everyone. But for the most part, your home is where you decide what you want to do. Just because we can know everything instantly all the time does not mean you have to “subscribe” to it all.  You get to create your own reality You don’t have to be inundated with the news or negative messages. You can choose what feeds into your family in your home. You can switch up the algorithms on YouTube or completely get off of social media. You can choose what you eat and your routines, what you feel is right and safe for your family. It’s what we can control because we can’t control other people and their actions. You also get to choose where you interact with people. Maybe you attend a virtual meeting, go to yoga, date online, or you are a part of the Organize 365® community. But that’s just it, we all need connection and to belong to a community of like minded people.  Changes are going to keep coming faster and faster We can set our own pace at home, but the speed of information at our fingertips is just going to keep coming faster and faster. Originally I was going to say this means we need to make decisions faster, but do you know where decisions come from? They come from knowing what you want. When you know what you want, you can make a decision about something that is in line with making that thing you want to happen! Slow down and understand what you want.  Bonus: All homes will have a side hustle What do you think? It will be interesting to see if I was right on any of these at the end of 2025. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 27 December 2024

I’m so excited. It’s my birthday! I am 50 years old today!!! The women in my family have lived to be old—into their 90s and 100s. I have always been in awe of all they have done in their lives. Organize 365® just turned 10 years old.  I think I am going to live to 100, so I am just getting started. I have an innate understanding of time and money that I call “Lisa math.” It doesn’t follow the traditional rules about these things, but I am able to use it to show how I understand the world.  We all have constraints in life. We are naturally limited by our time, money, and energy. Getting organized helps you to develop more capacity by investing your current time for a future return of more time.  Improving your capacity allows you to do more things in life, handle unexpected events, and live out your unique purpose.  The mission of Organize 365® is to help busy people get their home and paper organized so that they can do what they are uniquely created to do. Over the last 20 years, my Sunday Basket® has given me an extra 5,200 hours. I have poured that extra time into creating Organize 365®. I have been able to help many of you save more time by using your Sunday Baskets®. And, boy, have those hours added up! By end of 2020, the Organize 365® customers saved over 1 million hours!!! At the end of 2021, we have saved over 2.5 million hours.  Your time and capacity have been unlocked. So many of you have been gracious enough to share how you are living your unique purpose using the hashtag #myextra5. That is the best birthday gift ever.

Transcribed - Published: 26 December 2024

Organize 365® is celebrating saving Sunday Basket® owners 10 millions hours over 7 years. Don’t have a Sunday Basket®? Then now is the perfect time to get one for a deal! I am so excited to announce this flash sale on the Sunday Basket®, Complete Home Organization Bundle, and an upgrade for current Sunday Basket® owners.  You are worth the investment  Once I saved myself a ton of time by delaying my decisions until Sunday, I knew I had to share it with others. There was a need, I tested it, you tested it, and now we are all saving time. Not always physical time, but time to think, less time looking for things, and time to dream. Time to take care of daily living, but also proactively plan ahead. Freeing up time and capacity will expand your opportunities and lessen your cognitive load. You are worth the investment.  I wanted to understand the impact the Sunday Basket® was having on homes. So I started counting, you know like McDonald’s did for a while until there were so many sold that now they just say billions and billions. And as of now, we know it’s 10 m i l l i o n hours saved! Woo Hoo! And we want to celebrate with a flash sale!! What are the deals?   $50 off the Sunday Basket® $500 off the Complete Home Organization Bundle $500 off to upgrade your Sunday Basket® to the Complete Home Organization Bundle Thank you for celebrating 10 MIllion Hours saved to focus on what you are uniquely created to do! EPISODE RESOURCES: Sunday Basket® Complete Home Organization Bundle Upgrade to Complete Home Organization Bundle [email protected] Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media.

Transcribed - Published: 26 December 2024

In this episode, I introduce you to Carrie T. who is married with two children. She has a daughter away at college and her son is still at home. Carrie travels a lot to see her daughter compete and listens to the podcast during those long drives. Carrie actually found the podcast many years ago when she was looking for organization podcasts. She loved the advice that “Your brain is working while you are listening and the solution will come to you.” She valued other organizational programs, but gravitated towards Organize 365® because of The Paper Solution®.  Carrie started with a DIY Sunday Basket®. It was fine, but she couldn’t find the right colored folders so she had to create labels in the color instead. She realized she was doing a lot of work for something that she could just purchase. She asked for the official Sunday Basket® one year for Christmas and dove into setting it up on Christmas day. She valued that everything was in one place. She wasn’t looking for papers. She could almost always find whatever she was looking for in her Sunday Basket®. She admitted she may have over slash pocketed, but she’s definitely got the hang of it now. She’s looking forward to the tax write off of getting a Friday Workbox® next. Another reason Carrie asked for the official Sunday Basket® was for the community that she desired. She loves attending the Sunday Basket® Club. She likes to attend live, but also uses the replay to pause the recording and finish each task in her time. Then she hits play and continues on. We talked a little bit about how each week you go through all of the rainbow slash pockets, but the 2.0 slash pockets don’t need weekly attention. We agreed on average it takes about 90 minutes to process each Sunday. And I know about every 4-6 weeks I thoroughly go through my Sunday Basket® and that can take me about 3 hours. She also values the division of workboxes in quarter 4 for the holidays, the next year, and taxes. It’s like 3 external brains for the different hats you wear as a household manager.  Carrie wishes she’d just gotten the official Sunday Basket® sooner. She has so much more peace of mind now because she knows “It’s in the Sunday Basket®.” With her extra pockets of time and her children getting older, she’s playing with the idea of getting her pilots license. She wants to be able to fly to see her children and attend their sporting events.  Carrie’s advice is, “Keep listening, and if you feel like the Sunday Basket® is the right thing to do, just do it! Do it now.”  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 25 December 2024

