New Year, New Idea

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It's nice to start the New Year with a good idea.

When we first moved into our apartment, my boyfriend's pet project was to paint panels of mat board with chalkboard paint and stick them inside the trim on our cupboard doors with double-sided tape (landlord-approved DIY!).

My pet project, which somehow took me months to realize, was to find us a regular source of local and/or organic food. That turned out to be Mama Earth Organics, which delivers us a box full of organic produce every week. It's not always local, especially in winter, but it's been a good option for us. I love that the food box challenges us to work with food we wouldn't necessarily choose at the grocery store. But since we don't choose it, we don't always remember it's there. And a crisper smeared with soggy decomposing fennel is not a pretty sight.

Enter Erin's Big (and, in hindsight, obvious) Idea for 2014! Keep a running list of the contents of our crisper. On the chalkboards right beside the fridge. Use up a food? Cross it off. Unpack the food box? Add to the list.

No more letting cold air escape while I peer indecisively into the motley paper and plastic bags we've recruited for produce duty. No more sitting on the couch thinking, I should plan dinner. But I don't want to stand up and walk three feet to see what we have. And no wiping fennel gunk off the bottom of the fridge.

That's right, folks. This is an organization tip that promotes laziness. Try it with a magnetic whiteboard on the fridge or just some scrap paper. Or go the awesome route and make a chalkboard.

This idea has only been in the testing stage for 1.5 days, but early results indicate major successes to come. We'll go into mass idea production as soon as we have more data.

My New Year's resolution involves using Pinterest less. In case yours doesn't, here's a pinnable version of this groundbreaking idea:

 I'll be back soonish with the projects that filled the gap between my last post and this one: Christmas gifts that I couldn't post about until they were given. And I might even start using non-iPhone photography again. The New Year is full of possibilities.

Have a happy one!