Get Organized
In Action
You can act like you don’t need want one.
Chad did and now look how well his has turned out.
Few things make me prouder than all of this.
The Amys
That’s what I feel like I need right about now. A whole pack of “me’s” to organize the crap-ola in our casa. Side note: Have you guys seen that show? Somehow I just stumbled upon this little series set in my home state and about this woman who is a super-organizer and calls her pack of organizing lady workers by her own name. Honestly, I haven’t decided what I officially think about it all yet.
Anyhoo. The reason for all this discussion is the horrible state of all of our closets. For today we’ll start with the office closet which is looking like so:
It’s full of all the coats the Texan rarely wears, extra bedroom carpet, lots of golf balls, equipment chargers and t-o-n-s of papers. Paper, paper and more paper. This weekend was spent tackling just a small portion of that paper as part of what is now being called Junkapalooza 2012.
My weapon of choice is simply a stack method. Sort everything out into like piles, include piles for paper to be recycled and papers to be shredded.
Following all of this a trip to Office Depot yielded me two file storage boxes for only $7.00 each.
As you can see, organization is an interesting concept to Lucy. But we’re getting pretty comfortable with the idea, especially since an hour or two took our living room floor from this:
To this:
The closet doesn’t really look any different since this was only one nasty box uncluttered. But we’re getting there.
In other weekend news, our time was spent hibernating from the cold and doing the following:
- meeting a new client to discuss pillows and a custom dog bed
- eating an entire box of mini Fruit Roll-Ups
- figuring out how to watch cable tv on the iPad
- ordering Mindy Kaling’s book (get one here) and getting really impatient for it to arrive
- threatening to bathe the dogs but never following through – not sure who is really punished by all of that
- watching the Ninja Warrior marathon on G4. Sucks. You. In.
- sending 46,879 unsuccessful emails to book a Memorial Day weekend beach house. rich friends please help.
And some of us just did this which totally works too.
What Does This Scene Need?
A tray of course! Thanks for asking.
As you can see, I love containers. Chad’s new tray system is working almost as well as my candy dish-turned jewelry box system.
He of course isn’t the only one in need a good tray. Mine is just next to the bed.
This one is just a melamine plate from Tar-jay that cost about $2.00. I just really liked the pop of the blue pattern and plastic durability. You wouldn’t even realize it’s plastic until you pick it up.
It basically just collects my earrings and hair clips – things that I forget are in my head until I try to fall asleep, and something pokes into my brain.
A Desk for Weekends
Forget the things that I said yesterday about my new blue porcelain lamp not working on the guest bedroom desk. I take it all back.
Even as I typed that post I wondered, why would I say that the only place I need a lamp is on this desk – and that I bought it even though it didn’t “match.” Well, things don’t always “match” in my world. But somehow a bunch of clippings and a stack of magazines ties this baby in pretty well. It’s like I try to tell the hubs, if nothing matches then it all matches.
Who needs things to match anyways?
The rattan jar used to be available in our shop, but no more because it’s my new ribbon holder. That little Chinese tea tin came from Goodwill for 59 cents. It holds my price tags now. The zig zag tray and tortoise glass of course are also available in the shop. We have lots more so hop to it.
With so much going on, you suddenly don’t notice the contrast of the blue in the lamp versus the desk. The extra light for sewing is definitely a plus too. Everybody wins.
Where is your crafting/sewing/blogging happy place?
Creative Juices
They’re bound to flow when you’ve got yourself a four foot wide inspiration board to stare at all evening.
Sure, it’s a little empty for now, but me has a big pile of magazines and catalogs that I have yet to chop up. Soon it shall be spilling over with tear sheets and fabric swatches. Can’t wait.
Want to make your own?
Step One: Buy a quarter inch thick 2×4 foot board from the home improvement store. Ours came from Home Depot and cost about five bucks and was pre-cut. Zero effort.
Step Two: Cover the board with one yard of fabric. We used a nice neutral linen fabric on clearance and wrapped the board, stapling the excess behind the board. It’s going to hang on the wall so it doesn’t have to be pretty.
Step Three: Choose a ribbon and stretch it diagonally across the board in the pattern you see here:
We used a thin grosgrain ribbon that costs a dollar a roll. We needed three rolls, and used a junk mail envelope to space our rows.
Step Four: Use nailheads to secure the places where the ribbons cross.
Step Five: Add brackets to the back of the board for easy wall mounting.
Step Six: Get to cutting and collecting – and get inspired.
We’ll keep you up to date on how ours comes along – well mine, I won’t pretend Chad uses a ribbon inspiration board to collect his magazine pages.
Had you guys forgotten that we were working on that second bedroom slash Amy office? I know we had. I think the last time we visited this room on the ol’ blog was when we showed you guys the glass desk top, new paint job on the desk and our new favorite pillows.
We’ll be back soon with more pictures and the plan for this room. We’ve got a new little book to help keep us on track and a giveaway to go with it – all next week!
In the meantime in between time check out other ideas for harnessing your design inspiration here. See how we painted that desk teal right here.
Cleanin’ Out Our Closets
For some reason cleaning out our kitchen pantry is such a rare occurence around here that when it does occur it instantly becomes blog-worthy. Does this just means that our blog is really mundane and boring? That’s a rhetorical question, by the way.
The last time we cleaned out the pantry was last summer. We were sure to document the entire process right here. Here’s an old pic of how it all looked freshly painted and organized. Lots of beer, cereal, Goldfish and chips.
We didn’t think to snap a before picture of our pantry this time around until after we saw how empty the finished project was.
Here is the progress made… in the floor. Lots of cereal boxes to be recycled. You’ll remember why right here.
And here is our 2nd Annual Clean Pantry Photo.
Which, looking at the comparison myself now, isn’t that empty after all and is in fact more full than our first round of cleaning.
What you can’t really tell is that all the items that are left in are pantry are now beer and baking supplies. Seriously. We could bake some cookies, microwave some oatmeal and pop some Boy Scout popcorn. And drink beer of course. You might notice though that there were two cases of beer in the closet last year and now there are only two.
If you’re extra curious, the cases of beer aren’t necessary because we really drink that much. They are necessary because despite what the boxes say they are filled with Chad’s favorite beer from Texas like Fireman #4 and Saint Arnold’s. He can’t get it here so he requires that all family and friends who come visit bring him beer in order to gain admission into the house. It has worked out well for him.
So it looks like we’re off to the grocery store but in the meantime we can’t stop looking at those clean shelves and that full recycling bin. We know, it’s probably in the eye of the beholder…
And just for fun and to break the boredom you’re inevitably experiencing right now after reading 365 words about a clean closet (if you’re even still reading) we give you a music video.
Chosen by Chad Whited. Yes.
He doesn’t physically type many a blog post but he contributes to almost every one. This is his contribution after being asked, “What’s the best video ever? I want to add a video to the end of this post, otherwise it’s going to be pretty not interesting.”
Answer: “November Rain. Boom.”
So here you go. Boom.
My favorite part is of course Stephanie Seymour’s 8o’s-tastic and slightly inappropriate bridal gown.
P.S. After writing this post out, Chad decided that November Rain may in fact be too good to be used as a semi-joke on the blog . I forbid any changes. We fly by the seat of our pants around here. Feel free to watch it again. Nothing’s too good for you. It was a real argument on the couch last night. No lie.
What have you guys been doing lately? Any closets getting cleaned out? Or Boy Scout popcorn being consumed? Or really strong feelings about Guns N’ Roses videos?
