Category Archives: Open House
When I Say I’m Busy…
I mentioned way back in March that my house was a mess and I needed to take a blogcation to deal with it. Well, during my “blogcation” I wrote a ton of posts, co-hosted The No Housework Party (ironic, no?) with Rachael, got the flu for two weeks, took Adaline to see the Easter Bunny, had Easter, was poked and prodded by the obgyn, had mother’s day, made a baby, redesigned my blog, and then it was June, and guess what…yeah, I never cleaned anything. Blah. The mess needs to be addressed and fast. We have a room we use for storage that’s going to have a baby sleeping in it in eight months.
Here’s what I did accomplish during my “blogcation” (researching, finding, and ordering the tables included).
But then it got junked up again and so this is what we accomplished last week….
One of the reasons why I need guest bloggers is because my computer is needed for other things. For the past two days I’ve had my laptop hooked up to my VCR and I’ve been transferring videos into digital format. Then I can either ditch or store the videos and create some much-needed space. This is going to take months. The transfer happens in real-time which means if I have 80 hours of video, it’s going to take 80 hours to transfer which means that’s 80 hours that I can’t access my email/blog. On top of my extreme exhaustion and potential nausea that may or may not begin any day now…I’m really hard at work trying to get this stuff done so that we can finally clean up this mess.
Here’s the set up that I’ve got going on.
The computer on the far left is being used to transfer audio cassettes into digital format. My laptop is hooked up to the VCR which is transferring VHS tapes into digital format. I can be in the family room with Adaline while these two computers are busy doing their transferring thing. When I have someone to keep an eye on her, then I sit at the table and scan photos into the small black scanner to the right of the laptop. When I’m done scanning I mark the back of each photo with an “s” so that I know it’s been scanned.
Needless to say that I not only have very little time for blogging since my computer is otherwise occupied, but I also am exhausted by the end of the day and just really don’t feel like writing. I have a million ideas for great posts (oh you will love the extensive Father’s Day link list if I ever get a chance to finish it!), but after a day chasing around a toddler and/or melting my brain in front of a scanner (coupled with pregnancy brain and crazy hormones), I just can’t wrap my head around writing. In fact, I’m pretty sure that I’m rambling now because words just don’t seem to make sense to me anymore.
So the less you hear from me should be a good thing. It should mean that my laptop is hard at work transferring videos. Although I may be absent from commenting on your blogs as much as I usually do, I’d really appreciate it if you could help me show my appreciation to my guest bloggers by commenting on their posts here and visiting their blogs. They are truly helping to keep me sane.
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Wordless Wednesday: Express Your Mess
This is supposed to be a Wordless Wednesday, but it won’t be entirely Wordless (which you probably already guessed from all the, ya know…words) and the more I talk about how not-Wordless it is the more Wordful it becomes. Okay, I think it’s now officially “Wordful”.
Tomorrow is No Housework Day and Rachael from Non-Domestic Mama and I are hosting a No Housework Party. In honor of our favorite holiday we thought we would be totally honest and express ourselves by confessing our messes…in photos.
There are some areas of my house that stay pretty neat most of the time: Adaline’s nursery, the family room (which is actually supposed to be the dining room but I don’t, ya know…cook), and the laundry room which is usually uncluttered on non-laundry days (duh), but is always filthy as far us dust, dirt, and grime is concerned (yay!).
Just as I have areas that stay fairly clean I have others that are disasters: the master bedroom, the spare bedroom, and the living room, which I will show you today.
So it is with great pride (or complete and total embarrassment) that I reveal to you my mess.
Here is the master bedroom. I straighten all of the junk up about once a month and then junk it back up within a few days. There’s a lot of paper clutter because right now this is where I work on the bills and scan documents into the laptop. This will hopefully be resolved soon as we turn our living room into an office in the next few months.
We never go into the living room, so unfortunately it became a hot spot for junk in transition. This is supposed to go in the basement…put it in the living room in the meantime. This is supposed to go to mom’s house, this is supposed to go with Cool Daddy to work, this is supposed to go upstairs…put it in the living room in the meantime. I can’t stand looking at clutter, so with the exception of the master bedroom, I keep the clutter in rooms that I never go in. It’s a great system (not!). Again this is something that should be resolved once this room is converted into an office (hopefully).
The spare bedroom is the worst. We use it to store things we have no other place for or that we don’t want to put in the icky basement and risk ruining. We are in the process of getting the storage room and the living room cleaned out (hence the need for my blogcation that I’m obviously not taking while I’m writing on and on about my mess). It is a slow work in progress. You should’ve seen how bad it looked last week.
Don’t forget to stop by Non-Domestic Mama to see what mess Rachael is confessing to today 🙂
You, my dear readers, get to be part of something very special. In celebration of this most glorious day of all days on the calendar Rachael from Non-Domestic Mama and myself are teaming up to host the first annual No Housework Party! Oh yes. Not much will be different for Rachael and I since we avoid housework every chance we get…but for those of you dedicated domestic goddesses…we’re giving you the day off!
