Day 6 Challenge- Them dirty drawers!

You must say that with a southern accent! Think Brenda Lee in The Closer.

Lot's of pictures today. Lots accomplished today.

This before picture is a little embarrassing:

Squint real hard and you can make out the top of my dresser.

Commence the emptying and purging of Le Crap!  I cleaned off EVERYTHING, dusted, and started making piles. My entire bedroom floor was covered. In clothes, not dust, just to clarify.

Dust rag- yuck!

 

Fave pics of my husband. Isn't he cute doing crossing guard duty?

Candles are my friend! Lighting is everything in this room ;)

Gift from Santa. The dock, not the iPod.

 I bought the iPod myself. Cue Destiny's Child here- All the women who are independent, throw your hands up at me!

Some decor.

 I don't like my dresser too empty. It reminds me of when we were selling our first house and had to remove any personal effects. I like my house to look lived in.

Buh- bye!

 Those are all dollar store and homemade gifts from the kids that I get for Mother's Day and my birthday and Christmas, and, and, and. They are all over my house and I love them but I've decided to relocate them to my curio cabinet in in the living room.

Behold, a dresser!

 Now onto those drawers!

My br*ssiere drawer before.

 I wear the same 4 br*'s over and over again so this drawer is almost all going to donate! Wonder what that gray towel is doing in there?

My fancy schmancy jewelry roll up.

One day I'll get a real one, but for now the towel/rubber band system works for me! This is temporarily holding the jewelry I don't want in my jewelry box because my 2 year old really likes to dig around in there lately. I don't have much real jewelry but the few pieces I do have mean a lot to me!

Br*ssieres after!

My workout clothes drawer before.

Work out clothes after!

Hello, IKEA cubbies.

 I'm using the cubbies above for my socks and undi*s. I matched all my socks and trashed a lot of unders! I'm a big thrift store shopper but I draw the line at buying second hand unders so I just threw mine in the trash. I can neither confirm or deny if I just now got rid of maternity undi*s.

Pj's before.

 I'm finally giving away my maternity pj's. My husband will not be sad to see those leave. I, on the other hand will shed a small tear. They are so comfortable! They are so big on me though that they tend to fall down when I 'm walking around in them.

Bye lovelies!

Newly condensed albeit a little wrinkly pj drawer!

 

The fun drawer before :)

 I was holding onto much of my ling*rie because most of it I received as gifts at my bridal shower. That was almost 5 years ago! So got rid of what doesn't fit and kept only what does.

Ready to play name that tune? "Victoria's Secret, well their stuffs real nice. But I can buy the same damn thing on a Walmart shelf half price and still look sexy, just as sexy as those models on TV. No, I don't need no designer tag to make my man want me."

That was fun! Sorry, got a little sidetracked there, back to the challenge!

Gift hiding drawer. That box holds a Tim Tebow jersey for my son, shh...don't tell.

I feel an explanation is necessary for those disgusting Vienna Sausages. Those belong to my husband. I forgot they were even in there. I can't even stand the smell of them. I buy them once a year for his Christmas stocking and these are the extras. He eats them straight from the can- urp!

I found a different hiding place for gifts and found this in return:

Gasp! An entire empty drawer! Oh the possibilities.

But really I just moved my jeans from the closet to the empty drawer.

 Wow! That was a lot of hard work but also very therapeutic! I think it looks great too! I purged a TON of old stuff today. My donate pile is rapidly growing. I was going to make a trip to Goodwill later in the week but now I think I'll hold onto it until after the challenge is over and take one final group picture!

Thanks to Toni over at A Bowl Full of Lemons for hosting this challenge. It is so much fun and long overdue for my house!

Still trucking along

Day 5 for me, day 8 for others. I'm not giving up though. I thought we were out of the woods with the nasty head cold but my 12 year old stayed home from school today. I think it's time to double up on the green smoothies.

Headed under the kitchen sink today. No plumber crack in sight!

