Tailgating Essentials to Start this Football Season Off Right

It’s the sweltering dog days of summer when cicadas sing lullabies and we watch the weather channel like crows watch the hen house, but we are excited because the new year is starting.  For us in the south, our new year starts on August 1st. Come August 1st, families start kissing the lazy days of summer goodbye as they become mindful of bedtime routines and getting children back on school sleep schedules.  Everything feels new at this time of year more so than January 1st ever could.

 The children are starting a new grade in school with new teachers and classmates. Many of our friends have moved into new homes over the summer break just to be ready for the start of the new year. And nothing is more refreshing than a new football schedule. Past losses are wiped free and anything is possible. There is a powerful feeling of hope at this time of year. It’s contagious and this is our South.

“College football is not like religion, it’s more important than that.”

-      Unknown

 We are not sure who coined that phrase, but it certainly goes a long way in describing how southerners feel about football. We absolutely love our football! Perhaps it’s the spirit of competition or the need to belong to something greater than ourselves, regardless the reason football is king in the South. From Friday night lights to college tailgating and NFL teams, we love it all.

 If there is anything to know about football in the South it’s that tailgating is serious business steeped in long traditions that vary by school. Whether you are at The Grove at Ole Miss or sailgating with the VOLS Navy on the Tennessee River before a game you are sure to discover the regional flavors that make these traditions so special.

To prepare for the start of this football season…

Here are some tailgating essentials:

• A perfect outfit in your team’s colors!

• A clear purse

• Sunglasses

• Sunscreen

• Bug Spray

• A hat

• Tent

• Folding chairs

• Folding table

• A wagon- to haul the goods if you are walking around

• An ice chest filled with your favorite beverages and lots of water because it’s HOT!

• Ice chest with (already prepared)food to grill.

• Bottle opener/Corkscrew

• Coozies

• Snacks

• Battery powered fan

• Hand wipes

• Hand sanitizer

• Small first aid kit

• Phone chargers

• Small bag for trash

• Tailgate grill (Fire extinguisher)

• Propane or charcoal

• Utensils/BBQ tools

• Paper goods (Plates, napkins, paper towels, cups)

• Speakers or entertainment system

• Games

• Extension cords

• Décor-flags, rugs, pom-poms or anything else needed to make your tailgate look like home!

• YOUR TICKETS!!

To pack an ice chest:

• Stack bottles and cans at the bottom of the ice chest.

• Pour fresh ice over cans and bottles

• Put tailgating food on top of ice in air tight containers

•  Large plastic tubs are great to store the non-perishable items throughout the year. Be sure to restock before putting them away so they are ready to go for the next home game.

Game day is almost here!  Check our Facebook and Instagram pages for pictures of our tailgating adventures and please share your tailgate pictures with us! 

 What would you add to this list?  Let us know!

And last but not least…Geaux Tigers and Geaux Cajuns!

There is Always Time for a Party in the South

And to close out our guest blogger series, Amber is talking about another favorite topic of ours, PARTIES!

Living in Taiwan has really been eye-opening. Particularly about how southerners truly do focus their lives around their homes and entertaining in their homes. In the south we love to entertain in our homes. However, in Taiwan it is customary to invite people out to a restaurant. The person who invites typically pays for the meal. This is largely due to the fact that many people live in apartments.

This has been a huge adjustment for my husband and I as we really love to entertain in our home. In the past when we purchased a home, one of the main features we considered is how well the house will work for entertaining.

I come from a really large family that celebrates everything together.  All of the parties throughout all of the years and all of the expected parties to come have contributed to my extensive collection of serving wear. Plates, bowls, wine buckets, candle holders, cake plates, you name it. I have all the holidays covered. Christmas, Mardi Gras, Valentine’s Day, St Patrick’s Day, Easter, Derby, Summer parties, fiestas and so many other theme events contribute to these items I use once a year.

Years ago, I learned to purchase mostly white serving wear so I am able to use my fundamental pieces throughout all the seasons but let’s be real, even with these root pieces my collection continues to grow yearly.

The real challenge of owning all of these items is in how to store them. It’s a struggle because there are so many different shapes and sizes. Many pieces are downright bulky and hard to organize. They are sparsely used and take up significant space but bring such joy.

In my last home, I had a wonderful area under my staircase to store these items. Unless there is a designated place in my new home when I return to the states, I will definitely need the assistance of a professional organizer to help me in this area.

Sometimes knowing what to do isn’t enough. Sometimes we need a little help with the things we are really good at doing.

There are reasons superheroes have sidekicks. Sometimes we just can’t tackle the world alone and that is ok. So even if organizing is your superpower there will be times and areas where you will struggle and can benefit from some help. These are the times to consider the value of hiring someone to help bring peace to your family. Life is easier when everything has a place. Find that peaceful easy feeling by hiring a professional organizer.

Holiday Time

Amber is back and talking about one of our personal favorite organizing topics!

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Do your organizing superpowers leave you on January 6th as quickly as Santa passing on his sleigh Christmas morning?

We are so eager to put out our Christmas decorations. The Thanksgiving turkey has barely cooled when many of us start displaying every Santa we own. We decorate beautiful trees with ornaments we’ve collected over the years. We adorn our mantles and doors with garland and wreaths. We light candles to make our home smell like gingerbread and Christmas trees. We shop for the perfect gifts then wrap them in beautiful paper with coordinating bows. Some of us go so far as to coordinate the wrapping paper and bows with our home décor. We plan. Oh, how we plan and it brings us such joy! We love everything about this holiday…

Until the beginning of January when all that planning and care goes straight out of the window!

