Meghan's Candy Inventory {Flashback 2011}

So since I have a lot of catching up to do, I just might go back and try and capture some things that I missed in 2011. And then again, this just might be the only post that I do on somethings I missed in 2011, really only time will tell, it's only the 3rd and I've still got high hopes! And for the record there will be no rhyme or reason to my posts, because remember this year is all about "Simplifying", and the old me would have to get it all organized and in chronological order, preferably on an excel worksheet, before I posted anything.

This goes back to November, the day after Halloween. First you have to understand the constant battle, and I mean CONSTANT battle I have with my daughter about keeping things picked up. And while I can be completely OCD with organizing I do not hold her to that level. I just need her to put her things away after she uses them, put her clothes away or in the hamper when she takes them off, basically just pick up after herself. But for some reason it just doesn't happen. And I'm at my wits end trying to figure out how to get it through the cute little head of hers.

I help her get her room cleaned up and tell her that THIS is what it needs to look like every night before she goes to bed, by the next night, it's a train wreck. I find clothes shoved under her bed, at the bottom of her bed under her sheets and anything she takes out of her closet, even just to look at ends up in the dirty clothes. I just can't seem to get it through her head to put things back where you found them when you are done with them. Everything has a place, everything in it's place! One of my favorite sayings.

I asked her to clean out her very out of control back pack, I come back a few minutes later and this is what I find ~


seriously, I don't know where I went wrong with this child!! But, this same child will find out of place items in a store and run and put those things back where they belong, she has been doing this since she was 2 years old!

So back to my story. There was no school the day after Halloween, so she went with candy in tow to Mimi's house. When I dropped her off I was telling Mimi about how we had spent some time getting her room picked up and organized over the weekend. Again, telling her my sad tales about how Meghan can't keep anything clean.

A little while later I get a text from Mimi stating that Meghan has some organizing genes in there somewhere because she was taking an inventory of all of her Halloween candy and writing it down. I sort of laughed and responded back, to bad she didn't know how to sort it in excel!! Mimi then sent me a photo of the inventory list and at that moment it all became so clear to me ~

Her brain thinks very differently than mine! I looked at that picture and just started laughing. While I'm a very straight, lined up, in order all nice and pretty kinda person, she is one big circle scattered, no rhyme or reason kinda girl. This is the reason that we don't see eye to eye on how our stuff should be kept. I need the organization in order to be productive and apparently she does not, although you know this will be a constant battle between us. But I do try and keep things in perspective and realize that organization is not as important to her as it is to me, and she is only 8 years old, but, somewhere in the middle we can hopefully find some happy ground where we can both live.