Even my two year old knows the routine by now, as soon as I got down on the floor and opened the cupboard he started to take everything out. Oh wait- first my before picture:

I {heart} Costco!

I wiped down the inside with some hot soapy water then put down some non-slip water resistant covering. Have a look see:

I even cut around the pipes.

Made a mistake while buying bins. I didn't account for the pipes. Is it just me or does my sink have more pipes than most? They were very hard to work around. I purchased a 3 drawer bin to hold my sponges and brushes but it didn't fit. I'm not gonna lie- I was bummed. Not too bummed though. I just used another bin I had.

Look closely, my helper left his hammer in there.

I'm not totally satisfied with it but it'll do for now. ("That'll do Donkey, that'll do" Name that movie!) I also bought a set of racks for the doors to hold my cleaning supplies but once I got them home I had second thoughts about putting the screws into the doors. (We rent) So I'm waiting to find the perfect over-the-door rack but until then- tada! It does look better. I added the dish rack to the donate pile since the only time it gets used is when my mom visits. I also put our recycling container under the sink. It used sit under our breakfast bar, next to the trash can. I like it better here though, it makes the kitchen look more tidy.

I bought some Shaklee products from our Organizing Challenge host over at A Bowl full of Lemons but I've yet to try them. I'm excited to see if they live up to the hype. Until then, I'll use up what I already have.

I'm a little overwhelmed because I'm behind in the challenge but I'm excited at what's happening so I'm determined to finish!

Not quite grown.

There's a lot of Teenageritis going on in my house these days. She's almost 15, she rolls her eyes. Often. She is sure her younger siblings are here on earth just to annoy her. She spends a lot of time in her room. She texts. A lot. She thinks I don't understand or remember what it feels like to be almost 15. Her dad is worried that she she'll speak in mumbled one word answers for the rest of her life. 

She is also an honor student. She is a hard worker. She's excelling on the swim team. She started school this year in a new state, as a Freshman, not knowing one person and still received 10 votes towards becoming team captain.  She is dependable. She is responsible. She has moxie. I'm in awe of her bravery most days. 

Crazy girl

Sat in line with me to see Santa. She looks excited, yes?

Beautiful in every way.

She still likes to crawl into Mama's bed when she's sick.

 I had to resist the very strong temptation to crawl in next to her and snuggle.

Day 4* - Feeling Better

The rest of the folks doing the challenge are on day 7 but half of my household got hit hard by a head cold. Combine that with my 2 year old's first ear infection, first sick child visit and first round of antibiotics ever and we've been a bit overwhelmed here. Everybody is finally feeling better though so I'm trying to catch up with the organizing. I did escape one afternoon and put my time out of the house to good use. I hit the Dollar store and Walmart and loaded up on a ton of organizing bins and caddies.

Day 4 is the Linen closet. I technically didn't have a linen closet before today. I have the closet in the hallway near the main bathroom that holds towels and washcloths. All the spare bedding was housed in each individual bedroom. I have 2 sets each of sheets, pillow cases, and blankets for each bed in the house. I do that in hopes that my children would be inclined to change the sheets on their beds more often. It's simple really- when you strip the bed of dirties, just put the clean set on and throw the used set down in the laundry room. Just the other day though I asked my oldest daughter when the last time she had changed her sheets and couldn't believe the answer, so...I took full advantage of today's challenge to make a linen closet. With everything in one place, I will be better able to keep track of who is and who isn't changing sheets.

Now, where to put it? We have 3 closets in our master bedroom so I am going to use this one:

Pretend before picture.

Full disclosure time. This isn't the exact closet I'm going to use but my husband was excited to help and he cleared everything out of the other closet before I had a chance to take a before picture. It's identical to this one except it stored boxes (about 4!) of stuff from his childhood and parts to our toddler's crib. It was just as crowded as this one, so use your imagination.

Then I yelled at kindly asked my kids to bring me all their spare, clean bedding. Only my 12 year old could find hers. Hmm...

"Oh, since you're already here, help me fold these sheets please!" She was more than happy to :)

When the rest of the spare bedding comes back from the wash, it will now have a home here:

Hi Minnie!

