CLOSET REVEAL

It turns out that I don't really need a deadline to get things done, the fact that my house literally falls apart when I take on a project is enough motivation for me to get it done!  

I'll start with the pretty pictures and then delve into the ugly truth in another post. 

Now, for the pretty pictures, here is the new and improved closet....

It all started with this $5.00 vintage lantern I found at the thrift store. 

I added the wire baskets for more storage.  

I already had the corduroy bins and they hold purses, hats and a few summer items. 

I ended up purchasing the wire hangers wrapped in velvet.  I bought them at Homegoods. 

They take up less space and there is zero chance my clothes are slipping off those babies.  

I picked up this brass tray at a junk/antique store our on Christmas adventure trip.  

I loved it at first sight and it's perfect for corralling more jewelry.  

I love the fact that is is tarnished, old and imperfect. 

The plate is from Pottery Barn, the frame is from Homegoods 

and the little black box if from the thrift store.

I framed the poem "Footprints" and added it to the closet.  

A very good friend gave me this poem a few years ago when I was going through a rough time. 

I love that I can start each day being reminded of this great message. 

I have been mulling over ways to use these antique doorknobs we inherited with the house. 

 I was thinking of using them as hooks, but for now, I kind of like them on display. 

Last night, I stopped in Hobby Lobby and picked up these knobs for the dresser.  

I took most of the pictures yesterday afternoon sans the knobs. 

The screws were silver and I added a hint of Rub N' Buff to the tops of the screws. 

I just couldn't help myself. I haven't Rubbed N' Buffed anything in about a month. 

Next to my new jewelry display, I have a mom bulletin board.  

I like to hang special things my kids make/give me here. 

It's just an old blank canvas covered in some fabric. 

The stripes turned out great (the second time around, that is).  

I ended up painting the entire wall Sherwin Williams Kilim Beige 

and then did the stripes with Sherwin Williams Sea Salt. 

Here's a shot without the light on.  I love the lantern, but it casts some strange shadows in there. 

The dresser got a coat of cream paint and now blends in much better with the rest of the closet.  

Ahhh, all finished!  Sure felt good to scratch this makeover off the list. 

Just to remind you, this is how the closet looked last week.  

And this was my inspiration board.

I'll share the valuable lesson learned tomorrow.  

For now, I am going grab a cup of hot tea, my kindle, 

hang out in my closet and enjoy the fruits of my labor. Kidding, maybe!

Sharing with:
Savvy Southern Style
Miss Mustard Seed
Home Stories A2Z
Delightful Order

No Minimalist Here
At the Picket Fence
Shine Your Light
Eclectically Vintage

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GETTIN' BUSY

Since it looks like the rain, snow and cold are finally settling in here, I will most likely be bombarding you with projects around the house. I tend to get a tad antsy this time of year since we are stuck inside.

First up, the closet makeover.

Yesterday I purchased the wire baskets and I investigated the hangers.  I brought home some of the wire hangers that are covered in velvet.  If I end up using them, I need to get my hands on 125 more.  

I was originally planning to buy the wooden hangers from Ikea, but when I ran across the ones covered in velvet, I thought they seemed like a great option.  Clothes sliding off the hangers is a bit of a problem in our closet and I think it would be even more of a problem with the wooden hangers. 

Velvet versus wooden - what's a girl to do?  Any advice?

I also finished turning the old window into a jewelry display.  It was quite the process.  

It started out looking like this...

And now it looks like this....

The first thing I did was take it outside and break out the glass with a hammer.  It was exhilarating! 

I did get a few strange looks from a neighbor. 

Next I used metal cutting scissors (very technical term) to trim the wire backing to size. 

The backing is from an old fireplace screen that was here when we bought our house.

After that, I attached the wire backing to the back of the window with small "U" shaped fasteners.  

I added some "S" hooks that I purchased at Lowe's to hold the bracelets and earrings. 

I also added cup hooks at the top for the necklaces. 

I bought this old window from an outdoor antique show years ago.  

I was never quite sure what to do with it.  

So glad I finally found a use for it.  

I was feeling ambitious today and I tackled the stripes. 

I mixed it up a little with the colors and I love the way it turned out.

 I will show you next week. 

The only thing left to do is to paint the dresser.  

Since I loathe sanding and priming, I am thinking of either making my own chalk paint 

using Carmel's instructions or maybe biting the bullet and ordering some Annie Sloan chalk paint.

