Tag Archives | spring cleaning

De-Crapification: Laundry Room and Linen Closet

By on April 16, 2013 Comments { 2 }

For those of you following along my decrapification adventure, you’ll notice I haven’t written about it since it began. I did great for a week, then stopped. So here’s the first update anyway. :)

Laundry Room and Hall Linen Closet

This time, I discovered that my crap tolerance level has gone down, my clutter-frustration has gone up, and it’s in direct relation to the frequency of which I de-crapify my house. It hit me like a lightning bolt as I was working.

I remember the first time I went through this linen closet. It was unbelievable. I ended up donating 11 SETS OF SHEETS after that first purge in 2007. We don’t even OWN that many sets of sheets any more. I don’t have six bags of trash to throw away, or two huge moving boxes of stuff to donate this time. De-crapifying every six months or so has definitely been the best thing to help me stay on top of what we own.

I know that Dana White says in her ebook (affiliate) Drowning in Clutter? Don’t Grab a Floatie, Drain the Ocean! not to begin with an area that no one can see, but I just had to. The laundry room is a room that I see, every single day. It is the room we go to when we need cleaning supplies, vinegar (yes I keep a gallon of vinegar in the laundry room), dog shampoo, vacuum cleaner bags, carpet cleaner, and other things. And I pass by it every time I enter or leave my bedroom.

Dana also recommends putting items where you would look for them first, rather than where it would  make sense to keep them. When we need vinegar for something, the laundry room IS where we look for it first. I gave up trying to keep it on the floor of the pantry in the kitchen, after I forgot it was there and bought a 2-gallon pack at Costco and ended up with 3 gallons of vinegar. (WHO needs 3 gallons of vinegar?!) So we keep it in the laundry room.

It went fairly quick! I had the boys empty the room, and then I vacuumed out the dust, wiped everything down, and did a hand-wipedown of the floor. (It’s too small to bother with the bucket and mop.) Then I put everything back up on the shelves. I tossed the empty laundry detergent bottles and general trash that was there, and wiped down the appliances. The whole thing took about 45 minutes. It looks SO much better now! And yes, this is the WHOLE laundry room. Or closet.

Before & After: Laundry Room

The Linen Closet is that, and so much more. It’s huge, so this is where we keep all sorts of things like board games, my food scale, box of mailing supplies (bubble envelopes, mailing labels, package tape, etc.) along with sheets and blankets. Several years ago I bought plastic baskets to keep everything in, which does help. After emptying, the closet looked like this:

Hall Closet

I went through the contents, threw away a BUNCH of stuff, sorted a pile to donate, and then put it back, organized.

Hall Closet: Before & After

I know there isn’t a dramatic appearance between the before and after, but the amount of junk I was able to clear out of there was amazing. Also, look up there about the word “after” and you’ll see EMPTY SHELF SPACE. The top basket is also empty. That’s over 3 feet of NOTHING up there. :) I love it!  I set aside one sheet set to donate this time. Just one. And one huge comforter with pillow shams.

Now everything is returned to it’s natural place, and all is right in the world.

In case you’re wondering, the plastic bins came from WalMart. They help me keep everything contained, and therefore prevent my head from exploding. Nony, er, Dana said that this is important. (Head explosion prevention.) There is plenty of empty space on those closet shelves now, too, for things that may need to be kept there. Or not.

Here are the results of the first purge:

Donations & Trash Some of the donations and JBF Sale things are actually from the second purge—in the basement, my bedroom, and walk in closet. Updates on those coming shortly!

Need help decluttering digging out? I mean serious help?

You need Dana White’s books! This lady knows what she’s talking about because she spent the last THREE YEARS literally digging out from under the clutter in her own home. She has helped this overwhelmed Momma make sense of it and tackle it while building in habits that most people do without thinking about it.

Get both ebooks, 28 Days to Hope for Your Home and Drowning in Clutter? for only $8.

Click the book cover to purchase the set through my affiliate link.

declutter_ebook1-372x500-223x300

categories: Home & Family

Tags: , ,


Comments { 2 } :

Spring Break, or Let the Decrapification Commence!

By on March 31, 2013 Comments { 2 }

It is amazing to me how much personal belongings can make me feel stifled.