Spare blankets, beach towels, pillow cases.

Twin sheets, king sheets and the basket has a heating pad and a travel pillow.

I also used the top shelf for an extra duffel bag and Kiwi's travel suitcase. It had been in his room but he keeps stuffing all his socks and underwear in it. Now it's way out of his reach.

I'm off to catch up on the rest of the Challenge!

Day 3 - Easy Peasy!

Today's project is to tackle that Tupperware! This was easy for me because believe it or not the tupperware cupboard is one of the only places that really bugs me if it's messy. I try to organize it at least on a weekly basis. I don't put anything inside the cupboard unless it has a matching lid.

Not too shabby

I did take the time however to switch everything from one cupboard to another. Something I've been wanting to do but haven't taken the time. 

Nice and neat

I did steal borrow a basket from Kiwi's room until I can get to the $ store for a smaller, different colored one. Until then, this now holds those small, round containers that only seem to hold a few tablespoons of sauce, but I keep them because they do come in handy for kids lunches.

Just think, in about 18 more days I should have a sparkly, organized house. Now if only these  challenges could do something about the sibling bickering...

Day 2 and I'm ready for a nap!

Today I tackled the desk. Well, only the top of the desk. It's almost as if the Bowl full of Lemons lady knows me. I think she's starting off slow so some of us participating in the challenge don't run screaming from our computers. Baby steps. I'm a big fan of baby steps. I'm also a big fan of getting my clutter under control so I'm fully committed to finishing this 21 day challenge. 2 days down! Stops typing for a moment to pat herself on the back. 

Before

Don't judge.

So I unloaded everything from the top of the desk. Well, I left the printer and phone, but everything else got moved. I resisted the urge to just make one giant sweep with my arm over all the crap clutter.

Then I made it shine like the top of the Chrysler building! Can you name that movie?

Here came the hard part. Sorting through everything. I had one box for Donate, one for Keep and a trash bag for well...trash. Only a few things landed in the Donate box. (eensy weensy baby steps) Then I sorted through the Keep box. This took hours. It took longer because I had this feverish little monkey helping me:

Cute little Monkey!

I did however fill this trash bag. GO ME!

I'm so excited about all the stuff I found buried on that desk!

One of my favorite pics of my now 12 year old and myself.

My ipod holder. They still keep calling me Mom.

A gift card we bought (and promptly lost) as a thank you gift. NOW I remember where I put it!

Here are some much improved after pictures!

A nice snug home for my baby mac.

The basket holds tape, sticky notes & paper clips.

 

 

Printer paper, bill holder, pencil jar, a few fave pics and an old Mother's Day gift.

My printer that looks new after I dusted him, another Mother's Day gift, and that cute little framed picture.

All finished!

I may actually pay bills here now instead of hauling the bill caddy to the couch.

I'm totally pumped for Day 3, bring it on!

Day One and already behind...typical.

I'm participating in A Bowl Full of Lemons 21 day organizing challenge. It started yesterday, but never one to sprint out of the gate,  I didn't start until today. First up, the junk drawer. Would you believe me if I told you I don't have a junk drawer? It's true! Although since we just moved 7 months ago recently, I may have an entire junk room, but that wasn't the assignment! So I picked another drawer in my kitchen that holds utensils.
Here's the before picture:

That's not too bad right?

I emptied the entire drawer, got rid of a few things I hadn't used in awhile, washed out the drawer before putting everything back, then organized everything into this handy dandy caddy I bought from Target. It only took about 10 minutes total.

Here's the after picture:

I'm excited for the next project! I hope it's how to tackle a "dump room"! You know, that room that stores all the stuff you probably shouldn't have even moved with you in the first place, but are just too lazy busy to start going through stuff? You have one of those rooms too, right? Right?!

What's for dinner tonight.