So it appears that having a deadline for finishing a project is just what I need.  Go figure!

How about you, does a self imposed deadline work for you?

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you all have a fabulous weekend.

Sharing with:
Savvy Southern Style
AKA Design

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KEEPING IT ALL STRAIGHT

I pride myself on being pretty darn organized.  It's a little something I picked up from my grandfather.  

That man was an organizing machine.  Even as a child, I loved having things orderly.  Now, don't get me wrong, with three kids and lots of balls up in the air, every so often, I drop a ball.  

For example, I once forgot to pick up one of my  kids from pre-school.  We've all done that, right?  Please say yes!  A couple of months ago, I was brushing my teeth at about 10:00 a.m. and I suddenly remembered I was supposed to be at the orthodontist that morning at 9:15 a.m.  Ooops!  So while I have the best intentions of keeping it all straight, I'm human, and, obviously, I screw up sometimes. 

The most important organization tool we have in our family is the "Family Calendar".  My old calendar was ready to expire, so I made a trip to Target.  Fortunately for me, a brand new Target opened recently about 3 minutes from my house.  My husband would say that it is very unfortunate.  Anyway, I had planned on buying the same calendar I had last year.  

This one....

It worked well since there was a space for everyone in the family and there was plenty of space to write.

However, I didn't like the fact that I could only see one week at a time. 

While searching for the Post It calendar, I came upon this lovely thing and knew it was perfect.  

It was only $8.99 (compared to $18.99 for the Post-it calendar). 

It has a space for everyone, plenty of room to write, and it even has a spot to fill in the meal for the day.  The best part is I can see the entire month at one glance.  

It's like they designed it just for me!  

Don't you love the name (Organizher)?

It fits perfectly on one of our bulletin boards. 

The bulletin boards hang here, on the side of the refrigerator.

The top bulletin board is used for invitations, schedules, grocery list, birthday list, etc. 

Just on the other side of the wall in the mudroom, is another great organizational tool.  I bought this wooden sorter at Homegoods several years ago and it works great since there are three slots and we have three kids.  When the kids bring their folders home from school each day, we look through them, empty them out and sign what needs to be signed.  The folders go in their slots and they grab them on the way out the door in the morning.  

This summer, their "summer workbooks" are being housed there.  Yes, they have summer homework.  Does everyone have this nowadays?  Even though it is a pain in the you know what, I do think it helps them to not forget everything they learned the previous year.  

Speaking of school papers, once we empty their folders, the papers we want to keep go into this three drawer rubbermaid container.  They each have their own drawer and we keep only the important papers we want to save in here.  Everything else gets recycled.  At the end of the school year, I go through the drawers one more time and the "keepers" get put in an extra large ziploc bag marked with their name, their grade and their teacher's name. The bags are stacked and stored in a rubbermaid container in storage.  So far, each child has only one rubbermaid container.  We are saving less and less each year.  There were so many art projects in pre-school and now we just save a few tests, creative writing and a small number of art projects.  

One last thing that helps keep me organized is this great little book I picked up at Homegoods a few months ago.  I take it everywhere with me and I write down my daily "to do" lists in it.  

It's been a life saver lately. It was only $3.99.  

I know everyone has their own system for keeping it all straight.  This one works for us.  

Care to share any of your organization tips?  

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Just in Case

You just never know when you might be stranded in your house and not able to get to the grocery store.  Well, should that happen to me anytime in the next month, our family could survive on cereal and Cliff bars.  As a family, we consume an embarrassing amount of cereal each week.  My friends poke fun of me and my cereal stash.  Wait until they see this!  I normally buy Honey Nut Cheerios and Life cereal, but recently my husband bought the generic version in the health food section at Kroger.  I snubbed my nose at it initially, but I ended up liking it better than the original Honey Nut Cheerios.  I think it's normally about $2.49 a box, but today it was on sale for $.99.  So what does any sensible mother of cereal addicts do?  I buy 20 boxes.  Plus we already had about six boxes at home.  The Cliff bars are normally $4.99 for a box of six and today they were on sale for $1.99.

My little assistant has been wearing his older brother's old taekwondo outfit around for a few days and he was more than willing to help me build a tower of cereal and Cliff Bars, so he could knock them down.  

Here he is in action!

