December 8-Lorraine will speak to the Bullard Rotary Club in Bullard, Texas (south of Tyler) 6:30-7:30 a.m.

January 10- Messy Desk, Missing Papers- Lorraine will present one of her most popular talks on systems that help manage piles of paper to the Women's League of Canton.

January 14- Get Organized for the New Year- Come hear Lorraine's tips for organizing and decluttering, as well as her favorite products and systems for keeping order. At the Grapevine Public Library at 2:00 p.m.

January 20- Organize Your New Home- Learn techniques to get your most cluttered areas in your home organized. At the Denton Library.

Do you need a fun, practical speaker for your upcoming event? Lorraine has a variety of helpful talks for libraries, moms' groups, businesses, and more. She can tailor the content to the needs of your group, and her presentations are always well-attended. Learn more about her speaking topics by clicking the Need a Speaker tab on her website.

It is not too late to schedule Get Organized! to decorate your home for Christmas. Have you dreamed of a picture-perfect, festive-looking home, but do not know where to begin? Do you need some fresh ideas or just help putting everything on display? Our elves can help! We have a variety of decorating services to get your home ready for an upcoming party or set the stage for a beautiful family Christmas. Plus, we can take everything down later and organize it for storage. 

If you are ready for Get Organized! to help you have a very Merry Christmas, contact us to get started.

Are your kitchen cabinets a mess? You can bring order to them in one afternoon with these helpful ideas:

• Baking pans that are piled on top of each other on a shelf make it hard to get the one you want. Instead, store them on their sides using an expandable pot lid organizer, as pictured. No more stacking and unstacking to get the one you need.
• The space under the sink is often underused. Add an expandable undersink organizer, which can be configured to fit around any plumbing with its moveable shelves and bins. It turns the area below the sink into usable storage.
• The lowest shelf of a cabinet often becomes a black hole of lost items because you have to get down on the floor to see what is there. Make it easier to store and retrieve things by using these sturdy boxes with lids from IKEA. They come in various sizes and can hold cookie cutters, plastic wrap, water bottles, etc. An added bonus is that if you are not using the lid for stacking the boxes, you can use it instead as a glide-out tray on another cabinet shelf, as shown in the picture. Store the electric skillet or other small items on top of the lid and pull it out to get to them. Use your label-maker to label the boxes and lids so you and others in the kitchen can locate what you need instantly.
• Items on high shelves are also hard to get to easily, but you can still make that space usable. Clear handled storage baskets work well at storing groups of like items. The handle makes getting things down from high shelves a much easier task.
• Keep in mind that you work most efficiently in the kitchen when you set the room up as a set of stations: baking, chopping, coffee, serving, for example. Bring all baking tools together at the station where you will bake, all coffee supplies together where you make coffee, and so on so that you can easily reach most of the tools you need for the task at hand. This idea works whether your kitchen is large or small.
• As always, before you begin to organize, purge the cabinets of unnecessary items, sort what remains into similar groups, and then put them in their homes. You will love having an organized kitchen to cook in at Thanksgiving.

When you have a crowd coming to your home for Thanksgiving, you may need extra seating.  IKEA's Terje Folding Chair is sturdy but lightweight, folds for storage, and has a hole on the back for hanging when not in use. It is affordable and comes in black, white, and red.

If you get desperate, ask your neighbor for some extra chairs, use camping chairs, a bathroom vanity chair, or even a step stool, cooler, or stack of pillows for the kids. While some of these options might not be pretty, it will bring the family together for a meal.

If you need a larger table for the big feast, you can get creative without having to break the bank. A plywood board placed over your existing table can increase seating. Also, you can use two sturdy sawhorses in place of the table. Once you put the tablecloth over it, no one will notice the unusual tabletop!

Are you heading away for Thanksgiving?  A little pre-trip organizing can help the busiest travel season of the year.

Pack smartly. Put shoes in the bottom of the bag so they will not slide around and wrinkle clothes. Stretchy knit clothing will also reduce wrinkling. Roll clothing to fit more in the bag. You can even roll together an outfit for a day to make getting dressed easier. Resist the urge to pack for every situation. If you find that you really need something when you are traveling, you can probably purchase it on site. The benefit of just having one carry-on bag is worth it.

If you are flying, be sure to leave for the airport in plenty of time, since running late will just add stress to an already busy day. Traffic jams and airport security lines can mean added aggravation. Send your boarding pass to your phone to save time at the gate. Remember  liquids must be in bottles that are 3.4-ounce or less, packed in a clear zip-top bag. This GoToob three-pack of squeezable bottles features dripless spouts and suction cups that can briefly hold the bottles to shower walls.

If you are traveling with children, anticipate their needs. Bring a few small toys and books, or, in order to travel lightly, you can download games and books to a tablet computer they can use in flight. Remember to bring ear buds, a charger, and a travel battery for recharging along the way. many airports have charging stations also, and some planes have USB ports at each seat. Do not forget to bring their favorite stuffed animal or blanket for comfort away from home.

If you will be leaving a pet at home, find a petsitter at Rover.com, where you can search for sitters in your zip code and read reviews about them.

Make sure you have plenty of gas the night before so you do not have to stop at a gas station on travel day. Avoid delays by using a travel app like Waze to help you monitor traffic and find alternate routes if needed.

Shopping online for Black Friday deals has never been easier. Here are a few tips for effective online shopping:

1. Shop first thing in the morning. Online retailers tend to update their website's prices in the wee hours, so get the best selection by logging on early.

2. Find out what will be on sale weeks before the sales begin. Two sites, GottaDeal.com and BFads.net, collect news of upcoming ads, flyers, and other sale deals for retailers like Walmart, Home Depot, and Macy's, and post them on their website. Both sites allow you to subscribe to their updates to get the latest news in your inbox. Even now, you can view the Black Friday ads of some retailers to begin planning your purchases.

3. Keep an eye on social media. Follow your favorite retailers on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. to get word of special deals, including some that you might not hear about otherwise.

4. Compare prices and features by using a price-comparison site like PriceGrabber.com.

You can see at a glance whether the gift you have your eye on is a good deal or not.

5.  Make a list of what you are looking for. This will keep you focused, help you stay on budget, and keep you from buying things you really do not need.

6. Always be careful when shopping online. Use trusted sites and update your passwords to increase security. Pay with PayPal or a credit card rather than a debit card to reduce your liability.

7. Never put your credit card information on a site that says, "http://". Instead, the beginning of the URL should read, "https://". The "s" means it is a secured website.

Of course you can also begin shopping on Thanksgiving day, but you will still find great prices if you wait for Friday. Use these ideas to get organized before Thanksgiving so you can shop efficiently, get good deals, and have more time to enjoy with the family.

Need a dress for an upcoming holiday event? You
could spend a lot of time and money shopping for something new that you won't need after the big event, or you could save money by renting.

LendingLuxury.com lends designer dresses at a fraction of the cost. Sign up for a free membership, search by size, color, style, cost, designer, and occasion, then get it shipped to you for five days, at no extra charge to or from your home. You do not even have to get it dry cleaned before returning it!