Hasta La Ideas

Set your TiVOs, DVRs, or tune in Monday morning, April 26, to the Rachael Ray Daytime Talk Show. I’m on the episode giving advice on how to organize your closet, just in time for warmer weather.

I filmed my segment for this episode back in January, and I can’t believe I was able to keep it a secret until now while I’ve been waiting for it to air. I had an amazing time on set, and Rachael was incredibly nice to me. Michael Buffer (famous for his “Let’s Get Ready to Rumble” tagline) was on set the same day and I was able to meet his adorable dogs and daughter. Buffer announces the whole episode, and even announced me! In the same episode, RuPaul teaches the audience how to put on fake eyelashes (and, wow, RuPaul is tall — I had no idea), and veterinarian Dr. Ernie Ward shows viewers how to safely trim their pets’ nails. There are even more experts giving advice in the episode, but you’ll have to watch to learn more.

My appearance on the show is a little bittersweet, as it was the last time I wore high heel shoes. After my accident, I may never be able to wear high heels again. I know it’s not the most important thing in the world, and my podiatrist assures me my feet will appreciate the change, but it’s still a little sad. Feel welcome to join me in waving goodbye to my high heels at the end of the segment.

For clarification, I’m on Rachael’s daytime talk show, not her 30-Minute Meals show. Check your local listings for when the show airs in your region. I hope you enjoy the tips!

We have had a wonderful bump in traffic recently, and we thought it might be a good idea to talk about our history and all that we do here at Unclutterer for the benefit of our new readers. Obviously, there is our daily content on the site and in our feed, but the fun doesn’t stop there.

Brief history:

Unclutterer was started in January 2007 by lawyer Jerry Brito. In March of that year, he sold the website to the Dancing Mammoth company, brought on more writers, and Unclutterer went from being a website with posts a few times a month to a thriving site with content every weekday. In November 2007, Jerry left to start the food blog Crispy on the Outside and Erin Doland was named the new editor of the site. Erin has been with Unclutterer since March 2007 and loves her job more than she can properly express with words.

Unclutterer services:

• Unclutterer Forums — Our active online community where you can gather to share your successes, struggles, suggestions, and smiles. My personal favorite section of the forums are the challenges that people set for themselves.
• RSS feed — All of Unclutterer’s content delivered straight to your RSS reader of choice. If you aren’t familiar with RSS, check out our primer to learn more.
• E-mail feed — All of Unclutterer’s content delivered to your e-mail inbox. Unlike the RSS feed, however, this content is usually delayed 24 hours from when it was initially posted to the website.
• RSS feed without the A Year Ago posts — If you do not wish to receive the A Year Ago posts in your RSS feed, you can subscribe to this content feed. You can also learn how to create custom feeds for any website using Yahoo! Pipes.
• Follow us on Twitter @unclutterer — In addition to our daily content from Unclutterer, we also provide information and links that catch our interest over the course of a day.
• Nest Unclutterer — This free service blocks all of those annoying spambots and advertisers that follow you on Twitter.
• Erin’s column on Real Simple magazine’s Simply Stated blog — Every Tuesday and Thursday Erin produces original content for RealSimple.com.
• Keyfiler — Keyfiler is a web-based service that securely stores all of your license information in one place, for easy reference from anywhere in the world. You can also use it to generate customized reports, export your license information to handy formats like Microsoft Excel, and manage passwords for your favorite websites.
• At the Big River — AtTheBigRiver.com allows bloggers to create intuitive, functional, and humane URLs on the fly, without interrupting the flow of your writing to stop and find the “correct” URL.
• FixMyHTML — HTML code can quickly become a depository for useless tags and slower load times. For an easy way to figure out how to clean up that chunk of HTML code that has been giving you a headache, give this service a try.
• Unclutter Your Life in One Week — Erin’s 7-day plan to organize your home, your office, and your life. Available at major retailers. Published November 2009 by Simon and Schuster.
• Unclutter Your Life in One Week PDF worksheets — If you would like PDF copies of all of the worksheets that appear in the book (so that you don’t have to spend time recreating them yourself or write directly in your book), you can purchase them through our site for $2.50.
• Less is More and Simplicity is Revolutionary T-shirts — If you need a shirt, these are great for spreading the simplicity message.
• Unclutterer icon for iPhone and iPod Touch — With this snazzy icon, you can have Unclutterer as a link right on your main desktop.

