Day 23 - Spring 30 Day Clutter Buster Challenge

Welcome to Day 23 of the 30 Day Clutter Buster Challenge!  Today I went above and beyond the call of duty.  Today I decluttered 43 things!

Yes, more pens!  Seriously, how many pens can one person accumulate?  Apparently, quite a few!  The pile on the left is for the garbage since they don't work.  The pile on the right is in the donation pile - which is getting huge and is being picked up tomorrow!  In the centre I had some stickers that I used to put on the calendar whenever I remembered to exercise.  I haven't exercised in a while so obviously a sticker was not motivation enough.  There is also a staple remover and a date stamp that hasn't been used since July 15, 2007.  I could tell the exact date since, well, it's a date stamp!  I think this may be it for the pens, I hope.

I also wanted to show you my finished product for my Menu Planning Calendar.  I finished it this morning and I can't believe how well it turned out.

I even have a column for lunch ideas.

I bought a small tackle box from Walmart to store the extras.

I kept some blank magnetic paper so that I can write in some meals.  At some point I can take them out and transfer the ones we want to keep onto the computer and print them out so that they look nice a neat.

I've tried menu planning so many different ways.  I tried writing it on the calendar but the calendar ended up looking so messy.  Besides there was always that one meal that we never got around to eating - in my house it was usually meatloaf.  I would add it into the next week's meal plan (since I already had all the ingredients) and, for whatever reason, it would get skipped again.  My calendar started to look like all we ate was meatloaf and we hadn't had it once!

I also tried writing it on a piece of paper but that paper would get lost and if the paper got thrown out then I would have a hard time remembering what was planned for the rest of the week.  I tried online programs such a Cozi for my menu planning but I could only access it from my computer and not from any other device like my phone or iPad.  Turning on the computer to find out what needed to be defrosted for dinner was a pain.

I'm hoping this new calendar will help make meal planning easier.  That's the thing about organizing systems, if you find that one way isn't working for you and your family, it's time for a change.

Do you menu plan?  Share with us some of your tips to make it easier.

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