Organizing Paper Clutter

I have always been envious of organized people. You know who I am talking about. Their kitchen cabinets are neatly organized, and all their plastic containers have matching lids. I have boxes of plastic containers, but usually cover them with wrap, because I can't find the right lid.

My goal is to conquer all clutter. I started with paper because it is so visible, and gets worse with each trip to the mailbox.

I started by stapling the sides of the paper folders, leaving them open only at the top. Then I labeled each one with a different category of mail, and papers. Mine are labeled as follows: Bills, Insurance, Magazine offers, Business, Coupons, Pets, Misc. You could label yours with whatever you have most of. Then I went through my mail, threw away the trash, and put what I wanted to save in the folders. My plan now is to do this each day as soon as I come in from the mailbox.

The two binders were for the other type of paper I have tons of: recipes torn from magazines; and home projects, arts and crafts ideas, etc., that I wanted to save from magazines.

The first binder I reserved just for recipes. I labeled my dividers with the usual categories: Casseroles, Vegetables, Appetizers, Soup and Bread, Desserts, Misc. I glued the recipes to heavy paper, and punched holes to fit the binder, and filed them. It was fun going through these recipes. I found a lot of favorites that I had forgotten about.

The second binder was for various articles I wanted to save from magazines and fliers. The dividers in this binder were labeled as follows: Organizing, Decorating, Kitchen, Arts and Crafts, Sewing, Pets. In this binder I used a combination of heavy paper to glue articles on, and magnetic photo pages. You could use whatever works for you that you have on hand.