Decluttering the Mud Room

Take a deep breath, because this looks pretty bad! Are you ready for what I am currently tackling? I would like to finish it by the Sunday, but it is a busy week, so we'll see. This is a lot of work, and there is one cubby full of junk for each family member. I may just take everything out, put it in a box (one for each member) and let them deal with the contents.

See ya next week for the results!

A Clean Office

I did it! I met my deadline of finishing the Oval Office by Sunday! Whew! This first venture into "joint" cleaning and organizing has been rewarding and frustrating! I have decided that I am Lucy to my friend's Ethel; she agreed to go along with some of my wacky ideas!! There were moments that I questioned myself, but ultimately I am very glad I plowed through frustration and the likes thereof.

The results, you ask:

The previously cluttered floor in front of the shelves, now barren!

The bookshelf is organized, neat, and clean! I am not sure about the odd grouping of plants on the top - when we put these shelves in last year I envisioned plants on the top, but just never got around to putting any up there. And, believe it or not, I really do not have many plants in this house. I think I was too busy nurturing young kids, and had no energy left for the plants. I am starting to feel I need more green in the house, so I may soon-ish have plants up there.

I was challenged by part of the bottom area of the shelving, as I use it for storing some of my "office work" stuff. I have different papers, envelopes, notebooks, and even some odd shaped stuff for girl scouts or whatever project I am currently working on. I may go out and purchase something more attractive than the white plastic drawers, but for now it works and I was very happy that I did not have to purchase anything!

The piano is clean! No dust or extraneous items on it.

The desk is clean and decluttered. I have a small "in-box" to store some items I am currently working on, or need to grab for a meeting etc. Other than that there are no "things" on my desk and I intend to keep it that way!

I painted the window trim, washed the screens and put them back in, and I even washed the window treatments and re-hung them. Harder to do than I thought; this simple treatment really confused me! Yesterday, however, was nice and I was able to hang the curtains on the line, which was really nice!

Finally, I washed the carpet and was done! Well, I am bothered by this little area rug we have squeezed between the desk chair and piano bench. I love the rug, but it was a cheap Walmart purchase from when Bill and I lived in Dublin, so 8-9 years ago. And it WILL NOT stay in place. I walked over it once or twice and it bunched up like this. I am seriously contemplating removing it. I actually would kinda like to put in on our front porch, but rain would ruin it. So, who knows.

Anyway, I finished the Oval Office and am now on to the next project: The mud room. Ouy Vay

It Gets Worse First

When deep cleaning things always get worse before they get better, right? The view today (above) after the view last night:

Yesterday I made really good progress on the office. I cleaned up the floor in front of the bookcase. (full of stuff again - but the piles are trash, donate, move downstairs, and move to the kids bookcase.)

I even cleaned up the desk area quite a bit before calling it quits for the day yesterday. This was about 4 hours of work, believe it or not. I had a lot of stuff to go through piece by piece!

And today I tackled the pile on my desk (still have some to go on that) and the bookcase. Everything came off and was gone through. I listed some books on paperback swap, decided to donate some books that have been on there for more than a year, and organized and cleaned the entire bookcase! Another 4 hours of fun!

Hopefully Sunday I will have it all finished and ready to show. Bill is impressed. Annika said last night, "I don't see any organization!" Pfttt.....

Hitting the Grindstone

A long distance friend and I have decided to become each other's Cleaning/Decluttering Motivators. This is rather like a work-out buddy, but it is a cleaning-buddy instead. Neither one of us are great "neat freaks" so motivation and accountability is a good thing!

She is currently working on her home office, so I figured I'd join her. We actually have two "office" areas, one on the mail level and one in the basement. Both need work (of course!) but I thought I'd tackle the main level room, what we refer to as the Oval Office due to its shape, first off.

I've decided to divide the room into four main sections:

#1: I have a bunch of stuff on the floor in front of the bookcase- mostly girl scout stuff that needs to find an appropriate home, especially since GS is basically over now.

#2: The desk, which is a repository for all things being worked on. I actually have tidied this up a bit recently. Would you believe it?

#3: The desk drawers. There are things in here that I know not where they are! It is tough when you share your desk area with the rest of the family! This part will be tough for me to tackle!

#4: The bookcase - which needs to be dusted well, and the bottom part needs to be re-organized, nay, organized. It will give me a chance to cull some kids books and put some of the spring/summer topics back in the kids rooms.

#4: General dusting and cleaning. The piano is not so cluttered - a small stack of extra photos was set there last week when I tidied up my desk area, but that is it besides the dust ... can you see my finger mark in the dust? I'll also wash the carpeting and lights, oh, and add another part:

#5: paint the window trim.

So there you have it. Maybe I can accomplish it all by the end of this weekend? OK, I will commit to having it all accomplished by Sunday. Scary!

Hot and sticky

Yuck. Today is the first official hot and sticky day. It is only 73 outside, but it rained earlier and there is a "chance" of rain today, so the humidity is quite high. Silly me thought it was going to be cool, so the girls have coats, and Lauren wore a long sleeve t-shirt to school. Sorry kids!

It is just icky outside. I liked it much better when I thought it was grey and cool, not grey and sticky. Cool and grey fits my mood.

Job Report

Well, the job I have is nothing brain draining - that is for sure! Rather boring and mundane to be honest. But, I get out of the house and I meet some new people, and so far everyone seems like good people.

What I am primarily doing is sampling food made from Government Commodities. I am working at Food Banks and Food Distribution sites, so I am seeing many of the people and families this Great Recession of ours is affecting! It is humbling, to say the least. And, the truly amazing thing; all these programs where I am WORKING are run by volunteers. There are one or two paid folks, the rest are entirely volunteers. And they just happen to work much harder than any paid employee I've ever seen. Then, a majority of them leave their shift and receive the benefits of said program.

Good people, I tell ya, good people!

Domestic Day!

Hmm, I have to laugh at myself today. I have a "free" day with only one phone call to make for work, and that is to my boss/friend. So, armed with a to-do list a mile long, I am avoiding most of it and completing the fun projects I have been putting off the past month or so.

Today I have going: making yogurt with my new yogurt maker I received for my birthday. Spaghetti and meatballs in the old faithful crock pot I received for mother's day or my birthday when I was pregnant with Annika, homemade Samoa cookies (like the Girl Scout version) and soon I shall put a loaf of bread in the bread maker. I'd make it in the oven, but it is pretty busy right now! I'm dying to try out my pizza-peel and new oven stone, so soon I'll make my favorite bread recipe.

Now, I am off to hang laundry to dry on my little laundry line outside. Then I guess I'll have to attack some of the real to-do items on my list.

blechhhh