THIS COUPLE NEEDS HELP!

Believe it or not, I actually hired cleaning ladies this week. However, cleaning was not my primary motivation. Mostly, I hired them to give us balance. Know how I'm always yakkin' about how a great couple has balance, where one's strengths balance the other's weaknesses, and vice versa? Well, for the most part, John and I do a really good job of reining each other in, away from crazy or over-the-edge. There is one area, however, where we share the very same weakness, and that, alas, is our downfall. When it comes to home maintenance, every house needs both an Oscar and a Felix. We, however, both lean a bit more towards the Oscar side when it comes to clutter, which is strange, because I despise clutter. I find it very distracting when I want to focus on a project. But, I just can't seem to keep myself from creating it! And my hubby? Well, he is ever so comfortable with it!

Take this file cabinet for instance:

I haven't seen the top of it in over a year! It sits right next to my desk, which made it a convenient place to stack all the photo boxes, albums, and other materials that I needed for reference when I started writing my other blog, Miss Becky Goes Abroad. So, for about a year, whenever I needed to file something, I'd barely lift the lid with one hand, while holding onto all the photo albums with my elbow...

then try to shoot the papers through the crack before I lost my grip. As you can imagine, the "to be filed" stuff piled up over time. As has the stuff on our dining room table, our coffee table, and pretty much everywhere else -- especially after all these emergency visits to the hospital.

My saving grace is that I also hate wasting money. If I'm going to pay someone to clean my house, I'm going to make dang sure that she has access to every surface that I want dusted, scrubbed or vacuumed! So, if I hire someone to clean, say, twice a month, that means twice a month my hubby and I will be forced to make sure we have a place for everything, and that everything is in its place. Which is why the photos and Christmas cards finally got moved off the file cabinet and over to the bookshelves.

Guess it's time to catch up on some filing, huh?