Today I'm trying a new recipe from A year of slow cooking. I love this lady's blog, a few years ago she made a New Year's resolution to use her crockpot every single day. I've made many of her recipes, and every single one has been a hit with my family. I took the plunge today and finally ordered her new book. I can't wait to get it in the mail!
I love my crock pot. I use it at least 3 times per week. When I was a single parent I used it 5-6 times per week. I would use my lunch break from work to go home and throw something in. It saved the nightly what's for dinner question, saved us from stopping for fast food, and most importantly saved my minuscule single parent budget! Oh man, that seems a lifetime ago...

Back to tonight's recipe. We are having Margarita Chicken. I had all the ingredients in my kitchen except for one. Chicken. Not one to let a tiny little thing like not having the main ingredient deter me, I just used a pork loin instead. We'll see how it turns out in about 4 hours. I plan on serving mine with quinoa and a salad.

2010 year in review

2010 will officially go down as the suckiest (what? it's a word.) year on record. That's not to say I didn't learn oh-so valuable life lessons, but still, in a nutshell- it wasn't a good year.

Here are my Top 7 Reasons Why:
1. Moved away from family and friends and everything I've ever known
2. Sold our first home at a tremendous loss
3. Moved to a new, cold, cloudy, rainy, sunless state
4. Marriage crumbled
5. Hit my all time personal low in life
6. Dad had a heart attack
7. Felt God had abandoned me

Now, having stated that I learned a lesson from each and every item above. It was painful but I learned and I grew. Here's how:

1. Being away from everything familiar has forced me to branch out of my comfort zone in so many ways. It has forced my little family to band together.

2. It was our first home but it wasn't filled with happiness. Not even close. Took a $30K hit and we're still paying it off. It's been worth every penny though to have relationships restored in the resulting move. We're now living in a rented house with mauve carpet and a matching mauve kitchen. But it's a pink house filled with peace and love. Wow, that sounds cheesy.

3. Ok, if I'm being completely honest I'm still struggling to to find the lesson in moving here. I miss the Colorado sunshine. I miss the 300 + days of sun per year. I miss real mountains. Sigh. I am learning though that home is where my family is. My husband and kids and I are together and wading through the transition as a team. It's pretty cool.

4. My world fell apart at the beginning of last year. Oh so slowly though, we're rebuilding what was ruined. Whoa boy, this was a tough one. I've learned to love is a choice, to trust is a choice and both decisions have to be made daily. Sometimes multiple times per day. Sometimes multiple times per hour. I'll probably be learning this for the rest of my life. I've learned powerful lessons on forgiveness and grace and mercy. To quote Mahatma Ghandi- The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. I am stronger than I ever gave myself enough credit for and I'm not too modest to claim that.

5. Oh yeah, spent months in sweats or pj's, on the couch, barely functioning. I cried every.single.day from June to October. This one is very personal and made me come to grips with my thinking that depression is a spiritual problem. I no longer believe that. I reached out to my church and got paired up with a counselor.  I knew I had to do something though, to be able to come back to the land of the living before my kids are all moved out. Don't get me wrong, living in lala land has it's pros such as baggy, comfortable clothes, a nice indention in the couch that fits you perfectly, being on a first name basis with the pizza delivery person- but it's not how I want my kids to remember me. I also discovered NCIS during the my days on the couch. I now love that show. Oh Leroy Jethro Gibbs, make my heart go pitter pat!

6. This one scared me. I am thankful though that I was close enough to drive to be with him and had the resources available to be able to afford it. We live on the Dave Ramsey plan so we had an Emergency Fund established. The day I left to be with my dad, my husband and I were separated and barely on speaking terms. I spent a week with my Dad, away from my husband and by the time I made the drive home, for the first time in almost a year, I actually missed my husband and felt the tiniest bit of hope for saving our marriage. I also developed a new friendship with my elderly neighbors, one that I cherish. They stepped up and opened their home to my kids before and after school while I was gone. I'm not sure I would have been able to make the trip to see my dad had they not been willing to help in that way.

7. This forced me to go looking for him. Again. I've found him in a fresh, new way. Of course during my search, I discovered He in fact never left me in the first place.