This Thursday, April 7, stop by and link up your post!
You might also be interested in:
*My Least Favorite Chore: Here’s a hint it rhymes with “fishes” 😉
*Open House: Storage: I am deceptively organized
*Open House: Adaline’s nursery: Pink and Green Shabby Chic…and clean!
*Open House: The Family Room: Clean!
*Open House: The Laundry Room: “Clean”! Too bad you can’t see all of the spider webs and dirt in these photos 😉
*Open House: The Master Bedroom: A tour of the master bedroom when it was clean that one time!
Coolest Family on the Block is committed to helping you find creative ways to have fun and make memories with your family all year-long. Don’t miss an idea, tip, or trick…subscribe and have updates sent directly to your email!
My mama’s kitchen
At the beginning of November I entered my mom’s kitchen in a contest to win new appliances. I worked really hard to get her votes by posting reminders daily on Facebook and Twitter, blogging about it here, and emailing everyone that I know! I fell way behind in my blogging for those 17 days and I still can’t seem to catch up. Unfortunately despite my best efforts we didn’t get enough votes for her to make it into the top ten.
My mom is a great mom/grandma/daughter/sister/aunt who loves to cook for her family. Ask anyone that knows her what an awesome cook she is! My mom really deserves new appliances…she deserves an entire new kitchen makeover! Maybe one day we’ll be able to help her get her dream kitchen (or at least one where the floors and fridge aren’t duck taped together. Until then, enjoy these photos of my mom’s old, beat up kitchen.
My mom’s freezer is older than me (I think). Ice gets built up in the freezer too quickly and easily.
My mom’s fridge has to be 20-30 years old too. Can you see the duct tape holding shelves on to the doors of the fridge? The hand towels shoved between the vegetable bins are there to collect water because the fridge leaks (?). In the last photo of the fridge you can also see the horrible floors where the tile has come off.
Here’s the stove, where the magic happens 😉 I’m not sure how old it is but I think it has to be at least 10 years old if not older. I believe that the hood/range thingy is older (Can’t you tell that I’m an accomplished cook by my use of technical kitchen appliance jargon? Be very impressed.) It’s hard to tell in the photo but if you look close you can see pantyhose underneath the hood holding the stove range together.
I got this microwave for my mom about 10 years ago. Some of the lines for the digits are starting to fade so it’s hard to tell which numbers which (is it 3 or is supposed to be 8?).
My mom has never had a dishwasher. My 82-year-old grandmother washes the dishes while my mom is at work because she refuses to let them sit until my mom comes home (although the crazy woman has also been known to get up at 3 or 4am to wash dishes!).
*The text content in this post was edited on November 22, 2010 because the contest for new appliances had ended and the original content was no longer relevant to this blog as a whole. If you were brought here by a search engine looking to enter a sweepstakes the deadline to enter your kitchen into the Sears/Kitchenaid contest was 11/02/2010 and voting ended on 11/17/2010. Hopefully you will find something else of interest on this blog. You can try starting here to see what this blog is all about. If you’re in the mood to read something completely random you could try this, or this if you’re looking for an amusing real life story involving mustard (which I’m sure you are). If you are only interested in winning a mixer and I have wasted your time I apologize and wish you the best of luck in all of your appliance-winning endeavors. Good day to you.
If you’re kinda nosy and like looking at strangers houses then you can see some of my house in these posts.
Doesn’t that sound like fun?!
*Open House: Adaline’s Nursery
*Open House: Dominic’s Nursery
*Open House: Master Bedroom
*Open House: Laundry Room
*Open House: Family Room
*Open House: Storage
*Open House: My Mama’s Kitchen
I still haven’t added the living room or kitchen yet. Let me know if you’d like to see them. The more interest there is the more likely I am to make the time to do it!
**TO MY REGULAR BLOG READERS, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR BEARING WITH ME WHILE I REPEATEDLY BLOGGED, FACEBOOKED, AND TWEETED ABOUT THIS CONTEST. I’M SURE THAT YOU COULD UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH I WANTED MY MOM TO WIN. THANK YOU SO MUCH TO THOSE OF YOU WHO VOTED (OR ATTEMPTED TO VOTE) AND THOSE OF YOU WHO’VE PASSED THE LINK ALONG VIA TWITTER AND FACEBOOK. YOUR HELP AND SUPPORT WAS GREATLY APPRECIATED. **
Open House: Storage
*This post was originally published in September 2010 and I have since then changed my blog theme and layout several times resulting in issues with older posts that have pictures. The pictures are sometimes too big, too small, or too “smooshy”. At this time I don’t have the time to re-post the photos to correct this. Clicking on the photo to enlarge it should solve your smooshy problems. Thank you.*
Today I’m going to show you some of my storage. Which basically means that you’ll look inside my closets and in my basement. Lucky you. I don’t have any great storage solutions for you because right now I am waist deep in clutter that I’m trying to get rid of and reorganize.
First I’ll show you my two best storage solutions.
1. DVD Storage.
We probably have about 300 DVDs.