Insert images of moving into your home here! Boxes, attics, yes, images of moving can quickly cloud our organizational sensibilities. Just get it put away, right? The holidays are exhausting and a new year is upon us. It’s time to move on.

Most of us are guilty of getting our boxes out of the attic and literally filling them with whatever fits into whichever box. We put things in spare shopping bags or leftover gift bags and haphazardly haul it all back into the attic vowing to reorganize everything “when we have time” so next year will be the first year of blissful holiday organization. It will be another piece of the holiday magic. Toy soldiers lined up waiting to be displayed.

The problem is we never find time to haul that stuff back down from the attic. The cute red and green containers we dream about are gone from the stores along with the holiday decorations and once again we say “next year”. “Next year” we are greeted with a hurricane of mismatched, unorganized boxes, crumpled bows, broken ornaments, etc. Wouldn’t it be great to schedule time after the Christmas rush to have a professional organizer come in and help?

A professional organizer can help you get your holiday decorations organized into the proper containers and label everything. A professional can help you create a system to keep track of what you own and what areas you might wish to enhance so when the new decorations arrive in the stores you won’t be tempted to make that impulsive buy and will actually purchase the items you need.

This is the gift I wish to receive!

Get a hard start on your gift giving this year and give the gift of a professional organizer to your loved ones! They’ll be grateful you did!

Things that Live in the Attic

Let’s discuss one of the most dreaded spaces in even the most organized person’s home. The attic…where things go to die in the Louisiana heat. When we moved into our last house, we promised ourselves we would only use our attic for holiday decorations because we have a ton. Name a season and I could probably compete with Hobby Lobby.

I absolutely love changing the décor in my house for each holiday or season. With that you need a lot of space, a lot of different size odd shaped boxes, a lot of labeling and a very nice spouse or friend willing to climb into the attic to help you haul it all down.

The attic is an area that can quickly slip into disarray because it is for the most part out of site and easily out of mind. It can become the “incase we need it” spot. The spot where we hide things.  The spot we store the stuff our kids will surely want as they get older.

When we moved, we realized we didn’t want or need 99% of things in our attic (decorations excluded). It was organized but it was organized junk.

Some people call this organized hoarding. This is a time when a professional organizer can help even the most organized person because once again the attic is an emotional tomb. If we put it in the attic there is a pretty good chance, we are tied to it emotionally.

Perhaps we want to keep the items presently stored in our attic but we have realized these items are not being stored properly and are ruining in this non-climate-controlled environment. This is when a professional organizer can help you visualize your spaces in a more efficient manner helping you find a better alternative storage location for these perishable items you hold so dearly.

The latest statistics show that there are 52,000 storage unit facilities across America.

What on earth is being stored in all of these units? These storage units far exceeded the amount of McDonalds in 2014.  Think about this a second. Don’t you feel like McDonalds are everywhere?

Now granted there is a time and a place for utilizing a storage unit. The average storage unit cost 1200 dollars a year. For this reason, we need to make sure we are storing things that actually hold the value of what we are paying to store them.

Try thinking about your attic space as if you were being charged. Would you pay for the things in the attic to be stored? If not it’s time to have someone help you sort through your things and decide what you should keep and ditch. Oh, and if you have a storage unit, they can help with that too! Even clutter we don’t see daily has a cost.

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Renovations

A couple of weeks ago we talked about why you need a professional organizer if you’re moving, but today we’re gonna talk about something that is just as stressful. Renovations.

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Perhaps you aren’t moving to a new location. Maybe you are renovating your current space. Many of us know families who had to rebuild after the floods in Baton Rouge and a year later in Houston. What an overwhelming experience! Martha-Carol and Lisa both flooded and know first-hand the trials and tribulations associated with these types of events.

Other renovations are not as involved as rebuilding an entire house or the first floor of a home but even renovating one room can be stressful. Regardless of the scope of your project, renovations are exhausting.

Example 1:

Your kitchen has lost its glam and function. You don’t know where to start but something must be done. Before heading to a kitchen show room, it would be wise to consider consulting a professional organizer. This professional can potentially save you hundreds if not thousands of dollars by helping you understand what is and most importantly is not working for your situation. A professional organizer can offer suggestions that you can then take to the kitchen show room to assist with your space planning.

Example 2:

You have done all the planning involved for your renovation and it is now time for the work to begin but before that can happen you need to empty the space and you do not have time to pack up. Before you start throwing items into an empty box think about hiring a professional organizer to pack your space. This professional will establish a plan that will make unpacking a pleasant and productive experience. You might even find you don’t need as much space as you initially thought to store your items as they can help you purge the unwanted items before the renovation even begins.

Example 3:

You have saved money and spent time collecting ideas for your renovation, you picked out new finishes and appliances, dealt with your contractor and subcontractors, eaten out for a month and now it is complete. It is everything you have dreamt it to be and you are too tired to even think about moving back into the space or where to put your things. You just want to prepare a homecooked meal for your family. This is a great example of when an organized person can feel unorganized. Much like moving, you long for normal and are too worn out to achieve it effectively. A professional organizer can help you plan your space making sure it is organized in the most functional way.

Have we convinced you of our organizational super powers yet?! Give us a ring for a consultation!