Productivity often comes...

into my life on the heels of disturbing news. And this weekend I received disturbing news. News I am not ready to blog about, and honestly, do not know if I will. I have just finished studying John 14 where Jesus assures His disciples that the peace He gives, He leaves with His own is not like the world's peace; therefore, there is no reason for a troubled heart or fear.

That is the verse I immediately began to meditate on as I was once again grateful to know that the Word of God is sufficient for every need of life. Even and especially in upsetting news.

Anyway, that's all I have to say about that. The productivity burst that it spawned was a card table full of post it notes marking out the categories of the grocery store aisles to help with sorting my coupons. I have been playing the coupon polka for years now with varying degrees of success. I've saved as little as one coupon's value--the one that was crumpled up in the bottom of my purse, left behind accidentally--and I've saved as much as $80 plus.

I bought a coupon sorter file folder thingie at Michael's some months ago in the discount bin for $.50. The price reveals its effectiveness. I have seen some women use binders with plastic dividers or file boxes. I didn't have those options handy, and I wasn't sure what could be scrounged up within the house but eventually came across some old picture albums--the free ones they used to give away with actual 3x5 pictures. Before the digital age of plugging the camera into the computer.

Hoping these would work, I was determined to accomplish something other than stewing on unpleasant news. I went to work on the coupons. Printing, clipping, sorting. Rinse, lather, repeat. Checking weekly ads, writing down prices, entering data into my iTouch. Rinse, lather, repeat.

It was a sudsy effort. But an accomplishment at the end of the day. The coupons are divided into two albums. The first contains the grocery categories, almost 28 of them, in alphabetical order. The coupons are organized by most recent expiration date to latest. The second album contains the shopping lists, a 3x5 index card list of my shortcuts e-coupons, and then each store's coupons. I sorted by three stores: Publix, Kroger and Walgreens.

This week will be the test week of seeing whether productivity borne out of disturbing news was effective. Regardless, I lay my head down tonight with His peace within knowing that His Word has been sufficient to comfort and encourage.