5 Sites That Fuel my List Obsession

I'll be the first to admit that I have slight compulsive tendencies. But not in a bad way! I just like to be organized. I mean, I'm not freakishly tidy and obsessive about organization - my bedroom is in a constant state of healthy chaos, and I very rarely make my bed.

But I love lists. I just love organizing things, putting them in order. My bookshelf is, to me, perfectly organized, but to others looks random. I suppose it does look kind of random, but I assure you, my bookshelf is organized loosely by chronology, size, color and genre.

So I enjoy nothing more on the internet than seeing things organized into lists. This is my list of lists, if you will, organized organization. Three of the websites I have an account with, and the other two I simply enjoy perusing.

1. Wists

With wists, you can build a wishlist using items from the entire internet! They don't even have to be for sale, really; anywhere you find a picture to your liking you can add it to your wist. You can tag the items, too, to organize them. I have tags like "inspiration" "nautical" and "literary" as well as tags to organize everything into different types of clothing, colors, etc. You can also look at what everyone else has on their wists and if you like something, copy it onto your own list. And you can put a widget onto your blog so that everyone can see what you like!

And here's a link to my wist!

2. 43 Things

At 43 Things, you keep a list of your life goals. Here's mine! Why 43 Things? Their philosophy is that "43 is the right number of things for a busy person to try to do. Why not more? It's too much. Why not less? You can do less, but it's still called 43 Things."

So at its core, 43 Things is a list of things you're trying to do with your life. You can rank them in order of importance, and add entries about your progress. After you finish one of your goals, you can write a "how I did it" entry to help others. The best part of the website, though, is cheers. Cheers are just little ways of supporting other people. You think it's awesome that this girl is trying to learn yoga? Give her a cheer! And it's so fulfilling when you get cheers! It's easy to let something you want fall by the wayside, and cheers just make you feel better about yourself.

3. Listography

I live and breathe Listography. While on 43 Things I have that I want to watch imdb's top 250 movies, on Listography I have the whole list written out that I can edit to my heart's content, crossing off items as I go. I have TONS of to-do lists, but I must admit, many people are much more creative with their listographies. You can have lists of smells that remind you of your grandfather, movies you cried while watching, hairstyles you want to try, anything! And if you can't think of a list you want to write, the website can generate a list topic for you! I generated a couple just now, just to see what it'd come up with and I got "what I'd do with a million dollars," "questions I have for the universe" and "interesting wikipedia reads." This is one of my absolute favorite websites! Here're my lists.

4. Listology

The only reason I don't have an account here is that it's too much like Listography. I do stop by from time to time, though, to see what other people have on their lists and maybe inspire some lists of my own.

5. Listal

Listal is another website I like to look at. The lists here are mostly pop culture in nature. It's great if you're looking for something like Best Science Fiction books of the 2000s or Top 20 Foreign Films. There are also some odder lists, like one I saw once with celebrities with cats. The best thing by far about Listal is that all of the lists are picture lists. That makes it really easy to relate to, in my opinion.

So. If you weren't obsessed with lists before you read this, I'll bet you are now! They're great! Do any of you use these websites, or ones like them?

Go forth and list, my friends!

PS. Oh, and I almost forgot! Enter my giveaway! Only one person has entered so far, so if no one else enters by tomorrow night, it's going to her!

Heck Yes, Anthropologie!: Ruffles

Ruffles might just be my favorite thing. Hanging off the edge of a garment, sometimes just tacked on to some fabric at random, they might be an afterthought. But in my opinion, something beautiful can always be made beautiful-er by adding ruffles.

Ruffles add attitude, oomph, grace. A mob of ruffles, scrambling every which way. Stiff ruffles, lined up in a military procession One shy lonely ruffle, curling around and disappearing in itself. An adventurous ruffle, blazing a trail across a vast plain of cloth.

So you can imagine my excitement when on the Anthropologie home page, there's a button promising to let me "see the unexpected side of ruffles." As always, Anthropologie does not disappoint. Or, it disappoints only in only one way: Their beautiful clothes are way, WAY too expensive for the likes of myself. Sad face.