Most of them are children’s/family movies.
I’ve been “collecting” them for the past 7 years.
These three cd binders hold all of our DVDs.
The one on the left has all of our animated Disney and Pixar movies.
The one in the middle has all of our G/PG movies, musicals, and Christmas movies.
The one on the right has all of our PG13 movies (mostly Action-Adventure).
I like the one in the middle the best because it has a hand and shoulder strap, but I haven’t been able to find another like it 😦 None of these are official binders with the rings. Those actually work the best because you can take out the sheets with the DVDs still in them if you want to reorganize or add more movies. I haven’t looked in years but at the time I wasn’t able to find a ringed cd binder that was big enough, so I’ve stuck with these. I really like this system because when we want to watch a movie we just leaf through and see what we have. We haven’t had much need to “travel” with them yet, but I think it will come in handy in the future. Not enough movies for the kids at Grandma’s house? Take the binder with you. Going on a road trip with a portable DVD player? Take the binder with you.
The biggest problem with this method is what to do with the DVD cases. However, if you left the DVDs in the cases you’d still need somewhere to store them (except they’d need to be accessible too). Because we don’t need the cases on a regular basis they are all packed away in a giant storage tote in the basement. This way if we ever want to give any of them away or sell them, we’ll still have the cases. If you know that you’re going to keep the DVDs no matter what then you could always throw away (read: recycle) the cases.
We keep the cases inside the TV armoire.
2. Shoes!
Soon I will probably retire all of my cute shoes for good. First I couldn’t wear them because I was pregnant. Now I can’t wear most of them because I no longer fit in the outfits the shoes used to match. This cycle will likely repeat itself. I’ve had most of these shoes for years.
I have a small foot (6.5) so I can usually fit 2 pairs of shoes inside these little plastic totes. They cost under $2. It keeps the shoes looking good, they stack neatly, and they’re clear so that I can see the pair that I need.
Right outside of the back door I keep a trash can for paper to be recycled. Old ads, newspapers, etc. go into this bin. Once it is full Cool Daddy takes it to a paper recycling dumpster at a local school.
To see how I organize my coupons below click here.
Now that all of that’s over, it’s time to look in the closets.
Here’s a bigger view of my closet.
(We don’t wear that much black, those are Cool Daddy’s work uniforms.)
By the way, I have quite a few of those over-the-door hooky things around the house. I find them pretty useful.
Here’s the other closet in the master bedroom.
My clothes are inside the dresser. Extra pillows, blankets, etc. are on top of and next to the dresser. Cleaning out and remodeling this closet is on my Giant To Do List.
This is Adaline’s closet. I try to stockpile diapers, as you can see. I buy 7th Generation, Earth’s Best, and Huggies Pure N’ Natural when I can. We were given a ton of clothes for her. The ones that are too small and too big are in totes in the basement. I’ll need to do another wardrobe switch soon since the seasons are changing up here in PA.
This is the closet in the spare bedroom. In January I started couponing and this is the stockpile of Health and Beauty products that I’ve acquired so far. Having Cool Daddy build some new/additional shelves for this closet is on The Giant To Do List. The top shelf has lots of Bibles. I like Bibles 🙂
This is the bathroom cupboard. There are towels, cleaning supplies, and some more health and beauty stuff in here. I’m hoping the Cool Daddy can build shelves here going the whole way up so that we’ll have more room to store things.
Here are the totes in the basement. This is miscellaneous clothes and junk and the next photo is Christmas decorations.
And now after all of those niceties I will shamefully show you my most used storage solution called, “Throw junk everywhere.”
This is the spare bedroom.
This is the living room.
I have to say that neither of these rooms looked like this prior to August. But ever since Adaline’s 1st Birthday Party I’ve had a big mess of stuff I just don’t know what to do with. I need to get more totes, but I’m not looking to spend the money right now. Updated to add that now the living room is lovely and clutter free and the spare bedroom looks much, much worse 😉
My last and most favorite storage solution is called “Put it in mom’s gigantic attic (much to her dismay)”. I don’t have any photos of that, but it’s been a family favorite for years 😉
I’m very sad that the 4 Moms Open House tour is ending. I do enjoy seeing everyone homes, but also, this is just about the only traffic that I get…so I shall miss you all dearly.
*Open House: Adaline’s Nursery
*Open House: Dominic’s Nursery
*Open House: Master Bedroom
*Open House: Laundry Room
*Open House: Family Room
*Open House: Storage
*Open House: My Mama’s Kitchen
I still haven’t added the living room or kitchen yet. Let me know if you’d like to see them. The more interest there is the more likely I am to make the time to do it!
This post is linked to 4 Moms Open House
+Smockity Frocks
+Life in a Shoe
+The Common Room
+Raising Olives
I’m not a “mom of many” (unless you consider one “many”), but I love reading about these ladies and their families 🙂
Coolest Family on the Block is committed to helping you find creative ways to have fun and make memories with your family all year-long. Don’t miss an idea, tip, or trick…subscribe and have updates sent directly to your email!
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