Organization

I always laugh about how January issues of women's magazines are all about organization.  How silly that we're all expected to fall in line with wanting to get our houses in order just because Christmas is over.  And yet, that's exactly what winds up happening in my house.  *sigh* 

I think I figured it out, though.  It's when my husband is on vacation, and when he's suddenly doing all these projects around the house (example: it used to be the one time of the year that Steven's former Star Wars room would get dusted and cleaned), I want to work around the house, too. 

We've lived in this house nearly 12 years.  In all that time, the shelves in the garage had never been cleaned.  But over the holidays, Steven tackled that project.  And wow!  It's amazing how much extra space he reclaimed by doing so!

The bottom shelf with seemingly-5000 boxes of ziplocs is reclaimed space.  Steven wanted to create more pantry space for me, which he did in spades!  So excited!  And notice that I had to Martha Stewart it all up a bit with some MS shelf paper.  Not because the garage needs to be prettier, but because this will make the shelves easier to wipe down. 

I got busy in my mess of a craft room.  (It's always a mess when I mention it here.)  But this time it was a wreck.

All that piled up mess in the above photo is now organized, put away, or moved to the giveaway pile in the guest room.  I also had a mess of paperwork to deal with.  Let's just say that my shredder begged for a break after I kept shredding receipt after receipt after receipt.  Seriously, it gave up.  Just wouldn't work any more.  It was back to business, though, after resting for a couple of hours. 

Steven also got the former Star Wars room all fixed up after a trip to Ikea.  (And who am I kidding?  I bought some stuff there, too.)  Pictures of his room to come at another time. 

Cleaning up and organizing always feels so good!