In business, this was the year in neutral! Try as I might to move forward with initiative, the universe wouldn’t allow it. But I had great success in other areas!  “Lovie, Are You?” You may be wondering how the PhD is going. Let me tell ya. I was warned that the second year is tough and it really was because the time I was giving to the PhD had to come from somewhere, right? I shared how I was dividing my time in previous episodes. But also, I traveled. Because I traveled, I didn’t do my normal home reset during my break from school and it was so bothersome, I did a whole episode about it. Baby Grayson got smarter this year, too. He now knows if my car is home, I, Lovie is home. He’s no longer fooled by “outta sight, outta mind.” So I moved all my stuff to the office for school, too. You may have thought in the past, “How does Lisa do it all?” I humbly explained how this year, I didn’t. Purple Work That Didn’t Work All of Organize 365® worked on two purple projects for a whole 10 months, that took lots of time and money, only to have neither get fully completed. So for years I’ve been told I need to go to an ERP system. This was the year. We worked with an accounting firm to get things and policies in place only to have the ERP team tell us that our bank and the system don’t play well together. So, I started thinking and came up with an idea. Once proposed, they said yes, I think we can use that solution to make Quickbooks work for you since we know Quickbooks plays nice with your bank. And we got to keep our super secure website. All was not lost because the company is better having gone through all of that.  And then there was our lease that was expiring. It got me looking at other spaces. I practiced driving to them like it was our new location. Kind of tried it on for size. I started dreaming of additional live events I’d like to host. They were ok, but then the cost of moving was setting in. Would our landlord extend the lease, just increase the price? They said yes, but to different terms of course. So here we are in the same building for the next four years, not moving. Again, all was not lost because we upgraded our current space and made it more functional for us for the season we are in. And stay tuned to attend some of the live events I dreamed up, like the Small Business Planning Mastermind on March 5th & 6th. Milestones Hit in This Neutral Year I am so excited with the milestones the company hit this year in quarter four, despite the purple projects failing. Such HUGE things!!! The podcast turned 10! The podcast is often about the Sunday Basket® in one way or another. And we say the Sunday Basket® saves people 260 hours annually. We also know that we have sold 12,000 Complete Sunday Basket®s, equating to saving “officially documented purchasers” 10 MILLION HOURS!!  That is so amazing!! That’s what I want, to give women back their time by delaying decision making so they don’t derail themselves.  And since we were going to have a party to celebrate the podcast, we decided to celebrate my award, too!  I saw Miami University was awarding Cincinnati Female Entrepreneur of the Year. With a short deadline to submit an application and three references, I didn’t know if I’d have everything in time. But my instagram followers are amazing and I actually received SIX overnight! I was so surprised to be in the top 3 being considered for the award, and even more shocked to be awarded the first ever Cincinnati Female Entrepreneur of the Year! I had all female entrepreneurs stand and I accepted the award on behalf of all of us. It wasn’t about who won, it was about all the women in that room being acknowledged for what they are doing and how they are growing Cincinnati. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Small Business Planning Mastermind Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 20 December 2024

