whoop whoop

One of our dogs died last Sunday.  Yeah I know what a depressing way to start a post right.  Anyway so because of this it left our lab up in the fence by his lonesome self.  We decided it was time to make him an indoor/outdoor dog.  As of today he has taken a liking to sleeping in our bathroom for some reason.  I'm almost to the point of this story, here it goes...so as I sit down to start writing I hear the hubs yelling "oh no, no, no, no, no, no.  you have to get out".  He had gone into take a shower and left Buckwheat in the bathroom with him and apparently Buckwheat has noticed that he's a bit smelly, we've been saying this all week he must have finally caught on.  So after typing this out I realize it's not going to be as funny to anyone reading it as it was to me sitting here listening to it, oh well.

Now let's get this party started. whoop whoop.  First off let me say that I don't think I'm the only one who put this week's hot spot off for as long as they possibly could.  There are 77 people that have already posted.  Last week I came in at 115.  Now I know that I haven't yet posted so I could very well be around or even after 115 again, but I'm posting later than last week  but yet possibly coming in earlier in the numbers so...there.  Why does it make me feel better to rationalize that it is ok that I procrastinated cause all the cool kids did too?

I know you can't see it here but under all that mess you will find my new copy of Organized Simply.  I brought it in here when I was working on our budget earlier this week.

Ok seriously this is why I procrastinated...

I know it doesn't look like a whole lot here.

But it turned into this...

What that doesn't look like much how about this then...

That's right an entire bag of shreds.  I had to dump my shredder three times and continue to cram it down into the bag just to make it all fit.

Hey there's the book!

So I completely did away with all our filed bills.  We've been discussing this for a couple months now.  I mean, while we don't do all our bills online we are starting to do a lot more, and if we did them all online we wouldn't have a paper copy to save so whey the hell are we saving the paper copies now?  The short answer, we aren't...anymore.  I kept one file...I will repeat that for all of you who don't believe me, we kept one file.  In it will go one month's bills, all of them.  The next month as long as the bills show that we paid the previous month correctly, the folder gets emptied and then the current month will go in.  That's it, one month's bills.  I had water bills from 2008.  Why?  My mother.

I also took care of the magazine basket, but don't have pics of it, it was pretty boring.  And I handled my stack of newspapers.

  I finally pulled the coupons out and did away with the newspapers, not before I washed my windows of course.  What you don't wash your windows with newspaper?  Oh it is the only way to go my dear.  Newspaper and vinegar.  You don't waste a whole roll of paper towels and your glass is sparkling.

Buh bye kissy mark that my rug rat made or some other random rug rat.

And just because I have to, here's my helpers hard at work.

Here's to next week.  I'm still holding out for the attic or basement, of which I have neither, so my procrastinating self can have a week off.  Check it out, you know you want to.

oh and whoop whoop, I came in at number 81...take that last week's 115.

project simplify round uno done

Ok so remember how I mentioned project simplify in the last post?  Why am I linking my last post, I mean you know how to use the scroll oh well annnyway...  Well closet clean up is complete.  Wow is all I can really say.  Mr. and I finished it up last night.  I'm thinking it was more geared towards clothing, hence "wardrobe" but how can I go through my clothes without taking care of the rest of the closet too?  I didn't get a shot of my the closet before I sorted through my clothes, I was so eager to start that I totally forgot until I was putting the last handful of clothes back in.  

Yes we are a total redneck family complete with bows hanging in our closet.  What you don't see is all the shotguns and rifles hiding behind the door.  The sad thing is I can't even blame the Mr. for it, one of those bows as well as one of the rifles belong to yours truly.  I can still blame him though, I had no interest in anything like this before I met him.

Like I said no before shot of my clothes, it may not appear so but my clothes are already sorted out in the above shot.  However, I did get these...

These are my old clothes from the closet that are getting donated.  I don't have a picture of it but I finally got around to taking my maternity clothes out of the closet too.  Oh yeah that's right King Cobra is 15 months old and I'm just now getting them out.  Slacker I tell you.  With both our piles of clothes and the stuff that we let go of we have two big over flowing laundry baskets to be donated.  Who needs 4 sets of sheets?  I mean ok ok some people actually make use of more than one set, and I did actually keep an extra set in case of an emergency but generally speaking I take the set off the bed, wash them, and put them right back on.  I like the smell and feel of sheets straight out of the dryer.  So needless to say I came to my senses and tossed 2 sets in the ol donate box or rather donate laundry basket, they haven't made their way into a box yet.  I still need to photograph them and make a list for write off purposes.

So what's next?  I know...