So, while I'm not at all sad to say goodbye to 2010 and I'm looking forward to 2011, I'll always look back on this past year as the one that changed everything.

Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas

Feeling so very blessed this morning.

For friends & kind, honest words

for the birth of a child, my All, my Savior

for family though they are too far away

for my husband and second chances

for nieces and nephews who I know and love, and the ones I don't know but still love

for moody teens who still want to snuggle

for messy rooms but clean hearts

for lessons learned and thorny sides

for questioning 10 year olds and unconditional love

for toddler tantrums and eskimo kisses

for sister best friends and memories to help the hurt

for snowy Christmas Eve mornings.

Life is good.

E's descriptive writing prompt

This is what E wrote at school about his bedroom:

My Little Kingdom

When you walk into my room, you will smell the Axe man spray that I scent it with everyday. My room is a mess, but not cause I like it like that. It's messy and scented with Axe so my sisters won't come in. My bed is untidy because what's the point of making it if you just mess it up again? I have a bookshelf that has my entertainment, and is right next to my bed. Across from my bed is my comforter which gets thrown there everyday. My walls are littered with pictures of Star Wars characters, sea monsters and trolls (aka my sisters). Clothes- the number one thing that makes my room dirty. Yeah- they make it to the basket...but that's when my mom makes me. My closet on the other hand is pretty clean. Just a Revolutionary War battleship and some clothes hanging up. As you can see, my room (in my opinion) is like a kingdom!

I will definitely be saving this one!

A little slice of peanut butter heaven

I found this recipe for a Peanut Butter pie on a blog that I follow, Thrifty Decor Chick. I changed it just a little and man oh man is it good! The best part is it's totally easy too!

Hoss said it's better than the one his mom makes. (!!!) Although, with his next bite, mumbled through a mouthful of pie, he said he would deny having said that until his dying breath.


Here's the recipe:

3/4 C confectioners sugar (today I learned that confectioners sugar and powdered sugar are the exact same thing. Who knew? Oh yeah, me too...I was just checking...)

6 oz. cream cheese

1/2 C peanut butter

2 T milk (I use Almond milk and it worked just fine)

One container of Cool whip (I made my own, an extra step but worth it)

Graham cracker crust or chocolate graham crust.

First, beat together the cream cheese and sugar.
Then add the peanut butter and milk, mix together.
Then fold in (almost) all of the whipped cream. You'll save a little to top with later.
Next, dip your finger into the bowl to make sure it tastes ok. Roll your eyes in blissful abandon, savoring this moment. *ahem*
Repeat last step. Slap your own hand so you stop eating the pie filling.
Then plop it into the crust and make it smooth and pretty. **
Let it chill for a few hours then top with the leftover whip cream.
Drizzle with a little chocolate syrup.
Enjoy.
Skip your next 2 meals because you just split a half of a pie with your husband.

This baby is even better the next day and makes a yummy breakfast accompanied with a cup of coffee!


**(I chopped up some mini Reeses pb cups and mixed those in after the cool whip is folded in before the plopping into the crust. I also halved some more pb cups for garnish before adding the choco syrup.

The most wonderful time of the year.

It's Christmas time! My favorite time of the year. We hunted down our own tree this year and it has made the house smell sooo good. It was fun hiking and hunting for the perfect tree. Cold, cold, fun, but fun still. We learned that some of us like tall skinny trees (wrong) and some of us like short, full trees (right). It's decorated with years and years worth of handmade ornaments from preschool, Kindergarten, church, and school. I love, love, love them. Little handprints of my kids that aren't so little anymore, hanging next to numerous Baby's First Christmas ornaments. One of my favorite things to do is sit in the dark and look at the lights twinkling on the tree. I like all white lights but the kids out voted me and put multi-colored lights on this year. I still have my little 4 foot tree that I keep out year round, so I put white lights on it. It looks just like it's full of stars twinkling in the night. So pretty and peaceful. The big tree is bare on the bottom. It started out full of ornaments but slowly I've started moving them up out of Kiwi's reach. Maybe next year he will be old enough to ignore the temptation to grab every one. He hasn't broken any, he just likes to take them off and look at them or show them to us, in case we haven't seen them before. He is also the reason that I won't be putting any presents out early. I will have to put them all out on Christmas eve, otherwise he would unwrap each and every one!