We hope that you enjoy all of what Unclutterer has to offer!

This afternoon at 2:00 p.m. EST, I’m doing an hour-long live online chat through Canada’s Globe and Mail. You can access the chat when it’s in progress, and I believe you can start submitting questions at 1:55 p.m. The topic of the chat is organizing e-mail, but I expect it also to cover office, home, and life issues.

Anyone in the world can submit questions (please do!) and follow along with the discussion. There is an editor who chooses the questions from those submitted and sends the selected ones to me, and then I type as quickly as I can to enter a response. I’m really looking forward to answering your questions — I expect it to be a lot of fun.

And, if you can’t stay around for the whole hour to watch the chat unfold, you can read the transcript of the chat afterward.

On Monday, I appeared in The Globe and Mail article “Four ways to free yourself from a cluttered inbox.” Check it out for tips to help get your e-mail under control.

As many of you may already know, my wife Erin and I adopted a beautiful baby boy this past summer. Although our son was born in the United States, both of his birth parents were recent immigrants from Haiti.

And so we found ourselves particularly troubled yesterday as we watched cable news coverage of the earthquake outside Port-au-Prince.

Haiti is one of the world’s poorest and least developed countries. It also has the unfortunate distinction of being the only LDC in the Americas. In spite of this, things were improving there. Hopefully yesterday’s events won’t put an end to this hard-earned progress.

There are a number of reputable non-profit organizations currently doing relief work in Haiti. They will surely need our support in the coming days. Please know that we appreciate any support you can provide to these groups.

Reputable Non-Profit Organizations Helping Earthquake Victims in Haiti

• Red Cross International Response Fund
• UNICEF
• Doctors Without Borders
• Partners In Health
• Hope for Haiti

I had a great deal of fun going through all of the 2009 unitaskers for yesterday’s best unitaskers post, so I spent a few hours and did the same with all of the Unclutterer posts. The following are the posts that I loved writing this year. They’re not necessarily the most read or commented on or likely to be your favorites — they’re simply the ones that rang “favorite” with me. Enjoy!

Outfitting a minimalist kitchen:

Making “essentials” lists is a risky endeavor. Obviously, the items I turn to every day aren’t going to be what other people use. It was still a fun experiment and I created my list by answering the question: “If my home were destroyed in a disaster, what 10 items would I replace first?”

Ask Unclutterer: Having it all:

Reader April asked the following question in the comments section of a recent post: “How do you have time for all of this – running a blog, writing a book, all of these musical activities & all the other stuff you seem to do?”

10 uncluttering things to do every day:

8. Get ready for bed an hour before you plan to go to sleep. Doing this means that your dirty clothes are more likely to be returned to a hanger, dropped in the hamper, or put in a mesh bag for dry cleaning, hand washing, or repairing. Also, a set bedtime routine signals your brain that it’s time to relax and prepare for sleep.

Official release: Unclutter Your Life in One Week:

Today is the day Unclutter Your Life in One Week officially goes on sale. It has been a roller-coaster ride, and I am so glad to finally be at this stage in the process. Expanding the Unclutterer message to a new medium is honestly a dream come true. My sincerest desire is that this book will help people discover the benefits of an uncluttered life and inspire them to clear the clutter to pursue what they value most.

Ask Unclutterer: How many hours will a family of four spend on laundry each week?:

Kids seem to generate a lot of clothing — spills, sports practices, uniforms for after-school jobs, indecision about what to wear, etc. If I generate 16 pounds of clothing in a week, I imagine that a middle schooler or high schooler could easily create 14 to 15 pounds of clothing in a week. Multiply that by two and add in two adults, and a family of four probably generates between 60 and 65 pounds of clothing per week. In our washing machine, that would be five to six loads of clothing.

Productivity and organizing insights found in Lean systems:

Even if you don’t implement the full systems, simply knowing about their methods can help to improve the way you do your work. I have definitely gained many helpful tips and tricks studying their processes.

What Unclutterer posts did you count among your favorites this year? Share your list in the comments.