Lost in Translation

I have several goals for this home assignment year that have to do with organization. So far I've been doing well at improving. I thought that I'd mention two tools that I think are helpful:

1) You Need A Budget (YNAB): I bought the Excel version of this software about two months ago. So far it's been working wonders on our budgeting. The software is simple. Each month you allocate all of your money to different categories and then track your spending. To make the budget work you need to spend last month's income, so you need to have a buffer of one month's pay. This tactic makes living off of a variable income more manageable. I've never stuck to a budget very well before, but we're doing great so far. The only problem will be dealing with two currencies in Colombia... I guess we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

2) Getting Things Done by David Allen: This book is great! It's teaching me how to organize my life into a coherent system so that I don't lose things and waste so much time. My problem before was that I had systems for some things but not for everything. This book teaches you to manage the "stuff" that comes into your life in one system.