Organization Round Up!

In July, The Organizing Junkie challenged us to organize our hair and makeup supplies. This was a good thing for me since until last week, my bathroom wasn't even unpacked yet ;-)

Check out the difference it made!

I have a cramped little bathroom with no counter space, and then a really weird empty nook on the other side of the room. As with any good organization, it started with me figuring out what I needed to accomplish organizing the space. In this case, I needed a vanity in that nook. Luck for me, I happened to have one that's been passed down in my family for 4 generations now... so I had my hubby move it in :-)

I LOVE how having the vanity in there allowed me to eliminate the counter clutter that kept piling up around the sink!

In the vanity I designated a "Useful Drawer", and I use it for all of my hair and makeup products that I use every day. Just my tried and true fixings that are needed on a daily basis, and nothing more. It's soooooo nice to have these things separate from all my other things so when I'm getting ready on a regular morning, there's no digging or searching.


See how my make-up bag just includes the essentials? No 30 shades of eye shadow or lip sticks that I don't use all the time. Just what I need.

*Tip for the overwhelmed*

Keep your daily make-up in an easy to grab bag. This way, when you're running late to church or something, you can just grab the bag and put your make-up on in the car on the way there. Please only do this if your husband is driving. Don't powder and drive! This works wonderfully for me, the most overwhelmed superhero in the galaxy...

Now, you know all that other stuff us women have? You know, all the stuff that we don't use on a daily basis? Mostly stuff that's "too nice" to use day to day, or free samples of stuff we have that we're not quite ready for purge? That stuff has no business hanging out in the useful drawer. It belongs somewhere off to the side.


Yes, isn't it sad that I don't use my hair dryer every day? That's another important thing to remember. Be honest with yourself when designating your useful drawer. I dry my hair about once every 3 months, so my blow dryer needs to be stored accordingly. The more you use the item, the more handy it should be to grab.

When organizing little things in a drawer, be open minded about your drawer organizers. I use all kinds of things from the bottoms of cereal boxes to empty baby wipe containers. The possibilities are endless:


As long as I was organizing my bathroom, I went ahead and redid my medicine cabinet as well. I wish I had a handy dandy label maker, but they're so darn expensive! So I used yellow band-aids to label the medicine cabinet. What can I say? Easy access ;-)


My Medicine Categories:

• Vitamins
• First Aid
• Pain Relievers
• Digestive
• Allergy, Cold & Cough

Everything I have for kids I keep in a separate box. This includes children's medicine, baby oil, bulb syringes, Q-tips, medicine dispensers, etc. Be sure to keep this out of reach if you keep medicine inside.


Check out how others rounded up their makeup and hair products over at the Org Junkie's site!

I Can Reach My Keyboard!

Wow. How was I blogging at a desk like this?

I have this bad habit of cramming things that don't belong in places that people can't see. I guess when your house is as out of control as mine is, the shove and cram is a survival technique more than anything else.

But now I can have peace when I sit at my desk. Ta Da!!!

I even organized the bottom part.

Now I'm sitting here, breathing in my fresh air and loving my beautiful organized baskets, labels, and hand thrown pencil cups. A place for everything, and everything in it's place. No huge calendar on my keyboard tray or things stacked so high I can't see my computer screen. Are you guys cleaning out your cabinets for our Cabinet Powwow? I hope so!

The Masked Mommy strikes again, and allows my secret identity to type in peace! ;-)

But before you start hating me for my beautiful clean living room and perfectly organized desk, know this. My kitchen is so out of control right now that when I was making pizza yesterday, I had to set my pizza pan on the floor to spread my dough. There just wasn't a speck of counter space to be found. Off to do the dishes! Up, up, and away!

More Cabinet Organizing

Yesterday I organized the top of my TV armoire, and today I organized the bottom half! Here's where I started...

I decided that we're done with VHS tapes. BUH-BYE!

You can see I had to keep a few of my hubby's VHS tapes.
Star Trek and Star Wars tapes couldn't be thrown out.
Can anyone say "nerd"? Haha! :-)

Then I organized all the game systems into baskets. One basket each for games and cords, then 2 baskets for controllers. I used to have them in bags, but that system failed me.

On the bottom shelf, I put kid stuff that needs to be accessible, but doesn't need to be out all the time, like blocks and stuff. The bumbo is also down there, but it really needs to make a trip to the attic.

I love cabinets because I don't have to look at my clutter, but my living room really does feel more peaceful to me when I know even the stuff behind the doors is organized :-)

Does anyone remember what our living room looked like before I made about a trillion New Year's Resolutions and started this blog? Well, I do because it wasn't that long ago. And here I am, 3 months later, cleaning things that are hidden (a completely foreign concept to me). Before, I was just lucky if I could walk through my living room without tripping. Yay for progress!!!

