Best Results Organizing

The other day, Paper Doll was a giant.

Granted, I was attending the birthday party of a two-year-old and was surrounded by tiny humans who couldn’t have cared less about my presence (except when I was holding up the line for birthday cake), but it’s always fun to observe them in their natural habitat. They communicate in their own foreign (as much to one another as to us) dialects, greet one another with hugs or bonks on the head, and toddle off in their own personal planetary rotations. There’s no “Let’s do lunch”, no “I’ll friend you if you’ll follow me”. Perhaps it’s an unrefined sense of object permanence, but toddlers have no need to set in motion future contact; nor do they need to fix their brilliant ideas in permanent form. They really have no need for paper. Not so with giants.

Near the end of the event, one of the grown-up attendees wanted to trade contact information. I offered my card, but she had none of hers with her. Absent any note paper, this lovely woman found the quickest solution — she grabbed a crayon and scribbled her information on a party napkin.

Sure, many people have those cell phone apps that allow them to Bump their phones together to exchange information. And, of course, we normally get through our days using numerous technological solutions that replace tasks we once performed with paper.

But this got me thinking about the situations in which we find ourselves where there isn’t necessarily a technological alternative to paper. There are times when we’re away from our desks, our offices, our notepads, computers and gadgets, or caught with our hands otherwise occupied. There are times when technology can’t come to our aid, and there’s no paper in sight…or sometimes we just want a fun alternative.

Today, we’ve got a few unconventional ways to organize our thoughts and information without benefit of technology or paper.

Waking Up: Remember the Essentials…While You Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Paper Doll gets the best ideas for blog posts while in the shower. Sometimes I use Dale Carnegie’s refined mnemonic Pegging Method for remembering things until I can get toweled off, but I often wish I had a voice-activated recorder or just a better way to take notes in the shower.

Some of my friends with children have been known to use their kids’ washable Crayola Bathtub Crayons  on the shower walls to capture brilliant ideas, but the word on the (Sesame) street is that the crayons tend to melt into nothingness if left in water too long.

Let’s face it, reaching a dripping hand out of the shower to write on toilet paper with an eyeliner pencil isn’t exactly optimum. As an alternative to paper, I have to admit I’m enamored by the idea of the Erasable Shower Note Tablet from eTravelGear:

Use the enclosed waterproof crayons to jot down your To Do items, song lyrics, or even messages for the next person in the shower. The tablet includes a crayon caddy to keep your writing implements handy and affixes to the shower wall with suction cups. (Note, suction cups’ suction success (say that three times fast!) varies by shower wall type (e.g., tile, ceramic, glass, plastic, etc.). If your best ideas strike you just as the hot water hits your scalp, or you’ve ever kicked yourself for letting your moment of inspired genius spiral down the drain along with the Clairol Herbal Essences, this tablet might be your saving grace.

Writing on the mirror with lipstick would probably make you feel like an extra in a horror film (and would ruin a perfectly good lipstick), but various sources report that you can safely use a dry erase marker on glass and mirrors. If your beautiful mind beholds the mathematical answers to the universe while you’re shaving or drying your hair, the dry erase marker offers a nifty one-handed solution. Later on, copy to paper or snap a digital photo, and when you’re ready to move on, make your messages, artwork or equations disappear with a dry erase eraser or paper towel. (Of course, be sure to test any dry erase marker on a tiny, not-so-visible portion of the shower door, window or mirror, and don’t dare try this with antique glass.)

Finally, not so much a paper alternative as an alternative kind of paper, AquaNotes has created a waterproof notepad so durable you can even write on it underwater. Each perforated sheet is 3 1/2″ by 5 1/4″, and the 40-sheet pads are recyclable and printed with soy-based ink. AquaNotes attaches to the shower wall with suction cups.

Plan Your Afternoon During Lunch

Do you ever thirst for better time management when you’re in the middle of a meal?

This nifty 6″ high write-on glass from Made By Humans has a special coating that allows you to write your To Do tasks and other notes with any household pencil. They also have designed a smaller mug version, but it seems you have to contact Made By Humans directly to purchase the mug in lieu of the glass.

On the Run and Having Fun

More than a few people, famous and otherwise, have caught the public eye when solving the “no paper” problem by writing on themselves. If you’re inclined to write on your hand, but wish for a smudge-free alternative, the To-Do Tattoo from Fred & Friends offers a whimsical yet eminently practical solution.

Each package includes a dozen transparent, skin-safe, adhesive “To Do” forms, ready to adhere to your hand (or wherever else you’re likely to need your notes). Just write your reminders with the enclosed washable-ink gel pen, tackle your To Dos and dispose. For the truly forgetful, this isn’t a particular cost-effective solution, and Paper Doll wishes it could go without saying that To-Do Tattoos should not be used in lieu of studying for that geometry quiz.

Family Communication Isn’t Too Cool for School

We tend to think of squeaky chalkboards as the province of the academic world, and there’s very little call to turn your garage or mud room wall into a classroom. However, you can take a page out of your grammar school dcor textbook to find a super paper-free communication alternative for your family.

Pick up some chalkboard paint from your nearest home supply store. Although Crayola’s chalkboard paint has been discontinued, Rustoleum, Krylon, and Benjamin Moore all still manufacture it, and you needn’t settle for Schoolroom Green. Colors come in stony black, rich red and a variety of other fun shades.

Next, pencil-sketch your measurements, use painter’s tape to delineate the borders and paint a small portion of your wall. Once it’s dry, keep a bright supply of art chalk in a plastic bucket so that the whole family can leave reminders and alerts: “Tomorrow is trash day!”, “There’s broken glass in the kitchen!”, “We love you, Daddy!”, “Welcome Back!” and so on.

If you’re not a Do-It-Yourselfer, instead of painting a chalkboard, consider peel-and-stick chalkboard cutouts from Wallies, ranging in size from super-sized for calendars:

to cozier decorator styles:

Wallies also carries various dry erase peel-and-stick removeable/repositionable options.

Leave A Bedtime Reminder

If you and your beloved sleep on separate shifts, you may find yourselves communicating more often by note than in person. A somewhat impractical but quite charming paper alternative is the Note Me Pillow from Veinticuatrodientes.

Simply write your message on the colorful pillowcase with the enclosed pen. (“Honey, please make sure the doors are locked and the lights are out before you go to sleep!”) To erase, just run the pillowcase under cold water — no soap necessary. The pillows come in yellow, red, orange, white and green.

The web site for Veinticuatrodientes, Spanish for “twenty-four teeth”, says, “When you put your biggest smile in your face, the most you can show is twenty four teeth.” Paper Doll assumes one could easily write more smile-inducing messages on these tablets, showers and mirrors, chalkboards and pillows, than mere quotidian To Do lists and household reminders…but this is a family blog, so I’ll leave that to your individual imaginations.