In this episode, I introduce you to April R. She is a single mom of 5 children with a cat and dog to love on, too. April was watching someone on social media talking about the habits of people with ADHD and April identified with many. Then she came across the episodes about ADHD and naturally listened to the ones that followed. She used to think organization meant cleaning. She now knows organization means productivity.  April’s proudest accomplishment as a result of learning from Organize 365® is her beloved drink station!  She has a tiny kitchen and there are lots of people in the house. But April took it a step further by placing it in another room. I pointed out that also takes it away from the triangle of cooking. April repurposed a hutch she got off Facebook Marketplace. She was able to accommodate all of her children and their drink preferences. She has gotten a lot of compliments from friends, but now with her sister (who had handyman skills) she wants to take it up a notch with cabinets instead, floating shelves, and a mini fridge.  April shared a lot of lessons she’s learned. Or is it one lesson applied in multiple locations?  She’s improved her flexible thinking executive function. She’s applied the drink station organization to her work and other spaces in her home. After her success with the drink station, she invested in the Sunday Basket®. And even though she didn’t use it effectively in the beginning, she was collecting in it the way she was supposed to. Then she would go through it every so often. Would you believe she found thousands of dollars just waiting in there for her? You've got to hear the episode to understand or maybe you have too! It dawned on her how her oldest daughter had a bigger bedroom than the two that shared. So she swapped them. That also gave the older daughter, who goes to school online, a better connection to their wi-fi and more privacy. April and the girls got the benefit of sharing a bathroom space instead of just April using it, as well as the connections she’s building with her two youngest as they get ready for their day together. April also shared about how she touches base with all her kids on Sunday to plan ahead. And how she developed an A/B meal plan (with a little help from Chat GPT) for when her kids are with her and when they are at their dads. But she knew what to ask for due to what she has learned through Organize 365®. She’s been prepared for the unexpected. When hurricane Beryl was coming their way, she was able to plan ahead and be prepared to ride it out. I told her about the snow day box I developed when my kids were younger to make it exciting to have the kids home. She’s realized that just because she’s organized it doesn’t mean it’ll keep things from happening. She has so much more joy and awareness now. She feels confident when one of the kids needs something from her and she can go get it from her Sunday Basket®. She has so much joy with the intentionality of how she’s spending her time with her kids and she’s so excited about the future.  April’s advice is, “If you don’t know if you should get the Sunday Basket®, do the drink station or just try one thing.” It’s true in the midst of your overwhelm of thinking you need all the systems. Just start with one thing or it seems too overwhelming to even start. All the systems are independent of each other. And as April added, then it just gets easier to add another system.  EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution® Home Planning Day Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  On the Wednesday podcast, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365­® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps and triumphs along their organizing journey. I am grateful that you are reaching out to share with me and with this community. You can see and hear transformation in action. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday. Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 18 December 2024

I love when the podcasters I follow do a year in review and so I thought I’d try my hand at it this year. This year was the year of renovations, like I have mentioned a few times. But when I look back collectively on all that was done in addition to the renovations, I realize how blessed I am. I had been warned the second year of the PhD was going to be hard and it was. And just for funzies, we threw in some travel and medical events too! New Bathrooms… We were all wide awake by the time Joey called, told us about a fizzy sound behind his toilet, but not to worry. He was going to go back to bed and would call us when he got back up. Oh no ya don’t! Joey is on the third floor and we don’t need a trickle down effect, pun intended. I had always had the dream to set our kids up with their first places, not knowing how but just that I’d like to. It was my dream. After considering rent, it was still the better financial decision to get Joey a condo at the height of the market. We were fortunate enough to get him one of the biggest units with a garage for his precious car. We knew there may be some renovations down the line, but they happened this year because as it turns out, there was sprinkler plumbing instead of the good stuff. It needed to be replaced.   New Living Spaces It wasn’t too long there after that I got to noticing that Grayson, while he technically fit in his converted-from-the-crib toddler bed, he didn’t fit. And Grayson is of the large variety. He was 4 weeks early being delivered and came in at 8lbs. This is a large child. But do I just put in a twin sized bed? I mean, it could fit in the cubby we’d had him in. No, I decided in the long run we needed to get him a twin XL to continue to suit him for many years. But that bed wouldn’t fit and at the end of the day he needed his own room. Well this scenario turned into the Money Pit; you know the movie?  One thing led to another which in the end was a bedroom big enough for two twin beds, a new kitchen, gas fireplace and gas line removed, new fridge, washer, dryer, and dishwasher. More appliances meant that if we were going to already be making a mess, we might as well make the biggest mess by adding more power to our electrical box! And now it is so nice and safe for them down there with more smoke detectors and a carbon monoxide detector. Abby said “You may not like this, but this is so nice I may never leave.” That was the point. I figured after 12 months we’d be revenue neutral versus moving her to a place of her own. Money well invested.  But once Abby’s kitchen was done, Greg and I really wanted a nice beautiful fridge like Abby had bought herself. So we refaced the cabinets in the kitchen and got our new fridge, only to find this one couldn’t open just like our old one. So why not start another small renovation to adjust the wall to accommodate our new fridge?  And Life, Oh My! But if your grandchild isn’t moving for a while, you get them a playset for the backyard. Which of course meant a new fence! Got to keep the coyotes out and Grayson in. We managed to squeeze in a trip to England and a few other travel adventures. And then little baby Grayson had a few allergic reactions. That meant a few hospital visits and red allergy stickers all over the house to avoid more trips to the hospital. But that’s all. LOL We had a full and busy year, can’t wait to see how we will thrive in 2025! EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter  Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Transcribed - Published: 13 December 2024