Don't forget about our upcoming Cabinet Powwow! Come here April 1-5 to link up your cabinet posts!

Long Time No See!

So I've been visiting family for the last couple of weeks, and given that my blog is a secret, it was really hard to post. Which reminds me... I'm pretty sure my mom saw my blog. So this is for her: Mom, if you found my blog, please send me an email and let me know ;-) I'll let you guys know if I hear back from her or not. I think I can trust my own mother not to release my secret identity.

The next thing I have to tell you guys is... I was traveling for 2 weeks and I did not gain any weight!!! I am so proud of myself! I'm just where I was when I left and picked back up on my regular diet this morning. Whew!

Well, as y'all know it's cabinet month here. Which means we're all supposed to be organizing our cabinets this month linking up here on April 1st to show off our progress! I tackled one this morning and it's sure making me smile :-)

Here's our TV cabinet. No one knows how to put away DVDs around here. They've been easier to control since I organized them, but we still end up with quite a mess sometimes.

This is the pile of DVDs that needed to be put away.
Luckily for me, it's just a matter of sticking them into the DVD book now :-)
Otherwise, this would have taken a long time!

I pulled everything out to do the sorting.

Here's the finished product!

It makes me so happy to open the TV armoire now! Nothing falls out when I open the doors, and watching TV is a lot more peaceful this way :-)

To see more Talk About Tuesday posts, click here.

Two Months Later... I can LIVE in my Living Room!

I am done with my Living Room! D-O-N-E!!!

I have decluttered E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G!

I hope the clutter creature has learned his lesson for now... He is no match for The Masked Mommy!

I wish my house were as organized as my living room is. Every surface cleaned, every part vacuumed, a place for everything and everything in its place. I have come a really long way since January 1st. Check out the progression of my living room...

Clutter corner. This mess all sat behind our recliner all the time. Believe it or not, this was our version of "clean" because the books and stuff are stacked. It has a table cloth because of the massive amount of junk under there...

This is where I was 2 months ago.
Unable to walk through my own living room.

Here is my living room "clean" in January.
I think it kinda looks like a yard sale.

Here is my February version. It's a big improvement.Nothing to sneeze at for sure.But with me being a super and all, I had higher expectations for our living room than this...

Here's my current version... finished (for now)! Yay!!!

My secret? Taking 2 truck loads of junk to Goodwill! Purge, purge, purge! I know it feels like you can't because your junk is not junk to you, but I promise you have too much stuff! You will feel so much better if you could just find a way to let it go!

Now Check out the rest of my Living Room:

You know what the craziest part is? I didn't buy anything to do this! I just rearranged the stuff I already had!

There are still some toys sitting around, but hey, we live in here! Check out Biblican Womanhood to see some more real people participating in Spring Cleaning for Normal People :-)

Creative "Counter Space"

Silly bathroom with zero counter space...

With no counter space, it's guaranteed that the clutter is going to start piling up around the sink and on the floor. That's what happens when your stuff doesn't have a "home".

This looks like a job for... The Masked Mommy!

Ahhh, that's better! Check out how I did it...

Just one nail in the basket (for tippage insurance ;-)

The bathroom looks great, and I finally have a place to keep all my make-up etc. What's better... it has remained clean for over a week now, because I finally have a system that works for me!

Visit We Are THAT Family to see more Works for me Wednesday posts :-)

Super Sorting!

Remember this massive pile of now-clean laundry in my living room???

I took it down!!!

I started by sorting it into piles.

I had one pile for each person in our family, plus one extra pile for
"linens etc", and one pile for socks and underwear.
It really didn't take very long. Maybe 15 minutes to sort the whole pile.

When I was done sorting, I put each pile in a laundry basket or

trash bag and labeled each accordingly.

Do you love how I have my pile of clothes is twice the size of every other pile? ;-)

So our laundry is still a big mess, however at least if you know who's clothes you're looking for you know which pile to go to. I'm working like mad to organize our closets and get our laundry put away for the Closet Powwow! Ahhhh!

Never in my adult life have I kept our clothes clean and put away. It's been a long journey to get this far with my laundry. I really hope I pull this off by the Closet Powwow!!!

*Reminder* March 5-8 We're having our Closet Powwow! I'll post a Mr. Linky so you can all show your closet posts off. Old or new, and feel free to post as many as you like! See you here then!

No Mudroom? No Problem!

We have no mudroom because we live in a very tiny townhouse (real estate is very expensive in the DC area...) Then, I was cruising around blogland and came across the most wicked awesome idea ever at The Shabby Nest! She had a closet-turned-mini-mudroom! Even we had a closet by the front door. I decided instead of wishing, I would be inspired, and we had our own closet-turned-mini-mudroom the same afternoon!!!

