You'll be shocked at how getting organized just a little will add great joy to you and your family because:

1.   You do 50% less work

2.   You know where everything is

3.   You keep appointments

4.    You’re on time

Merry Christmas! Hope you truly enjoy the magic of this holy day.

This is a delicious, company breakfast dish that's so easy to make ahead you won't have to get up extra early in the morning to fix your Christmas guests' breakfast. So please enjoy this shart cooking video. 

One of my joys in life is to take a different tack on something famous.

With Christmas in just a couple of days, could you use some last-minute, clever gift ideas?

Get a pen and paper, sit down with your favorite beverage and think. Your creativity is one of your special gifts and that super mind of yours just waits for times like this to come to your rescue. Knock and it will answer.

Here are just a few of the last-minute ideas I’ve come up with over the years.

1. Give gifts from your kitchen

Since I love to cook and I make all my salad dressings from scratch, I’ve often given the dry ingredients along with the instructions to add olive oil and vinegar (you can provide those too, but let the recipient shake them together later for a fresher gift). I save glass jars and quart jars are the perfect size for the recipient to add the oil and vinegar to the dry ingredients. You can also use those wine vinegar bottles for the oil and vinegar and put the dry ingredients into one of those cute little jars that sample jellies and honey come in when you have room service at a hotel.

Gifts from your kitchen are always welcomed. See what you can whip up to give. 

 2. Give money

Download Everybody Loves Money from my website for ten fun ways to give cash using stuff you’ve got around the house or from the grocery store.

I bet my friend Ina Scott will put a smile on your face. You'll probably see yourself in her writings.

"Yesterday Glen and I had our first really smooth, Thanksgiving dinner ever,

thanks to the marvels of list-making and doing as much as we could ahead of time. Even so, I cooked and washed dishes all morning long, but it was a peaceful time, and shoot dang, I was fresh out of the shower, dressed, and putting my hair dryer away as my guests rang the doorbell 4 minutes early, not that I was counting
much—okay maybe I was counting, but definitely not obsessing! 

Outside of the improved organization, I had a few breakthroughs that seem minuscule but are actually huge because they represent such a shift in my thinking.

First, as I was getting ready to cook pasta for Mac & Cheese (the meatless option on our Thanksgiving menu); I looked at the pasta and thought maybe it was the wrong shape. Visions of running down to the grocery store for a bag of the “right” shaped article danced in my head, but they were interrupted by a little voice saying, “Don’t doubt yourself. You decided on this pasta and it will be just fine.”  

This lovely Christmas poem was written by Judith Robinson for her Christmas card this year. She gave me permission to share it with you. She also asked me to make this notation: 2015 Judith Robinson (inspired by Rob Brinkley)

Oh those magazines can trip us SHEs (Sidetracked Home Executives) up!

Their glossy pages taunt us and make us want the impossible.

Although this song I wrote and am sharring with you, does exaggerate a bit, it’s very close to what can happen if we’re not careful.

Do you want jewelry for Christmas? If you do, why?

Have you ever thought about it? Why do women like jewelry?

Is it because we need attention? Jewelry can certainly do that. After all, it always tells some kind of story.

When you see a big diamond on a woman’s hand, do you assume she’s rich? When you see a diamond necklace or bracelet on a stranger, do you think it could be fake? When Marilyn Monroe sang Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend, she made us want them to be our friends too, even though they can’t talk or listen like a real friend can. The slogan Diamonds are forever implies that at least they’re loyal and not like a dog that goes off and dies on you.

Humans can be so mean and cruel

and we’ve seen enough of that truth in just the last few weeks.

With that said, humans can also be loving, kind, compassionate and empathetic.

Stories of kindness abound, they just don’t make it on the news like mean and cruel stories do. 

If you’ve been focused on all the latest newsworthy cruelty, take a break and spend some time reading wonderful stories of kindness. The official website for Random Acts of Kindness will fill your head with happy stories of kind people who acted in kind and unselfish ways and changed other people forever. Your creativity will kick in and you’ll reignite the angel in you that loves to be of service to others.

Most Christmas bows you buy at stores are so lame!

DIY and deck your packages with beautiful bows. 

I have a reputation for great Christmas bows and right now I'm going to show you how to make them in this DIY video.

The first one will be the most difficult but after that you'll be able to create an  "oooh"  "ahhhh"  bow in under five minutes.

Here we go! 

Helpless in Fresno

(A true, never before told story)

• Step One: Know that you are in exactly the right place right now.

• Step Two: Know you can have a clean, cozy, peaceful home.

• Step Three: Know that you’re not alone.

• Step Four: Know that when you take a thought, add feeling to it and take action, you can’t fail. 

                                   Here’s one woman’s story:

After a routinely chaotic, scavenger hunt for matching sox, clean underwear, clothes, shoes, coats, books and lunch money, her son, a third grader and her daughter a first grader missed the school bus.

That was pretty much the Brace Family routine. 

For breakfast, Mrs. Brace had served them apple pie and ice cream, telling herself it was healthy and contained all the food groups.

The baby (16 months old) was happily playing in Pico’s (a Doberman, Labrador mix named after the cul-de-sac they lived on) water bowl with the head of one of her sister’s Barbie Dolls. 

You KNOW things can change.

Would you like to save money, but still make happy memories your family will never forget?

Just because money is tight, doesn’t mean your creativity is in a recession. Now’s the time to call on it to kick in and come to your rescue. Here’s something I did one Christmas and it just might give you an idea or two.

This one particular year when I was a single parent and didn’t have very much money to spend on Christmas, I got the idea to fill the living room with balloons to cover up the fact that there weren’t
 many presents under the tree. The idea to make Christmas morning seem more spectacular than it really was cost me a package of 100 multi-colored balloons.

Christmas Eve

After the kids were fast asleep, I began my Christmas Eve blow-up. I blew until I’d get dizzy, take a break, get some air and blow some more. The room began to look very festive and I was quite pleased that my idea was going to work! However, halfway into the project, I made the dreadful mistake of letting Suki (our big white with black dots cat) in for the night.

Suki was a year old and had never seen balloons before. Much to my surprise when he came into the living room, he was fascinated by their floating action. He ran at a cluster of the hollow balls and the air from his rush sent them bobbing across the carpet like a flock of fat, flying pigs.

Don’t forget about yourself during this busy holiday season.

I hope you watch this short video from me telling you to get your rest.

It’s truly the best gift you can give for yourself and everyone who has to live with you.

Every year as I'm getting organized for Christmas, I start looking for the Christmas letter from the mouse family that lives in our house. Mrs. Cheddar (her name is Mozzarella) is the one who writes it and I’m sure she’s disorganized because I usually receive it in February. I’m always amazed that she finds the time to write at all, considering how busy she is with all those kids. 

Well, the letter came today and as usual I love sharing it with everybody (with her permission of course). 

Merry Christmas

Dear Friends,

Merry Christmas from Washington State! We hope you all had a great year! As most of you know we live in Terry and Pam’s house. Last year I told about living in their piano (until Pam discovered she couldn’t play the one and only Christmas Carole she knows, because we built our nest on some of the keys and when she hit them the notes didn’t play and of course we were busted!