Casual Update - Seeking Comments/Suggestions

So for the last few days I have been taking a break from the organizing kick I had =)  I still have it however I am running out of main areas to tackle. Between celebrating a belated Valentine's, my car acting funky, and my friend going to the hospital related to her pregnancy I've been pretty distracted from my blog!

Here is my request - please post your comments/suggestions on what I have posted so far AND what you would like to see me cover in the future.  I can't promise that I will implement exactly what you suggest but your comments may inspire me to tackle something else!

Fridge Conquest - It was a tough battle!

I should have known better than to tackle this expecting to be done in an hour or so!  *smiles* I'm glad I did though, it had to be done!  How much food goes to waste and how much time is spent trying to figure out what to eat?  I have done it so many times, open the fridge thinking "man, we have nothing to eat" or "eh, I don't want anything in here because it'd take too much time to fix something." In the middle of this battle I decided to make some juice for the next couple of days for us too (too darn ambitious!) haha. It's not perfect but it is a whole lot better than it was before. See for yourself!

Before...

After!

Sock/Underwear Drawers - Conquered!

WOW!  So here's what I did...I emptied out my two top dresser drawers on to my bed (hence the Before picture).  After sorting through by throwing away undergarments I am never going to wear again and overused socks that needed to desperately retire (holes, tears, stains, evidence wear etc). The whole process between the Before picture and the After picture took less than one hour!  This project has made me realize that I have more socks than underwear & bras combined.  I think I just realized what I really want for Valentine's Day. *smiles*

49 Pieces of Clothes in 1 Drawer!

I spent about an hour and half sorting through my dresser and organized the clothing articles again in 4 categories: Trash, Donate, Sell, and Keep.  I did not find any clothes in there that I wanted to sell. There were some that I am willing to donate.  Basically I had 3 drawers of clothes I wanted to keep and I folded them in a way that I can SEE what shirts I have. I also managed to fit all 49 pieces of shirts (t-shirts, sleeveless, long-sleeved, and camisoles/tanks) in ONE single drawer. AMAZING.  My drawers are not unusually large either it's about... 24"W x 14" D x 6" H. Yes I could have spent the two hours playing a video game or watching a movie before bed...but I decided to be productive and use that time to sort through my clothes, fold them, and blog about it. *smiles*

Operation Declutter: Mission Underway

So after doing a little of research on how others were able to get organized (and stay that way!) and after tackling the decluttering project for the last 48 hours...there are THREE things that I learned so far...

• Establish FOUR different piles and sort accordingly:
• Trash - Stuff you do not need, will not be used by anyone else.
• Donation - Stuff that you haven’t used in over a year, can be used by someone else.
• Sell - Stuff you haven’t used in a while and can make money from selling it.
• Keep - Stuff you use on the regular basis and cannot part with (yet).
• This is TIME CONSUMING.
• This is the reason why you should not let things become clutter (spend less time cleaning/spend more time living!)
• It FEELS GOOD!
• It is so gratifying to look at a room you’ve been working on and see that everything there has a place and a purpose.

Today I found out that I have a loveseat!  Seriously, I haven’t seen this in weeks.  Note to self: the sofa and loveseat are for: sitting, reclining, napping, and lounging.  It is not a shelf, waste basket, coat holder, etc.  The bedroom has been tackled and now the livingroom is also decluttered.  Over the next few days the goal is to take all donations to Goodwill/Salvation Army and sell the stuff to be sold. 

...and it starts!

Today my husband came to me with two unopened beautiful cans of ginger snaps and he asked, "where would you like me to put these?"  I suggested he put them on the dining table in the kitchen and replies with how he wants to have a house one day where we can have a place for everything with a purpose.  I remember thinking "well, we do aim to eat those one day" then it hit me.... why in the world do we have so much stuff?  Then that lead me to think why does our house get so messy that we have to dedicate our days off cleaning it? If we didn't make such a big mess, we could spend less time cleaning, and if we can spend less time cleaning, then we can just start enjoying each others' time and company.  Today I realized that we need to have less stuff.  To have our house in a state where everything DOES have its place and purpose.  We don't need to wait for a bigger house to start this. In fact, it may be important to start good habits now instead of struggling to change them later on.