“The LORD bless thee, and keep thee; the LORD make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee; the LORD lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace.” Numbers 6:24-26

God gave these words to Aaron, the priest, and his sons to use in blessing the children of Israel.  As I read this passage a few weeks ago, I thought how appropriate it would be as a blessing for our family.

I was excited to find these verses as a print on Etsy.  I found an inexpensive mat and frame at Target and my husband hung it on the wall in our living area.

Beyond that, I want to make this an ongoing tradition in our family.  For years, when my mom mailed me a card or a letter, she would include the words of 3 John 4, ” I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.”  I want to do the same with this blessing for our children.

Numbers 6:27 says, “And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel; and I will bless them.”  It’s exactly what I want for our family – God’s blessings! 

With this print on the wall, we can now see God’s words of blessing every day.

Do you have any Scripture posted around your home?

I never claim to be an interior decorator.

However, I love having our household items organized.  While I could blow the budget at The Container Store, I have found a free alternative – shoe boxes.

I usually save our empty shoe boxes and have found several ways to use them as organizing tools.

In the top of this closet, a small shoebox holds extra light bulbs while a large one holds appliance instruction manuals and warranty information.

In a boots shoebox in the top of our daughters’ closet, hats are stacked.

My older daughter used a shoe box lid along with several empty jewelry boxes to organize some of her jewelry in a drawer.

Card games are corralled in a box in a hallway closet.

Hair brushes and accessories live in a box in the cabinet underneath the bathroom sink.

Is there an inexpensive tool you’ve found useful for organizing items in your home?

My decorating ideas are few and far between, but here’s one that I’m really enjoying.

Our daughters have had several jewelry boxes over the years.  They work well for small pieces of jewelry, but now that our girls are older and have some “real” jewelry, we needed a way to store it neatly.

Around Christmas time, I looked at some jewelry trees, but didn’t see one that I liked.  Plus, it would have to sit on the top of their dresser, which is already prime real estate.  Then I saw this idea in a magazine – hanging jewelry on a cork or memo board.

Each of our girls already had a board, so we simply added push pins from which we hung the jewelry.

The wooden jumping jack needed a place to hang out,too!

The boards serve as wall decor in their bedroom and allow the girls to instantly see what jewelry is available to wear.

Better Homes and Gardens and Southern Living are two of my favorite magazines to read, so I’m thinking the idea may have come from one of those.

Where do you get ideas for decorating your home?

If you’re like me, you enjoy having a clean house, but don’t always embrace the work that it takes to get there!  There are chores – like vacuuming – that I don’t mind at all, while others – like cleaning the bathroom – make me look for any possible reason to procrastinate!

I finally recognized my weaknesses (at least those related to house cleaning 😉 and found that there were certain tasks that I was always postponing because I dreaded doing them. Then, when I finally got around to the cleaning, it was more difficult since it hadn’t been done for awhile. 

I finally created a minimal weekly schedule for attacking my chores and it has been a huge help.

I tackle the main tasks for the day at 8:00 A.M. That is when the girls begin their homeschooling and, since they are pretty good at working independently for the first hour or so, my interruptions are limited. I have found that I enjoy the tasks more if I have the radio or a cd playing while I work. Getting my chores done early in the day gives me a sense of accomplishment and allows me to complete them before other distractions arise. My energy tends to wane by the afternoon, but I still feel good about what I finished in the morning.

You will note that there’s nothing assigned on Thursday; that is the day we are out the door by 9:30 A.M. for art class at a homeschool coop, followed by library time and piano lessons. On Saturdays, I oversee the girls’ chores as they are responsible for cleaning their bedroom, bathroom, and play/school room.

I realize that others may have obligations that cause them to need more flexibility in this area, but I have found that sticking to this schedule works for me. You may still find dust on my ceiling fans, but if you stop by on Monday at 9:00 A.M., you’ll be impressed with how clean the master bathroom is!

Do you have any type of cleaning schedule? How do you motivate yourself to do chores you dislike?

This post is linked to Works for Me Wednesday hosted by We Are THAT Family.