If you only knew what I go through in my twice yearly battle with STUFF. Let’s just call it what it is: CRAP. A couple of years ago, a friend of mine coined the phrase decrapification, on Twitter. I stole it. It’s mine now. I even gave it a definition. I should see about adding it to dictionary.com because it’s that profound.

decrapify

(See? Genius. Admit it)

It’s as if I cannot breathe with all this STUFF around. It’s time to go through and make some hard decisions again. Decrapifying my house, my yard, and my life–AGAIN. That’s the goal of our “Spring Break” during the month of April.

I know what I need to do.

declutter_ebook1-372x500-223x300To help me, I am re-reading a great little book by Dana White (Nony the Slob), called Drowning in Clutter? Don’t Grab a Floatie, Drain the Ocean! I love the way she writes, because she gets me. Or, I get her. And she is the queen of decrapification, or as she calls it, “de-slobification”.

If you click on the book cover, you can purchase the PDF ebook  for $3. (That is my affiliate link, and so are these next ones. Thank you FTC for making it awkward for me to earn 25cents.)

If you prefer Kindle books, you can click these links to purchase her 2 titles individually: Drowning in Clutter? or 28 Days to Hope for Your Home for $3 each, or get the 2-book set for Kindle for $5.

There are several large trouble spots in my house right now.

I know I can always say “the kitchen counters”, because they are a catch-all for… everything. But they’re easy. Put that stuff away and our beautiful new counters are there. It is easy to do. Quick too. But the counters aren’t the areas that are smothering me right now.

The big, bad spots are rather hidden, actually:

The Linen closet

The "games" side

The “games” side

It is this HUGE closet in the upstairs hallway, containing everything from sheets and blankets, to books, games, mailing and packaging supplies, and other… crap. Stuff I honestly haven’t even looked at in… oh I don’t know… forever?! Yeah.

The Laundry Room

laundry room

This is also more like a closet. It is just large enough to house our washer and dryer. You can’t go in and close the door behind you without squeezing up next to the wall and the dryer and shutting it right behind your rear. Presently both appliances are covered with crap, along with a nice gray coating of that wonderful dryer lint dust. The shelving above needs to be cleared off, dusted, and put back in some semblance of order so we can USE the cleaning supplies that are there.

The Basement Family Room/ School Stuff Storage Room

basement family room IMG_1878

It’s bad ya’ll. Yes I did just say ya’ll. I am from Washington and have never lived in the South, but ya’ll just fits here. IT’S BAD YA’LL. We don’t do school down there and haven’t in a couple of years. (Have I ever mentioned that I hate caves? Yeah, basements without windows to the outside world are caves in my book.) All the crap keeps getting dumped down there, including ALL the paint buckets and stuff left over from our kitchen remodel. It’s all gotta go or be put away. Or given away. Or thrown away. Or something.

My Walk-In Closet & Vanity Area

messy closet Master closet & vanity

The master of all disasters. I’m even going to take a before picture of this for you, because it truly is a sight to behold. Last year (or year before last?) I joined with Simple Mom on a decluttering linkup and she had us go through and take out old clothes we can’t or don’t wear any more.

Since then, I am happy to report that the hanging clothes have been a lot easier to deal with. But this closet.is.so.bad. I haven’t even touched the stuff on those shelves in years. I’m going to CLEAR IT OUT. Empty it. And start over. Second to that (and only 3 feet away) is my very cluttered vanity area. Should be easy but of course it’s tied to the closet. :P

God help me.

Haven’t you already decrapified these areas before? Well, yes. And no. Different seasons of life allow us to tolerate different things. Right now, I can’t tolerate all the stuff on the bedroom closet shelves, mainly because I don’t even remember what’s in there. I don’t hang out in my walk in closet all that much. Besides, as we move things, buy things, box and store things, eventually it’s all got to be gone through all over again.

There’s more decluttering to do than just these areas. The others include:

messy antique desk

My poor antique desk, covered with junk!

messy nightstand

Both nightstands look like this!

I promise I’ll keep the decrapification updates short and sweet and include pictures. Maybe I’ll even get some serious writing in while we’re on break too. Wouldn’t THAT be something? ;)

What are you decrapifying this month?

categories: Home & Family

Tags: , , ,


Comments { 2 } :

Spring Breaking & Math Freebies

By on April 16, 2012 Comments { 1 }

BrothersNOTE: If you’re visiting from the Ultimate Blog Party, click here–> Main PARTY post is right HERE!

