How Do You Keep Organized? (How to Have a Successful Blog)

Today's post is centered around the idea of organization.

I've touched on this two other times - both as part of my not-at-all regular series "How to Have a Successful Blog."

The first time I talked about organization was back in October of 2010.  In that post, I tried to come up with ways of categorizing what type of organizer a person might be.

Then, in May of last year, I revisited organization.  In that post, I broke down the different areas of organization and had people categorize themselves.  It was an interesting experiment that generated a bit of interest, and quite a few comments (for my blog anyhow).

That leads us to today's post on organization.  The idea was born out of my own observation of my desk as it currently looks.

Yikes!

I'm not sure what all you can make out from the photo, but let's go through it together, shall we?

Looking left to right (or bottom of the photo to the top), we begin with the fully opened box of 1999 Fleer Ultra.  I busted this box awhile ago on the blog - and since then it's sat on my desk.  The cards are sorted inside which is something, but I haven't had the energy (or motivation) to actually find a binder and nine-pocket pages to properly store the set.  Plus, I'm still missing a bunch of cards from the set which is a bummer.

Next, you might be able to see a small stack of cards with a Fleer Ultra Gold Medallion card of Hideo Nomo on top.  That particular stack is all the inserts (plus duplicates) from the box that I want to use as trade bait.  Some of it will probably end up in a Trade Stack at some point - but the rest needs to be scanned and then posted on one of my For Trade posts.

Near the top of my desk you'll find the first holiday box that I opened on the blog - the 20 pack repack box. I've traded a few cards from the box already but the remaining cards are doing nothing except sitting there.  That's another project I have yet to find the ambition to undertake.

Moving past the scraps of paper with various notes to myself on them, you'll find the stack of Pacific Aurora that I've opened up so far (fully sorted).  The top part of that stack is the duplicates thus far.

Continuing past my laptop you'll find three more stacks of cards - mostly duplicates.  At the far end of the desk is an origami box holding some of my extra LEGO minifigures that I have to figure out what to do with. Finally, at the bottom of the desk you'll see the partially opened box of Pacific Aurora - I'll probably be ripping more packs out of the box as the week progresses.

As you can see, I'm a bona fide disaster right now!  Luckily, my set collections aren't quite so bad - I showed the photo of a few of my binders the other day.

I posted a bunch of 2013 Blog Resolutions at the beginning of the year - but I think I have to add to my list.  My newest addition to the list is going to have two parts:
1.  Fully organize all the cards (and LEGOs) on (and in) my desk.
2.  Get all my sets in binder pages.

Perhaps once I reach the level of organization that I strive for I'll be able to more fully devote my time and energy into making this blog respectable (either that or acquire more LEGO sets, whichever).