Polish Tote

I grabbed these little totes at Walmart with no particular purpose in mind. You know how you know you will find something to use things for even if you don't know right at the moment and since it is a good buy you go ahead and get it (I know this is a run-on sentence but I write how I think sometimes and well, sorry). These little tote baskests come as a pair and were only $1 for the both. They did sit in the corner for a while and then one day when I had to carry all my new nail polish purchases down to the basement where I keep the rest of my stash this was perfect.

Now whenever I don't want to be stuck in the basement doing my nails I just throw the polishes and tools I need in here and go sit wherever. Just now I threw in a couple polishes, top coat, drying drops, nail file, toe separators, a yogurt and spoon, my magazine, and my cell phone and headed up to my bedroom to veg out. One trip. As I was heading up my daughter said, "You love that thing don't you!" I could only smile. The little things that make life easier are just great.

Do you always do your nails in the same place or do you have polish in multiple rooms? What do you tote your polish around in?

My Worst Nightmare..Part 2

This unbelievable. Right when I am making progress, scanning away, getting all of this paper out of my life guess what happens. I am sure you can guess...my scanner(actually a multifunction scanner/copier/printer/fax) dies. This thing jut will not power on anymore. What has me really irked is there were no signs of distress.  Sometimes I can tell when I should start prepping myself to by a new printer, monitor, whatever it is. This nothing. My daughter copied something earlier there was a paper jam which was cleared and all was fine.  A few hours later I hear the sound your computer makes when something is connected via USB. I really didn't pay it any mind until I noticed the blinking alarm light on the scanner. It wouldn't go away so I powered it down and the poor thing never powered back up. We have had it for about 3 years so I guess it may be about time for a new one..who knows.

Bye bye Canon MP780. You were great. I never had any issues (until you stopped working when I needed you the most). Well actually that is a major issue, you should have warned me you were about to go kaput!!

At my office (I am currently self-employed) we have a printer/copier/scanner that is not in use. No fax but I have an e-fax number for incoming and can either scan and email or scan and fax from my computer. My husband suggested to use that one. Great no need to spend money.He just brought it home and guess what again...there is no way on earth I will be able to use this thing. My major need is for scanning right now. This is a Photo printer..not so much for document scanning but scanning of photos it appears. No Automatic Document Feeder (ADF). I am used to taking a stack of 30 or so sheets of paper..loading it in the ADF and scanning it all at once, no more need for me to touch anything. With this I would have to open, put paper in, close, and scan for each sheet of paper. It is not happening. The time vs. money trade-off is just not there for the amount of scanning I need to do.

With that being said there is another multifunction at the office that I will suggest should be bestowed upon me. This is a newer model of my beloved Canon and has wireless networking. All I need to do is set up one of the PC's to receive incoming faxes and for outgoing faxes, hey, they can scan and email or scan and fax from the PC, that is what I would have had to do.

Either way this Photo printer is not going to cut it so we can either swap..or spend the money for a new one.

*UPDATE*-1/14/10- I did get the one from the office on Wednesday.  I was so happy I did a few hours of "virtual filing" last night.  Will try to do another hour tonight. Woo hoo! PROGRESS!

My Worst Nightmare...FILING!!

The amount of paper that comes into my household is absolutely overwhelming. As good as I try to be about filing it, once I fall behind it is almost impossible to catch back up. Now imagine falling behind on it not only once but a lot (can't even count the number of times). In all fairness to myself I did inherit a lot of it from my better half who was supposed to handle these things. When you inherit a few years worth of filing and paper despite how hard you try on a day to day basis progress is not made.

In 2010 I have vowed to get rid of all of this paper. Instead of filing all of this in my file cabinets,I have 3 in my home office, I have decided to create a virtual file cabinet. All papers will be scanned and filed accordingly on my external drive. The task just began yesterday but I will post a few pictures so you can see what exactly I am working with. Brace yourself because the pictures are not going to be pretty. There are 4 areas that need to be tackled.

It is a mess, I know, please don't shun and shame me. I already feel totally ashamed looking at these pictures. If all I had to do with my life was eat, sleep, and file then of course this wouldn't be so disastrous. Guess what, there is something called LIFE, that is a lot more important to me than being stuck in this office filing. I do realize though that I need to take a step back and get this under control which is why on January 1, 2010 I began a serious attack on all of this. Armed with a scanner, a shredder, and an external drive I have already filed more in the last 2 days than the last 2 months combined. Who knew it could be this easy.

I am giving myself 1 month to get through this madness. Let me clarify, I am talking about the papers that have not made it into the file cabinets yet. Everything that is sitting in a pile waiting to be filed will be gone. I have been diligently shredding as I go so the paper is getting out of here. Once I finish an area you can best believe I will be posting pictures of a new and improved workspace.

While this has been all taken pretty lightly I will say that it is something that can get out of hand and serious. Excessive amounts of clutter for me means a cluttered mind and state of being. In no way do I want to feel or live like that. I want to walk in my office and be happy to work in it.

At My Fingertips

I don't have a lot of beauty products but by all means it is more than a little bit. My husband would look at me like a was crazy if I set up shop with ALL of my items on our bathroom sink so for the sake of my sanity and his I only keep on my sink a limited number of items that I like to keep at my fingertips. When I say limited, now that I look at the picture, there is a lot but since it is packed into a compact space the amount is irrelevant.

Ahhh...the magnificent jumble of stuff.  Here is what I am stashing in my containers.  Eyeliners, lip liners, shadow base, emery board, hangnail clippers, tweezers, scissors, foundation, mascara, spot treatments, eyelash comb, eyebrow brush, concealer, foundation, makeup brushes, brush cleaner, eye makeup remover, q-tips.  In the back is my Coastal Scents palette (88 colors at my fingertips) and a small mirror.  Two containers with smaller containers in them holds a lot more than you would think.  Not fancy but keeps me organized.  How do you store your items?