Loving Thirty-One Products

I just got my new totes from Thirty-One warehouse sale.  This is what I did to my closet.

I like Thirty-One so much that I'm having a party on January 19th at 8 pm.

Local friends I'm having a Thirty-One party at my house. If you can't make it or live far away and want to place an order you can do so online at the links below. Event Home: http://www.mythirtyone.com/shop/eventhome.aspx?eventId=E2688082&from=DIRECTLINK Event Shopping: http://www.mythirtyone.com/shop/catalog.aspx?eventId=E2688082&from=DIRECTLINK Hope to see my local friends. Please let me know if you are attending and/or if you placed an order on line. Thank you and happy shopping.

Purging Games

It's been a while since I read my google reader. I read many blogs but my favorite blog is I'm an Organizing Junkie. I can always go to Laura's blog and find something to do in my house to get my life more in order. Her post about organizing her games motivated me to purge my game closet today.

Our games were migrating to different rooms. The bulk of the games are stored in my guest bathroom closet. Then the other games were stored in my laundry room along with other art supplies and things. This is what the bathroom closet looked like before.

I took everything out! I collected all the games from the laundry room and my daughter Victoria helped me purge. Most of our problem was most games were missing pieces and if you are missing pieces the games are useless. So with that said our donation pile wasn't much. These are the games we are donating to the school.

Two 1/2 bags full of games that were missing pieces are going into the trash.

This is what the game closet looks like now. I put the older games on the top. All other games are in the middle so they can reach them. We like to play games a lot. Victoria is posing with the finished photo since she helped me with the purging process.

What are our favorite games?

Victoria - Apples to Apples Kids 7+

Justin - Brain Quest Smart Game

Naomi - Monopoly Junior

Mom - Skip-Bo Card Game

Laundry Room - Entry Way from Garage

Wow, it's been a while since I updated this blog. I'm starting to be pulled to flylady again. She's been mentioned again from some internet friends recently this week. Yes, clutter can always be a problem that I seem to struggle with on a daily basis. Today I tackled the laundry room entry way. The shoes were such a problem. I couldn't find a way to contain them. Victoria and I found a solution I think. I had this laundry basket in my laundry room which was being used for toys but we tackled that last week and donated and purged a lot of that so I was left with this empty basket in my laundry room. We had so many shoes between the 3 that it filled up the entire basket. Now, if only I can get them to put their shoes in it without putting them all over the floor for us to trip on or for Daisy to take and chew up.

Credits:
Blue paper unknown Designer
Yellow paper unknown Designer
Warm summer Nights flower by ibdd
Yellow stitches from Melanie by CJoz
Blue stitches from warm summer nights by ibdd
font: the blue cabin and Vani

Craft Room Today

Last month I won a 2 hour consultation with a professional organizer Donna Yanoshik. You can view her website here. She came by this month and in those 2 hours she managed to make my room usable again.

This is what you see when you open up my door.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

She rotated my sewing desk and added my light. Removed the paper storage unit above iris carts which we gave to the kids for their school projects.

My desk I can now see the counter tops.

My computer area is now usable again. Do still need to purge the paper stackable racks.

My books were donated to the library. My sizzex, light table, cutting boards are all stored here.



My closet closed. The table in the middle of the room is for the kids to create.

When you open the right door of the closet you will see all my Stampin' Up punches hanging on the door.

Inside the rest of the closet you will see my Stampin' Up papers, embellishments and stuff that I kept for the kids to use while making cards and other crafts.

Craft Room Progress

Wow it's been a while since I have posted. I actually forgot I had this blog. You see, I tend to go back and with the fly lady program. Whenever I feel overwhelmed I turn to it. Back in October I started to tackle my craft room. Didn't get very far but I did manage to retrieve my sewing machine so I could now sew again. I used to quilt. Never made any clothing before but did attempt to make 2 dresses for the girls for easter. My mom was amazed that I made them. It didn't take me very long either. I used fabrics from my quilting time. The only thing I had to buy was elastic thread for like $3. It took me only about 2 hours to make each one. You can get the pattern here.


Anyway, my craft room was still a total disaster area. In January, I sent out a shout out for help through the MOMS Club. I needed someone to come in and help me purge. A great friend came by one afternoon and we tackled this mess while the kids were in school. Of course, we didn't get very far and had so much more to accomplish.

This is what we were dealing with. I'm embarrassed to show you but you need to see this in order to appreciate what it now looks like. I had papers, books, rubber stamps you name it all scattered across counter tops and floors.

My closet looked like this.

My desk! Where in the world is the counter top?

My completed scrapbooks, computer desk

Rubber stamps. I managed to purge a lot and sold some at splitcoast. Still need to upload some to ebay.

This is what you saw when you opened up the door.


Purged all those rubber stamps on the floor. Gave some to school, sold some and kept some.

My ribbons on to top of my sewing area. Under more rubber stamps needing purging.



My goal was to have a nice looking room for where I can sew, make cards, use my computer and yes invite the kids in to create as well.

This is what I donated to the kids school. It's filled with punches, papers, stickers, craft supplies.


Have to go feed the kids. Will post another Craft Room entry later today to show you what the room now looks like.

Laundry Room Again

Bet you thought I left the face of the earth. I've been so busy lately with the kids school, girls scouts and MOMS Club stuff that I haven't had time to do any flying. Today, I decided to stay home instead of running errands while the kids were in school. My 3 hours was spent purging, sorting and filing the two piles under my in boxes. These are the boxes I have been putting in ripped out pages from magazines, printed up recipes and professional photos that just have no home.

Here's the before photo:
Here is a photo of work in progress. I sat at the kitchen table and sorted all the papers into piles before filing them in my file box. I had tons of recipes I'd like to try one day, photographs that I now have in albums and craft ideas for the children are now filed away in the file box.

Photo after. I moved my husband's sock basket down. This left room on the top to put Justin's laundry basket that is waiting for cleaned clothes on top. I still need to do the pile under the blue basket. It has magazines that need to be read, coupons that need to be clipped and supermarket fliers that need to be used for planning. Any ideas on what to do with cd's that I no longer listen to? That's in the mini basket on the top. Probably need to upload them to itunes and toss them so I could use the basket for something else.

At least I got something accomplished today.

Craft Room Revisited

Anxiety is what I feel like when I open up my craft room door. Yes, this is what you see. It's a total room of clutter. Well, I start my sewing class today and the first step is to find your sewing machine. Do you see it in this mess? It's there straight ahead on the top next to my stamp pad turner. My goal today was to clean out the corner near the window and make that my sewing table. So for 2 hours I cleaned out that spot.

This is the before photo: I know I'm embarrassed to share these but you must see the difference an hour made.

This is the photo right when you step into my office. Papers are scattered all over the floor. Why do I need to keep all this scrap paper. First thing I tossed in the trash was that.

Unfortunately, my computer desk I wasn't able to get to. This is what it still looks like.

Okay, back to the corner of the room where I want my sewing machine. Oh, now you can see the sewing machine there next to my ink pad turn about. It's collecting dust for the past couple of years. Time to get the dust bunnies off you. To the left is the table I plan on using to sew. But before I could put my sewing machine there I need to clean not only on top of the table but underneath as well. I moved all that paper to the other side of the room. I moved all my stampin up stamp pads to my closet and put all my photos away. When the kids came home from school I attempted to get all my stickers sorted into draws by color. Only got that half done.
Tada.... I now have a clean corner for sewing. Sorry can't show you the other side of the room as it's now a total mess. This will take me another couple of hours to clean it all up. Baby Steps Baby Steps.