 |
Paula
Monahan
Publisher |
Greetings, Journal Readers.
The holidays certainly
came and went in a big hurry this year. Or so it seemed. In
my younger years it seemed as though the Christmas holidays
could never come quick enough for my cousins and me. The
holidays signified two things for us: getting presents and
having no school for two weeks due to the holiday break. What
care free those times were! As youngsters, we only worried
about deciding which present to play with the most and having
to go back to school at the end of the holiday break. For
us, taking down the Christmas decorations, restoring the ornaments
back to their proper boxes and then cleaning up all those
pine needles were chores for the grown-ups.
Now, several, several
years later, I am one of those grown-ups responsible for putting
up and taking down all of those decorations, cleaning up the
pine needles and organizing all the boxes and wrapping paper
my children discarded from opened toy presents. The day after
Christmas, I decided to get a jumpstart on my 2004 New Year's
resolution and fulfill it early. I decided to take professional
organizer, Cyndy Ratcliffe's advice on getting all my holiday
decorations organized into stackable clear plastic bins. This
turned out to be easier than I thought. After making a trip
to the local variety store to purchase the containers, I consolidated
all of my decorations into several neat see-through boxes
which will make decorating so much easier for the holidays
next year.
What started out as
a plan to only organize my decorations, eventually became
an obsession to get the rest of my house organized. Two more
trips to the local variety store ensued. Ten more clear plastic
bins made it through the checkout aisle. Over the course of
the following week, my husband and I went through most everything
from boxes in the attic to the clothes in our closets to consolidate
and discard what we no longer need. I must admit, though,
it was hard discarding size eight clothes from my own closet.
But the realization that too many years had passed since I
could wear a size eight gave me the courage to pass on those
items to someone else.
Having already met my
New Year's resolution of becoming more organized, I can begin
to focus on the most popular New Year's resolution made by
so many people: getting in shape. This resolution will not
be so easy to meet AND to keep. But with a few pointers from
this month's cover woman, Angela Ursprung, the Body Sculptress,
I can put my goal of getting in shape to action. Stay tuned...
I'll keep you posted on that one!
May peace and happiness
be with you,
Paula Monahan
|
A
resident
of
Raleigh,
North
Carolina,
Paula
Monahan
is
a
past
President
of
the
American
Marketing
Association,
Triangle
Chapter.
With
over
fifteen
years
of
experience
in
sales
and
marketing,
Paula
is
putting
all
of
her
learned
skills
and
talents
to
good
use
in
this
online
publication
for
women.
As
a
way
of
reaching
out
and
connecting
with
women
from
a
variety
of
backgrounds,
her
goal
is
to
create
a
networked
community
of
online
women
readers
who
value
inspiring,
insightful
and
empowering
content.
An
award winning journalist, Linda Ray is also an editor. In addition to
editing the Journal, Linda runs a freelance editing and writing business.
She will gently massage, or completely rewrite, your material—as
you wish. No job is too small for her—and no job too big, yet. Her
freelance work includes interviews, research and writing for business
magazines, ghost writing, Web page editing, and writing and editing marketing
material.