My Challenge for Lent

I used to think of myself as an organized person.  I try to keep things nice and tidy and in some kind of order. Order and cleanness are so calming for me. I am not truly comfortable unless I have those two things.

However, I have three kids.  Three really messy kids.  And I have a husband.  A husband whom I adore that is a "pile-r" (he makes piles---piles of receipts, piles of magazines, piles of little notes he writes to himself) and he is a pack rat.  Its hard to keep up with everything.  And I've discovered that for the first 18 month of any one of my baby's lives I definitely lose track of keeping things in order. Did I mention that the baby turned 19 months this weekend?  It's time to get things back in order!

I totally missed out on the whole "40 bags in 40 days" phenomenon. The basic premise is that you clean out 40 areas in your home for 40 days during lent. My friend Becca said she was doing it for lent and I thought, that is GENIUS!!!! This is what I need in my life RIGHT NOW! I know that doing this will not only purge all the "junk" out of my life but I really feel like it center me as well.  I can totally see this as a way to connect myself to God.

I missed the boat, like I said above, and didn't get started until the second week of lent.  I'd already given up candy (how childish is it that I'm addicted to candy and felt compelled to give it up for lent---uh!). Anyway, I'm sticking with no candy AND I'm doing 40 bags in 40 days--I'm just doing an extra bag a day here and then and doing something small on Sundays instead of taking the day off.

I saw an episode of Oprah once on organizing.  She said, "The area in your home that has the most chaos is the area of your life where you struggle the most."  She's freakin' brilliant.  My closet and kitchen--pretty organized.  Does this mean I like to cook and like clothes? I think so......We don't have a study right now, we moved our study out to give the baby a room. So our computer and desk are in our formal sitting room.  Our filing cabinet is in a hallway and everything that wouldn't fit is in the baby's closet.  It is a chaos creating situation for me.  Oprah's right.  This is where I'm struggling.

I found this printable on another blog to help me track my progress. Here is what I've done so far (I covered our names):

I'm not even half-way through and I'm feeling so liberated!  I'll give an update (and maybe some photos) later and let you know how I'm doing!