The Queen of KAOS @Home

As you know, the clock is ticking already.

Are you prepared for gift giving this year?

If not, now is the time to get the jump on it, so for our decluttering this week, how about having a look

at your gift giving plans?

 I am doing most of mine online, or making them so I am almost covered but I need to make a plan for

the ones I have left and get to it.

I’m going to make a list, and check it twice :0)

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Did you know you need a new cell phone? Did you know your car is trash? Did you know you’re not pretty enough, you’re overweight, you wear outdated clothes, you need to eat healthier and you need two large pizzas? If you didn’t know that, brace yourself because that’s just the beginning of your troubles — or so say the messages bombarding virtually every one of us every day.

Do you realize how much advertising you are subjected to each day? There are ads on television, ads on the radio, ads on the Internet, ads in the paper, in magazines, along the side of the road and on other vehicles. There are ads in virtually every business you walk into each day and there are ads all over your house. The next time you go to Wal-Mart, pause at the front door and take a careful inventory of all the advertising you are exposed to in that one location. There are hundreds, possibly thousands of print ads competing for your attention there. Wal-Mart radio plays a constant barrage of advertising trying to influence you to buy something. Many of the items available for purchase practically cry out to you to purchase them through advertising on the packaging. Even if you are the queen of frugality, you cannot help but be influenced by this daily barrage of advertising.

What many people don’t know is that the basic purpose of advertising is to persuade you to buy something you didn’t know you needed before you saw the ad. The message isn’t usually, “Hey, if you have a few extra dollars, you might enjoy this product.” The typical advertising message you hear really says something more like “Even though you never needed this product before, your friends and family will reject you, you will encounter daily torment, you will discover that you have no value as a human being and that you will probably die if you don’t buy this product right away!”

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by Maria GraciaIf you haven’t balanced your checkbook in awhile, or you lose your incoming bills before they’re paid or you put off filing your tax returns because it’s just too difficult to get everything together, than it’s probably time to organize your finances. Here are 5 quick ideas:

1. Consolidate your credit cards. Rather than having a bunch of different credit cards, consolidate all of your expenses on one single credit card, preferably one that has a low finance rate, and perhaps one that offers cashback or airline mileage on every dollar you spend. This can result in less confusion over which card to use, it can give you a better idea of how much debt you’re accumulating, it may give you more back for your dollar, and you’ll only have to write out one payment check per month.
2. Use a bill paying system. As soon as you get bills in the mail, they should immediately be placed into a bill paying system. All of your pending bills are then ready to be paid once a week, or once every 2 weeks, etc. Use that same bill paying system to store paid bill summaries, being sure that each category is in its own folder or envelope. Doing this makes it very simple to look something up when necessary.
3. Organize your expenses, as you spend. Want to know how much you spend each month, so you can determine your monthly spending budget? As you spend, just record that expense. This can be called your Expense Summary. A computer program like Quicken or a simple spreadsheet is great for this purpose, or you can certainly do this with paper and pen.
4. Balance your checkbook monthly. In order for you to have a good idea of how much money is sitting in your checking account, what checks have cleared, and any errors that you, or your bank, may have made, you must balance your checking account. It really doesn’t take that long if you balance your checkbook the same day your statement and cancelled checks arrive back from the bank each month. In fact, if you use a computer program like Quicken, you can do this task even quicker.
5. Keep your tax-related stuff together. Before tax season, you’ll start to receive tax related information from your job, your bank, etc. Keep all of these tax-related papers in a labeled file folder. This way, when you’re ready to do your taxes, you won’t have to search for the papers you need.

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What to declutter today?

Christmas is coming, it’s still a little early to get into decorating I think, probably next week it will be something to keep in mind though.

So how about if we tackle the “big ugly” today!

Do you have a corner or a pile that nags you every time you see it?

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