Before and after shots of one of the dressers.  This holds my shorts, tank tops, and pj pants.  I got rid of half the drawer.  The drawer above this belongs to the hubs, generally speaking he's neater than I am so it probably didn't need going through, although I didn't look it's not my drawer and he's a big boy.  Oh and please ignore the crap under and on the dresser in the first shot, hey you said to clean out my wardrobe not my bedroom.  No really it came out of the closet and most is stuff that is getting donated.

All in all I was pretty proud of myself.  Not for getting the closet cleaned out but for letting go of a significant amount of clothes.  Given now that I have received the book and am reading through it (only a few chapters in), I'm a bit ashamed that I didn't let go of more...baby steps, it will come in time.  Like I said in my last post its hard for me to let go of clothes (as I'm sure it is for most people) so I'm proud, because I really did get rid of things that I've been holding on to for far too long.  So without further ado here is a few more of the after shots...the closet in all it's cleanliness glory.

I made use of those wicker baskets that had collected in the floor.  And while you can't really see it the huge leaning tower of jeans on the right (beside where the top wicker basket it) is gone.  Oh yes they made their way into a cozy drawer.

My shoes all nice and neat, and yes that is a basket of dog toys.  I figure I'd rather keep it here than in the living room.  It's not the best of spots but it will have to do for now.

CDs on the left DVDs on the right.  All alphabetized and everything.  I debated on getting rid of the CDs, they take up too much room and we don't use them often but...another day I guess.

I have baskets like this along the top of both sides of the closet, holding various goodies.  These are mainly our bedding:  heating blanket, duvet for the down comforter, extra sheets...the extras and off season stuff.  you can also get a better view of the DVDs, see how pretty and straight they are, again alphabetical order people!

And last but not least, my clothes.  So pretty.  I didn't organize by color, I normally break it down into categories (long sleeve tee, short sleeve tee, button downs, etc) then colors, but I didn't do colors this time.  No reason, ok fine there is a reason...I alphabetized the CDs and DVDs, that was enough!  Did you see how many CDs we have?

So far I'm enjoying the project and am glad I stumbled onto it.  Even more I'm enjoying Tsh's book.  I'm only a few chapters in but I would totally recommend it.  I found it at a great time.  We just finished our taxes and got smacked in the face with reality because of this we were already getting serious about our money and reading through the book and her budgeting ideas really got me thinking about ours.  I've come up with a couple really good ideas we're going to start implementing (actually have already started) and without the book I don't think I would have.  So we're on the right track in the Hickey Long home.  And for now I'm waiting until Monday to find out what week two will bring.

my poor cluttered closet

I find myself blog lusting a lot lately.  Sunday I stumbled across one that pointed me to project simplify.  

For five weeks, we’ll work together and tackle different areas of our homes. Be encouraged and inspired, knowing that there are other families around the world rolling up their sleeves and working alongside you!

Yesterday it started, so being a good little projectee I went to the site.  Master closet was the first up.  Now when I first read it I thought the closet would be day one of week one, and assumed that we'd probably be working on the rest of the master bedroom later this week.  Well when I went back to the site, in the middle of cleaning out the closet (apparently I need inspiration, I don't know, don't ask me) I realize that no in fact we have a week to clean out our closet.  I immediately huffed at the thought that we needed a week to clean out one closet.  OMG I might need two.  Our closet is the biggest area for storage in the entire house, we do have a garage but that doesn't make my point so just forget we do...anyway since it is the biggest it ends up being a dumping ground for stuff that doesn't have a home elsewhere.  Where does the humidifier go?  In our closet.  Where do the Mr. and my bows go?  In our closet.  Where does the footlocker full of banks of pennies go?  What you don't have one of these?  In our closet.  Drawing materials that the hubs is never going to use?  That's right, in our closet.  

Put that on top of the fact that I have an attachment to my clothes and you have an overly stuffed closet that is going to take two weeks to finish, especially now that I know we have an entire week not just one day so being the procrastinator that I am I will put it off until Friday.  So the whole attachment thing, it's not so much an attachment as much of a fear of letting go...same thing right?  ok ok attachment then.  I have clothes that I like that are just too small and I feel that if I get rid of them it's admitting that I'm never going to be that size again.  I'm sure this is fairly common, maybe not.  However yesterday I started with my clothes and got rid of a lot that would fit into that whole admitting failure category.  I'm proud of myself, I have to say.  I just kept telling myself, it's a shirt I can buy a new one, no biggie.  I did keep a few things that were still too small but not a lot, as a goal.  

My clothes got organized and our DVDs, that's it.  It doesn't seem like much but it was two naps worth of work.  I also ordered her book, Organized Simplicity.  I'll let ya know how it is when I get it, it should be here in a couple days.  It has tons of good reviews on Barnes & Noble, so we'll see.