Organised Fun with kids on School Holidays.

Well I am playing Mum at present as the kids are on holidays.

I have all but given up trying to keep the house tidy, but we are managing with trying to hard. A good sign for me. What is really important when you have kids at home, wether they are preschoolers or on Holidays is to keep then active and entertained.

This is so much easier if you plan and Organise activities that will be easy cheap and cheerful. Some things you can do to keep the kids amused and the damage to the homefront to the minimum are.

* Explore your neighbourhood - Walk for at least and hour with the kids from your home. Go down streets and paths you have never been down and smile and say hi to your neighbours.

* Find a Park - Go to a park further afield. My kids have a "forced trip" to a city Park 3 x a week in holidays so I can get my "Group Exercise Class" in. They take a ball, or they join in the fitness class.

* Get the kids to do the School holiday Meal Plan - Now my kids are older they get out the cook books and decide what we will eat fro the upcoming week. Make up a shopping list and take them to the supermarket. Kids from age 5-6 can find items and help load the trolley.

* Home based Cooking schools - Set aside a day for baking during the holidays. Do a huge batch of muffins, cookies, cakes etc. Have some on hand and freeze the rest, school lunches will be exciting when they discover their holiday cooking class treats in their lunch boxs. Also if you do this all on the one day, there is only one big clean up in the kitchen.

* Visit local attractions - Become a tourist in your own town. Many attractions have cheaper or free rates for locals. Take advantage of this and explore places only the tourists go. Art Galleries, museums and other attractions are all for the taking.

* Let the Kids Choose - We had a holiday at home once, where each child chose a place (within 2 hours drive from home) to visit for a day trip. We wound up Caving, fishing, picnicing and swimming in amazing parts of New Zealand and came home to our own beds at the end of each days adventure.

So get out there and explore, keep the TV and Computers to the minimum, if you are away from the house you are making less mess. Less to clean up and keep organised more time for fun.

After all that is what life is about!!!!

Book Borrowers Beware!!!!!!!

Something that most people find incredibly frustating is lending out books that never come home. I have been working with a client regularly and one of my "duties" if to help her maintain an increasing library that she loans out to her clients.

There are a few things I have put in place to ensure that this valuable investement is maintained.

* Use of library cards - Each time a book is lent to a client the details are placed on a card and kept in the office. These cards are the same as the cards we had in our school library. The card stays in the book until the book in loaned, then is returned to the book when the book is returned.

* Keeping track of late returns - For your own library you can make a note in your calender when a book has been gone for 1 month, then call the borrower that day and call in the book.

With my client I check the cards and place a note in the client file on a flouro sticky note to remind the client to return the book.

* Categorise your collection - This can be a tricky process if you have a large library, however it need not be complicated. In my clinets case her books fall under specific sub-categories: Relationships, Business, Personal Growth etc. This allows you to see all your books and in a glance you can often tell if a book is missing from its category. I Categorised my clients library in about 45 minutes today, a small time investemnt considering the value of Books.

Books are an incredibly valuable resource and should be treated as such, you know that on average 10 books are worth about $250 New Zealand Dollars. So it is well worth the time and effort to protect them.

Also to all you book borrowers out there who are feeling guilty about unreturned loans. Take 10 minutes now to check your book Shelf and return those books to the person you borrowed them from. They will be thrilled, as many feel awkward about asking "Where is the book I lent you?". Also in future if you borrow a book, make a note of it in your calender and return it no longer than 1 month after you have borrowed it.

HAPPY READING and RETURNING

Welcome to the Organising Guru Blog

Welcome to you all, this is the first post from "the Organising Guru".

I have a wonderful job where I get to help all kinds of people get their lives in order either at home or at work. My Business is called Totally Organised, you can find it at www.totallyorganised.co.nz

I plan to share with you some of my more interesting Organising Challenges and how I helped my clients come to a solution.

Sometimes simplicity is the key, and a solution is never far away.

Getting this Blog up and running is exciting for me as I cannot wait to share with youways to become more organised in your lives.

Just so you don't think you are dealing with a Martha Stewart clone, I am not naturally organised and sometimes find being organised quiet a challenge myself.

I have a busy household with kids, pets and a husband all who at times seem to be conspiring to make being organised impossible. So I take it to mean it is OK to not be perfect, not everything will run smoothly and who cares if your beds are not made first thing in the morning.

My type of being organised is about, having time to do what really matters. Like spending time for yourself or with your family. Catching up with friends being social and not freaking out if your home does not step out of the pages of "House & Garden".

My home rarely looks perfect (I'm not sure if it ever has) but it is always open to friends and family, who can come in and feel at home. A friend once told me if your welcome is warm and loving, who cares if their are dishes in the sink. Life is more important than that.

So welcome to my Blog, and also my journey, make yourself at home and enjoy the adventure, join in of you wish and most of all dont stress about getting organised.

http://www.totallyorganised.co.nz