As you can see by this picture,
we were putting this closet to great use...
It was very organized, and we used it on a daily basis.

Yep. That's some closet...

Now it's a Mini Mudroom!

Did you brace yourself for these after shots?

I put up some hooks across the back (yes, I used power tools!)
And I put up a handy dandy shoe organizer to hold miscellaneous stuff like
mittens, sunglasses, and just whatever!

In a rental place, I couldn't build in a bench. So I just took down the door and put an extra end table in for a "bench". Then I laid an old curtain over the bench as a "skirt" and the "cushion" is made from a beautiful pillow sham that I picked up at a rummage sale. The throw pillow came off of my daughter's bed. The shoe basket was just relocated from that mess under my phone cords. Even the hooks and shoe organizer I already had around here. Funny how I spend more time preparing to organizing than actually doing it... ;-)

The curtain that's hanging is just from the same extra set I used as the table skirt. I hung it with the help of some nails and tape. Seriously.

I still have a lot of ideas for improving my "mudroom", but this is what I managed to hack off in one afternoon (with no help from The Masked Husband!) and I'm really happy with it!

Ok, so this was some closet makeover inspiration for y'all! Remember that my closet powwow is starting March 1st, so be ready with your links! Have you reorganized any closets recently? How 'bout in the past? Dig into those archives and come here to show off your work!

More Tackle it Tuesday participants here.

Still Faster Than a Speeding Bullet!

Who would have thought I would have 2 speeding bullet posts in a row? I just couldn't resist coming to The Nester's party!

Ewwww...

Ahh!
Not perfect, but a definite improvement...

And I owe it all to these babies:

I got them at the Dollar Tree for, you guessed it, $1! They're self adhesive, too. The cords on the floor I fixed with some tape. I even taped the router right to the wall.

I know it's not beautiful, but we're dealing with a weird phone jack/computer cord situation, and it's a walkway so I can't put a table there for the phone. It needed to be baby proofed, so I just got in there and did the best I could with the time available.

If you'd like to see some of my cuter projects that took more than 10 minutes, click here or here :-)

A~ma~zing Laundry Room Makeover!

If you haven't yet checked out Messy Jessy's Laundry Room Makeover, run don't walk! Her after picture looks like something out of Home and Garden Magazine!

... and look where she started!

She also had a lot of special touches like handmade a~dor~a~ble labels! Plus, she had cute ideas like "No Dumping" tags in laundry "no no spots"! She's got a ton of great pictures on her blog, so pay her a visit and tell her what an amazing job she did! She will inspire all of you!

Toy Storage that Works for Me!

As a mom, I would LOVE to fill my children's room with storage solutions from Pottery Barn Kids. However, in real life I have to think more down to earth...


So here is my blog about toy solutions for the financially realistic :-)

How do you turn a milk jug into toy storage???

Just takes some scissors!

The handle actually makes them quite handy for carrying around.

My 2 year old is quite coordinated with them.

*Tip* it's easier to wash them out after you cut them.

See? They're great for sorting small stuff!

But lets face it... they're not your most attractive toy solution.

I got this dollhouse at Goodwill for $2.50.

It was 1/2 off toy day. Although even $5 still would have been a remarkable price.

The milk jugs fit really nicely in this dollhouse.

(I bought this dollhouse to hold toys, not really to play with)

It holds a lot!

Plus, I painted it to look more like the dollhouse from

Pottery Barn Kids... :-) Not only because the paint was in bad shape, but also because I wanted it to be neutrally painted (so not to imply that my son couldn't play with a dollhouse.) We also have a neutrally colored play kitchen.

Check out the laundry basket. Not the prettiest thing, but I don't know a mom in real life that doesn't have a laundry basket of toys somewhere.

In our old house, it held all the "kid mess" in the living room including diapers.

There are also toys hidden behind curtain number 2! Our entertainment center had open shelves, so I just strung a piece of fabric on a ribbon and nailed the ribbon right to the furniture.

This is my daughter's old room.

Underneath that pretty quilt on the left is one of those really ugly workshop shelves that screws together, and then a big box of toys. On the wooden shelf I have Easter baskets I got on clearance with smaller things like play jewelry. Those pink buckets under the end table are actually adorable trash cans that I got on sale for $1.50 each! They also hold toys.

When my son was little, I just kept his clothes in this shoe organizer on the back of the closet door. His stuff was too small to fold anyway. Just be sure to buy the organizers that are clear or mesh so you can find what you're looking for.
But the real secret to getting rid of kid clutter???

REALLY GET RID OF IT!!!

This is the pile I made for Goodwill while tidying our toys for this post!

You know you have too much kid stuff, so purge while you sort! Be honest and get rid of the stuff they don't play with. You can do it!

Our laundry room giveaway winner will be posted later today! For now, I'm off to play group!