Friday, June 22, 2007

Yard Sale Part II

I've been really disconnected lately on my quest to becoming more organized. We're taking our yard sale leftovers to another venue tomorrow and then they are going up on freecycle or taken to goodwill. I'm just kind of overwhelmed with a walking baby and so many things to do. I'm just trying to keep the dishes clean at this point! Anyway, I will get back on the wagon soon!!

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Fireplace Mantel


Finally a fireplace mantel I can stand to look at.
It's not a secret that I hate our fireplace and wanted
it taken out during the demolition. I lost the battle
because of the extra time it would have taken, but
I still feel it's yucky and out of place. Getting it cleaned
isn't really a priority even though it really needs it
from being charred, but I just couldn't figure out how
to soften that huge rock wall. After unpacking all
sorts of boxes in preparation for the yard sale, I came
accross all of our wall hangings we had in our previous
home. Sadly, I have such a small amount of wall space in
this smaller place, I wasn't sure I'd find a place for
everything. Luckily I was able to use some of the pieces
and I'm really pleased with the way it turned out. It's
a mix of wall art, produce labels (local labels of course!),
a wedding photo, and a Cannery Row photo I took
during a photography class. The Mickey clock is my
subtle Disney splash and the pineapple is a bell that used
to be my Grandma's. Not sure if that begie vase is
staying or not. We'll see. Not pictured is the new fireplace
screen but I am not done with deciding on what's
going in the fireplace. I have some candle holders
for now, but no candles. It's still a work in progress!
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Wednesday, June 13, 2007

He Who Dies With The Most Toys...


... probably had the most cluttered house!

So Joseph's toys have really started to get out of hand especially since his first birthday. This morning I woke up to find them all over the floor. They're usually put away but with my mom visiting, it seems she had them all out, all over.

So I took it as a cue to go through his things and start to weed out the things that were:
-not age appropriate anymore
-stuff in the wrong place (teething rings go in the freezer!)
-parts to bigger toys (like attachment to his tummy time set)
-toys that he has shown no interest in for awhile and I have serious doubts interest will resurface

That's my clutter busting for today... Now onto the real day-to-day grind!

Monday, June 11, 2007

Unmotivated

Do you ever feel so unmotivated that you don't want to do ANYTHING? I'm having one of those days. It's like I came off the weekend and the yard sale. We had to go grocery shopping yesterday and that's a huge chore. So now I'm not wanting to do a thing. I have dinner going in the slow cooker today, I made some banana bread, but I've hit this point where I just want to veg out despite the fact that I'm still surrounded by mini piles and junk. My little guy is taking a good nap but I just want to sit and enjoy the silence!! I don't want to clean today!!

Saturday, June 9, 2007

Yard Sale

Our garage sale is coming to a close as we speak and we've made over $100 and gotten rid of a lot of things. My sister in law is holding another one in a few weeks so we're going to box stuff up and take it over there to see if we can squeeze a few more dollars out of junk. I think I'll probably start putting some more things on freecycle in the meantime. It's been a pretty successful day though in my clutter busting efforts. I am also getting our finances organized. I made a budget on spreadsheet to organize our spending and got further motivated when I saw Oprah's follow-up to the debt diet yesterday on tv.

Slowly but surely!

Monday, June 4, 2007

Inherited Junk

So is it still considered junk if you inherited it from a relative who passed on? In 2003, I learned the harsh reality of pack-ratting and "too much stuff" when I had to help clean out a relative's home after they passed away. I ended up with a ton of boxes. In our other larger home I had room for her dining set, and beautiful formal china set. However, it's all in boxes now and I don't havve the space in my small house for it. My mom doesn't have the space for it either but how can I get rid of something like that?? It doesn't make much sense. It's not even really my taste, but it was okay in my other house because I wouldn't have been able to afford anything for the formal dining area anyway so it worked out well. Too bad we moved!

Fast forward to 2007 and I'm stuck with a lot of her things and boxes of china. In addition there's a dining room table and china cabinet in my garage. I've been spending most of my spare time going through boxes getting everything ready for the big June 9th yard sale. I watched "Clean House" on the Style network last night and got some more inspiration. I made it through every box we had in our garage and seperated the "keeping it" stuff from the "yard sale" stuff. I also sold two items on Craigslist for $25 which felt like a jump start to my sales this Saturday. We still have some more boxes at my dad's house and last night we went to pick some of that stuff up. My goal is to get through it all by this Saturday and it's going to be tough. My little guy is needing a lot of attention right now because he's teething and not feeling well at all.

This weekend should be a success - Not planning to make big, huge, bucks, but planning to get lots of stuff out of our way!!