I am definitely one of “those” people who enjoys organizing. As a child, I kept my belongings neat and tidy. I also tried to organize the rest of my family. I remember taking laundry baskets from room to room attempting to help my mother by picking up and sorting what I considered clutter. I am not sure it was always appreciated! I was not, however, a “dream child” all of the time. I complained about being asked to do chores because I knew they would never stay “done.”

Fast forward about 40 years. I have worn many “hats” at this stage of life. After college, I married and worked for several years as a Physical Therapist. As a P.T., my focus was helping individuals function at their highest ability with any challenges that were put in front of them. It was my hope to help take the “dis” away from ability. After my first child was born, I was able to fulfill a personal goal, and stay at home with her full time. Over the next several years, my interests shifted to child birth and child-bearing issues. I trained to become a Childbirth Educator and a Doula. For the next 10 years I taught Lamaze Childbirth Education classes and provided labor support for couples as a Doula. It was my way of helping others get “organized” for a challenging, life-changing event.

Our family grew to include five children with a fourteen year age span between the oldest and youngest. I also realized that my wonderful, talented husband was a “pack-rat.” As much as I loved to have things orderly, I found it was a different matter to expect the others in my life to want (or sometimes even know how) to keep their things that way.

As my children grew, so did their stuff! It seemed to multiply from infancy through the toddler years. As they began school, new challenges of dealing with the related “stuff” emerged. During the course of my children’s school years, we spent nine years home schooling. We have also had, at one time or another, children in public, private and charter schools. They all had one thing in common: lots of associated “stuff” (i.e. papers, schedules, meetings, sports…) One year we had all five children in five different schools: pre-school, elementary, middle school, high school and college.

Needless to say, I have had a lot of experience with organizational challenges, just within my own family! What I found, was that when my systems of dealing with these challenges were functioning smoothly, my life was less stressful. I also found I had more time to do the things I enjoyed.

I have developed many methods of handling the “stuff” of life. I enjoy the process of making something that isn’t working well, become functional. Creating something “functional” or “organized” can be very different for each person. What I hope to do is help you establish functional systems in your own space that work for you. I want to help you “make your spaces functional places!”