Out with the Old, In with the Tree

It's the Saturday after Thanksgiving, which means it's time to put up our Christmas tree. As my husband and children scurry about piling up boxes in our living room, I'm trying to clear out the clutter that's already here. I’m sitting here at my “desk,” which amounts to a folding chair and home office armoire in my living room, and there are piles and piles (and piles) of papers surrounding me. When I moved my workspace up here from the basement, for the purposes of natural light and being closer to the kids, all my stuff came with me, and it’s been such a struggle keeping everything orderly.

We had an article recently in WHY magazine about paperwork—hiding it, organizing it, chucking it, etc. That’s what I’ll be spending a good part of this weekend doing. Unfortunately, I’m one of those people who likes to jot down little nuggets of wisdom on stray papers, so you can imagine the job that’s ahead of me. Are those sleigh bells I hear in the distance?