 

Sadly, I was a little too excited about stacking it all in the pantry.  Seriously, I need to get a life, but look how lovely they look all lined up.  What's that called?  Oh, yes, OCD!

In my defense, it was raining AGAIN today and I have a sinus infection.  So organizing the pantry was the highlight of my day, with the exception of spending some quality time with my little guy.
                    

Be sure to come back tomorrow to hear all about my laundry folding marathon.  Just kidding, I'll try to do something really exciting tomorrow so I can share it with you.

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All Over The Place

That is where my mind is most of the time, all over the place.  After celebrating a wonderful Easter Sunday with my family, I settled in front of my computer to do a little work.  Somehow, I ended up on Pinterest searching for some inspiration for our guest bedroom. By the way, if you have never been on Pinterest, you should immediately go there, after reading this entire post, of course.

Anyway, while looking at beautiful pictures on Pinterest, I came across this.  Isn't it lovely?

I immediately shifted gears and started thinking about my daughter's bedroom, which I'm still working on .  Here's another sneak peek.   Have no fear, progress has been made since this post.  The picture of her on the nightstand has always been one of my favorites.

Okay, where was in my scattered thought process?   Oh yes, the adorable jewelry display I saw on Pinterest.  I thought something like this would be great for my daughter.  She has way too many necklaces and bracelets and she hardly ever wears them because they are all jumbled up in her jewelry box.

When I get an idea, I must act on it right away or it will never get done.  So I pulled out an old picture frame/bulletin board that was under her bed and added some cute tacks that I had sitting around.  Here is what I came up with.

For some strange reason, she has three large towel bars in her bathroom.  There were four until I took it upon myself to chisel one out during the renovation.  Let's just say, that didn't go so well. The tile guy had to make a few repairs to my demolition work.  Anyway, one little girl doesn't need three large towel bars (for towels).  So I used my staple gun and attached some ribbon to the top of the frame and then I tied the ribbon around the top towel bar.

I bought this frame on clearance at Homegood's quite a few years ago.  I painted the frame white, took out the glass and covered the cardboard that came with the frame with some burlap fabric.  I put the cardboard back in the frame and used it as a bulletin board in our previous house.

My little girl started feeling sick tonight so she didn't get to help with this project, but she was thrilled with the outcome.  I think she will be wearing her jewelry a lot more now that it is on display.

And in keeping with the theme of  this post "All Over the Place", here are a few pictures from our Easter celebration.

If you missed the Easter pictures from years 2003-2010, you can go here to see them all.

My three boys!

My sweet little crew and I.

I am linking to:

The Girl Creative

The DIY Showoff

Somewhat Simple

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Hello Sunshine

First things first, I'm thrilled that our kitchen is being featured over at Remodelaholic today.  Be sure to  check it out.  This amazing blog is the perfect place to get inspiration for your own home.  A special thanks to Cassity for inviting me over.  

I have been excited about today all week.  Several reasons: 1) the Remodelaholic feature; 2) no gym on Thursdays so I get to sleep in a little later; 3) taking my son to the park to play; 3) THE SUN WILL BE OUT AND IT IS SUPPOSED TO BE 70 DEGREES!  We have had our fair share of dreary cold weather here and I am ready for Spring.  Funny how sunshine can change your whole mood.  I don't care if I wake up and have two flat tires, I will be happy tomorrow (as long as the sun is shining). 

To bid farewell to the cold weather, I went on a bit of a winter de-cluttering mission.  I am never excited to get all the winter coats, boots, gloves, hats and boots out, but I am always a bit slap happy to put them away.

This is what our mudroom looks like on a normal (cold) day.

This is the new and improved Spring version.

  So much better without all those heavy coats.

I tend to get a bit side tracked when I start a project like this.  

What started out as simply putting some winter wear away,

ended up as a full fledge spring cleaning of the mudroom and pantry. 

Since this is the pantry door, there is no hiding a mess.

 I would love to spruce this space up with some cool paint and glass containers, 

but I was trying to use what I had and just reorganize everything.

Here are the famous tin cans from this post.  This is also where I keep most of 

the kids' craft supplies and my cleaning supplies. 

And just to make sure Old Man Winter knows he is no longer welcome here, 

I added a lovely message to the chalkboard. 

Linking to:  

I Heart Organizing

Houseography

The Mustard Ceiling

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