Now that all the school kids are back to school around here, the weather is warming up. It does this every year! The first week of April is always spring break for the area kids, and it almost always RAINS. My kids grumble about it just like the rest of them, but not for long. Unlike the other kids in our neighborhood, my boys were able to take advantage of the SECOND week of April as well and now the THIRD and FOURTH weeks. But shhh! Don’t tell my kids! They think we’re starting school in the morning! ;)

We school year round, around here. I actually contemplated following a regular school year schedule this year, but spring is still breaking…. and we’re enjoying it! We’ll just stick to our established routine: 3 months of school, 1 month break– year round. This gives us all of December, April, and August off. December is cleaning, cooking, shopping and baking. April is spring cleaning and garden planting. And August in the Inland Northwest? August is usually too hot to THINK. 90′s, usually about a week of 100* weather… not exactly conducive to good studies!

Since we spent the first two weeks of April just enjoying the break, the next two weeks will be filled with activity! You see, we are in the process of preparing to sell our house. It’s not on the market yet, but we need to get it ready. We have a few big things to tackle, such as replacing carpets and updating the master bath tile.

Yes, that is teal carpet. And teal/hunter green tile with PINK grout. The vanity counter is pink too. Hello 90′s house! The only other major repair, the total tear-out and re-pouring of our driveway, was completed back in September.

The minor repairs are things like putting a smoke alarm back up, re-attaching corner pieces to baseboard trim, touch up paint, having carpets steam cleaned, etc. I’m not sure how much of this we’ll get done in the next two weeks, but we need to get started! We figure it this way: Whether or not we end up selling the house, all of this stuff needs to be done. But I hope we sell it!! We’re looking at property and house plans, and THAT is exciting, my friends.

Leave me a comment and tell me about your big spring project!

So, are you ready for your Ultimate Blog Party download?! Today I’m featuring a fantastic MATH resource called White’s Arithmetic!

Click each title to view and download: (downloads expired)

  • Book 1: First Book of Arithmetic
  • Book 2: A New Complete Arithmetic
  • Key to Book 2

Quick Hint for using White’s Arithmetic: Print these out full-sized on regular printer paper, so that your students can do the work right on the pages. :)

If you missed the other downloads, here’s Friday, Saturday, and Sunday’s!

categories: Home & Family

Tags: , ,


Comments { 1 } :

Is It Spring Yet?

By on March 15, 2012 Comments { 1 }

Dragging mornings.

Antsy kids.

Dirty, cluttered house.

Attention deficit LIFE. It must be nearing spring break again, right? That’s what I’ve heard. I am so ready for spring! And a BREAK.

In past years we have taken a month off every three months.  This year we decided NOT to do that, but the boys are still trying to talk me into taking April off like we have the past few years. The thing is that by only taking a couple of weeks off in April, we will finish school the end of June and have all of July and August off for the summer. I can’t tell ya how much I need that. I’m willing to sacrifice a big April break for a bigger summer one.

I think.

Right now, that first break is in my sights. I can make it. We spent a couple of weeks having some fun studying pirates, and reading the BEST book about a boy turned pirate. Now we’re ready to move on. I checked out enough books to keep us moving forward with US history through the end of March.

We can do this.

Rabbit trail: I’m seriously considering trying to get ahold of  a Sonlight Core D history instructor’s guide to finish our year with. I’m having a lot of trouble following a textbook and adding in literature. I’d much rather use the literature and just follow a reading & lesson plan. (A.D.D. to the max right now. Sorry. :)  )

So spring, where are you? Will you come with snow, or will you grace us with some much needed sunshine and outside time for my boys? Maybe some running time for me? Oh that would be so nice.

I will throw open my windows, and get my super deep spring cleaning done! I will decrapify and take a load to the thrift store for donation.

Or maybe I could just sleep for a week.

Who am I kidding?! As great as that sounds, you and I both know that’ll never happen!

————————


Did you know that Nony’s ebook, 28 Days to Hope For Your Home is on sale for only $5 for a limited time?!

Not for the Mildly Disorganized, this book will help you start to take on your house and change some of those habits that are making you feel defeated.  Take 28 days and just do it. 28 Days to Hope for Your Home!!

 

 

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links which, if you click over and make a purchase, will go to help pay for this site’s maintenance fees. Thank you!

categories: Homeschooling

Tags: ,


Comments { 1 } :