The mystery of the vanishing blog.

I cleaned up my blog. I took a few days and deleted all the ugly posts that had been filling it up. I basically got rid of anything that I wouldn't want my kids to read. There were many many posts written about how much I hated my husband and detailed the reasons why. 4 months of personal counseling and 2 months of marriage counseling have helped me change my ways. I have seen the light! I feel like this is where a man in a periwinkle suit prays over me, slaps me on the forehead and I fall backwards into the welcoming arms of Periwinkle Mans entourage.
I'm in a completely different marriage today. I finally feel like this is what marriage is supposed to feel like. I'm in on the joke now. I'm still married to the same person. He still puts his job first. I'm still high maintenance (his words, not mine). Whatev. I like to think of myself as being passionate and opinionated about things that are important to me. Anywhoo...
There's nothing I can say except it's only by the power of the Holy Spirit and His grace that I am still married. Forgiveness and grace are my best friends these days. 6 months ago I had both feet out the door and a plan in action of how to move back home. I still want to move back to Colorado, but now I want my husband to come with me.


There is so much more I want to say about this topic. I'll save it for a later time.

Bye Bye Binky

When Kiwi was about 4 months old we had a binky emergency. It went missing. Everybody in the house searched high and low and couldn't find it. I made a trip to Target to get a replacement and couldn't find the kind he had been using so I just grabbed one and headed home. He refused to take it. We ended up buying every kind of binky sold at Target to get him to sleep and he just would not be comforted. It was a very long night. First thing the very next day I went to the hospital where he was born and bought 8 or 9 binkies because that was the kind he liked. We just opened his last one. I'm not going to buy any more so that means it's time to start weaning from the bink.

Two of my kids sucked their thumb and the other two used a binky. Ana was 14 months old when she handed me her binky one day and never asked for it again. It was the same thing with her bottle, just handed it to me and was done! It's not going to be that easy with Kiwi. This kid loooves his binky. He is only allowed to have it in his bed at nap or bed time. He tries to sneak it at other times but doesn't get away with that too often. In fact when I try to take it out of his mouth he clamps down on it with his teeth and trying to pull it out is like wrestling with a pitbull. He loves that "game"!

I'm not sure how to go about it though. Should I just take it and make him quit cold turkey? Or offer it to him only at night? Only give it to him if he asks for it? Well that last one wouldn't work because it's the first thing he grabs when it's bedtime. As soon as I tell him it's time to get ready for bed he makes a beeline for the drawer we keep it in. He won't say prayers until he has it firmly in place.

This is going to be an adventure.

How low can you go?

Music seems to be the only way I feel God lately. My Bible? I read it. Church? I go. Tithe? Check. Devotions with the kids? Yes.
I cry and cry and cry and I ask and I ask and I ask. The response?
**Crickets chirping...**
...

It's frustrating. Definitely at a low point right now. A valley.

"The pathways are broken, and the signs are unclear, and I don't know the reason why You brought me here. But just because You love me the way that You do, I'm going to walk through the valley if You want me to. 'Cause I'm not who I was when I took my first step and I'm clinging to the promise You're not through with me yet. So if all of these trials bring me closer to You, then I will go through the fire if You want me to. It may not be the way I would have chosen when You lead me through a world that's not my home but You never said it would be easy You only said I'd never go alone." ~If you want me to by Ginny Owens

The Screaming Banshee

The OH SO terrible two's...

This morning E asked me why Kiwi was being such a brat. I explained the phenomenom of the terrible two's to which E replied "Man, I hope he turns 3 soon!"
I hate to say it but lately we all look forward to Kiwi's daily nap time.


Don't let this sweet innocent face fool you:





Look closely at this face, you see it don't you?: