WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO GET ORGANIZED?

Oh, how I admire all those layouts in magazines where the woman has everything in it’s proper place and knows where everything is at a moment’s notice. That would not be me! I have struggled ( and I do mean struggled) every year with the best of intentions to finally get myself organized. I’m not horrible disorganized..I do make an attempt to keep things together and keep a neat house. But each year I realize that I have w-a-y more than I need. I think it started out with buying in quantities when the boys were young, I was working a full time job, and didn’t have time to shop so I just bought several of each item to save time. That habit expanded into having too much stuff. Abundance is good sometimes, but when you seem to have too much it’s time to trim down. I’ve been working at it for quite awhile, but never seem to achieve that goal of knowing what I have and where it is.
  So this Christmas I decided that once and for all I was going to sort through all those bins of Christmas decorations in the attic. There certainly were things there that I never use anymore. So Don carried downstairs 5 large bins. I worked all one day putting like items together…how does anyone get 15 red velvet bows?  And the greenery. Yes, maybe once I used it all but now I am of the philosophy that I just make more work for myself by putting up so much. So out went all the extra strings of lights..we haven’t used colored lights for years. And all those country decorations which fit my style once upon a time but not my style today.  I can’t say I was perfect. I did keep more than I’m actually using this year. But I made a darn good start! Do I get a gold star for that?