Hello, friends! This is my first contribution to AnnArbor.com, so I thought I’d take this opportunity to tell you a little bit about myself and what you can expect from me here.

I am, first and foremost, a mother of three great kids (all of whom attend Ann Arbor Public Schools) and wife to a wonderful man I met in college, many moons ago. I am also a proud owner of two really large dogs, a noisy parakeet and several African Cichlids.I have lived in the exceptional town of Ann Arbor for 16 years, after growing up in Chicago and doing a 10-year tour of the Northeast.

I am a small business owner and I volunteer--a lot. In my spare time (of which none of us has enough), I love to travel, ski, garden, work out and futz around my house. I would have difficulty choosing between coffee and wine, if I was forced to make a choice. I am trying to become a better cook but I have pretty much given up on knitting.

That’s me, in a nutshell—now, you’re likely wondering what brings me to annarbor.com. An abridged version: for the last 10 years, I have owned a small publishing company, with a partner (who’s a mom, just like me) that makes dayplanners. Yep, time.mine® dayplanners.

So, that does make me a quasi-expert on keeping organized. You’d be amazed by the personal stories I hear when people find out I make dayplanners for a living—sometimes very funny and sometimes very touching. Over the years, I have learned a lot about how people organize their lives!

As a natural outgrowth of my work and life, my posts will focus on three main areas: home organization, life balance and mom-owned businesses.

I have tons of ideas that I think you’ll find helpful and will add to your quality of life. My inspiration comes from this amazing community in which we live and from those energizing customers with whom I have interacted over the years--maybe even a dog, bird, fish, friend or family member, too-- who knows?

Feel free to send me any thoughts or photos that are relevant—say, if you have the most disastrous storage closet ever and you get motivated to clean it out—send me “before” and “after” pictures. If you know of a cool business that fits the bill (must be officially incorporated), let me know about that, too. If you’ve developed a homegrown time-management system, figured out how to better help your kids prioritize schoolwork, found amazing products you can’t be organized without…you get the idea. Let me know.

What we say in our small business world at dotmine group applies here, too! “We love to hear from you!”