Many of you know that creating an organized system for some area of our home makes my heart go “pitter-patter!”

When we began homeschooling, I knew I would need a way to file graded papers and other documents and records.  Rather than setting up a plan immediately, I waited a month or two so that I could determine what I really needed.

Remembering how well my recipe binder worked, I decided to do something similar.  I got a two-inch binder and a set of tabbed dividers for each child. (I also purchased a three-hole-punch as I didn’t have one.)  I created sections in the binder for each subject that the girls cover in school.

Behind the tab, I filed each quiz, test, etc., for that particular class.  When our daughters complete special projects, such as the mammal poster our fifth-grader recently made, I can take a photo of it, then print it, and add it to the binder.

My fifth-grader has one set of quizzes that are printed on smaller sheets of paper.  I simply slide all of these into one page protector which is added to the correct subject area.

I also bought a package of special pockets to record our field trips.  I can save pamphlets, ticket stubs, photos, and other memorabilia from each trip that we take and store each set in its own pocket.

While I’m still working on organizing other aspects of homeschooling, at least I feel in complete “teacher mode” now with my binders!

How do you organize your children’s school work or other papers that you need to manage?

You know me as the self-proclaimed, non-creative type, lacking even one “artsy-craftsy” bone in her body. While I don’t expect that to change in a big way, I did manage a minor breakthrough.

I thought there had to be a way to dress up the board, and my light-bulb moment produced an idea for covering the plain wooden border with ribbon.

Two trips to Michaels later, I came home with a ribbon I thought my daughter would like since it included her favorite color – blue. (Just to show you how much of a novice I am at this type of thing….I measured the perimeter of the board and thought I would need 3 three-yard rolls of ribbon. Well, I didn’t even use one whole roll. I’m thankful that I could return the rest!)

Yes, I actually do own a glue gun – which worked perfectly for attaching the ribbon.

My daughter has thanked me several times and told me how pretty she thinks her board looks.

I fear that this burst of inspiration, however, has exhausted me for the time being, so I imagine it will be awhile before I have anything else like this to share!

Bringing order to chaos through organization gives me a singular thrill. Weird, I know.

My latest project has been gaining some sort of control over my recipes. I print them off the Internet, clip them from magazines and receive them handwritten on recipe cards from friends. The system I had was working okay; just a square woven basket with homemade dividers (created from envelopes) and a collection of 3×5 or 4×6 cards, 8 1/2 x 11 sheets of paper, and everything from small clipped squares to full-page magazine articles.

My goal was to be able to easily access a recipe for cooking and have a setup that allowed me to quickly browse through it when I’m menu planning for the week.

I bought a 1 1/2-inch binder, a set of dividers and a package of page protectors from Target. I paid a little more to get a pink binder; having my recipes in the cheaper white or black version seemed just a bit too utilitarian.

Many of my recipes were already on 8 1/2 x 11 paper, so I stuck those into the page protectors (most only occupy the front of one sheet, so I could have two recipes per page protector).

Once that was done, I decided on the categories I wanted (such as Breakfasts & Sweet Breads, Vegetables & Sides, etc.) and wrote those on the tabs for the dividers.

I’m not done yet, but I already love this new system! It’s so easy to find the recipe I’m looking for and I’m not afraid to leave the binder open on the counter while I’m cooking since the actual page is covered with plastic so splatters won’t damage it. (I also tend to make notes on my recipes, so this way they are preserved as well.)

There are quite a few recipes that I still need to type and print; I also want to design a nice cover that I can slip under the plastic on the front of the binder. I figure I’ll spend about $12-15 total on the supplies (not counting the cost of the paper and ink to print the recipes). I’m already wondering if I’ll need to upgrade to a 2 or 3 inch binder later if this one begins to bulge.

Here’s where I need help. I’m constantly finding new recipes I want to try. These don’t deserve a “home” in the binder until I’ve made them and determined if they’re “keepers.” Do you have an idea for organizing those loose recipes?

My husband mentioned skipping paper all together and storing my recipes on the computer, but I just can’t make that step yet!

So how do you organize your recipes?