Saturday & Sunday-Full of Organizing

In a impluse attempt to be more organized, like my mom, I purchased the Joy's filing system about two years ago.  At the time, I had really good intentions of becoming paper organized as soon as it arrived in the mail.  However, I got as far as putting all the filing tabs on the hanging files and assembling the binder before stuffing it back in a box and trying to forget I even knew what paper was.   

Saturday, after dance lessons, I parked my tushie on the front room floor and surrounded myself with approximately six boxes full of files and papers that I haven't been organized enough to go through.  Box by box I would sort the papers into small piles around me.  The paper shredder was right next to me so I didn't have to move and my kids were just a hollar away when it needed to be emptied.  They're such good helpers!!!

Jill, our kids Irish Dance TCRG,  came over to give me a CD as I was in the middle of all the chaos and you should have seen the look on her face. Hehe...it was too funny.  Seven hours later I was done..at 8:00 PM. Well, I had one file box left of stuff I just went through, but didn't want to spend any more time filing.  Plus, my tushie was quite sore.  Time flies when you're having fun, I guess.  I had trouble getting up and I highly doubt it was good for me to sit on the floor that long only moving my legs to stave off the annoying sensation that my foot was going to sleep.  

I didn't just happen upon these six boxes of papers, manuals and the like.  It's been a work in progress for several months.  Just check out this post I did at the beginning of this year.  There was a mental process I had to go through before I could even attempt going through the dozens of boxes we had accumulated over the 16+ years of our life together.  There was the basement storage room, the boxes in the garage and of course the one room of house where we stuffed everything that didn't have a place.  Especially when I finally cleaned out those other storage rooms.  This was my basement living room during the storage room clean out.

You do know that the reason I even wanted to tackle this much junk was because I wanted my pine tree's to be in a neatly organized and clean place, right?

Of course, all the stuff that couldn't fit into the storage room was either given to charity, shredded or put in here....

The garage was the next project we tackled and this room looked significantly worse than in this photo.  Yeah, that's been my mission in life.  To move junk from one room to the other. It's my husband's mission in life to hide it all so I don't go through these phases. 

The mental change I had to go through allowed me to finally get rid of things I didn't need.  For instance, I allowed myself one plastic tub to keep my dad's memory items in and one to keep his engineering and AAAD/MAAD books in that I just can't part with.  I even tossed a dozen of his sweat stained baseball caps that had mold growing on them.  I'm very sentimental and while it may be easy for others to have thrown that stuff out years ago, I had to hold on to it.  I couldn't let go.  This time I had to keep reminding myself that he wouldn't want me to keep his old moldy hats. I had to do this with everything I've kept.  Cards, kids papers, etc. 

Getting that organized led to Sunday being productive, too.  I even skipped church, but I'm sure God understands.

My new desk!!!  I've almost finished labeling everything and I actually feel giddy because I FINALLY have a room to be creative in.  It's not just mine though.  In order to talk hubby into splurging on the IKEA furniture, I had to sell him on the idea that this would be a place where the kids could do their homework and be creative, too.  SOLD!

*Cutting table with three drawers that hold almost all of my sewing accessories.

*Blue basket holds various IKEA containers that still need to be hung *somewhere*.

*File box-my last file box that I'll get to sometime this week/weekend.

*Plastic box holds various organizing containers for drawers, etc.

*Black magnetic strip will hold more round containers with sewing supplies. I have one over my desk that holds office supplies like paper clips, tacks, staples, etc.  

I just had to mention that I am using Lazy Organizer's Organzing bags.  I love them, love them, love them!  I would love more, but I think I'm cut off for awhile. Not by Lara, but by hubby. IKEA has seen me too much in the past couple months.  This small organizing bag contains my son's Nintendo DS, games and charger.  It still has tons more room, too. 

The closet filled with various frames and wall hangings as well as boxes of scrapbooking supplies that I so desperately want to sell.  The boxes are the loooooong ones.  They take up most of the closet.  Only problem is, I do not want to go through them and figure out what each item is worth.  I just want to sell it all and hopefully have enough to make the camera I want not look so far away.

That's it.  I've made good progress this weekend and I couldn't be more thrilled.  Knowing what lies ahead is maintenance, laundry,  Spring yard work and having more time with my kids is giving me goosebumps. 

And last, but not least...

PLEASE keep praying for Stellan.  He was doing a little better, but is now having more SVT breakthroughs.  His poor mama & family. They are looking into a second opinion.