Cleaning house!

At the beginning of the month, I decided to spend a little time decluttering and organizing a few key areas in our house. The goal was to take on the IHeartOrganizing blog challenge and toss or donate 30 items. 

I certainly did not get everything done I wanted to, but I definitely got rid of 30 items! I started with the craziest room in our house - our master closet! If you know me, you know I LOVE clothes and accessories. I also don't throw a whole lot away. The two traits do not make for a neat closet. 

I focused on an area that I haven't cleansed in a LONG time - jewelry. To organize everything, I use two things that are totally not meant for jewelry, but they work. I have hung a tie rack and a bulletin board behind the door in our closet to keep my jewelry on display. I find that if it's out of sight, it's out of mind and I don't end up using it. And worse, I end up wearing the same accessories over and over.  

I took all of the jewelry I own, laid it out on the bed and sorted it into 3 piles - keep, toss, and set aside for an accessory party. I'm planning an accessories swap party soon, so I wanted to set aside some things for that! Here's the finished product!

I organize my jewelry with a tie rack and a bulletin board!

Used extra nails from a home improvement project

Next, I focused on our entryway.  As you can see in the before picture, it just wasn't functional space. We got a few hook racks and a bench. I realize that the point was to declutter and I essentially brought more stuff into the house! BUT, I did end up sorting through the winter coats and donated several to Goodwill.

Before

After

LOVE this picture! Jake and Daddy's shoes together.

 

All in all, here are the numbers...

6 coats donated to Goodwill 

3 scarves donated to Goodwill 

4 sets of mittens donated to Good will

12 necklaces set aside for the accessories swap party

5 pairs of earrings set aside for the accessories swap party

5 necklaces tossed 

Woo hoo! I feel 5 pounds lighter :) 

All Quiet on the Blog Front

It's been a while.

And this is why...
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2011/4/prweb8347413.htm

We've been ramping up for the announcement of this major initiative at work, and now it's done!!! I've been working most nights and weekends for the past couple of weeks, which left little time for blogging.

I promise I'll be back soon, but to tide you over, here are a few pictures from a recent trip up to West Virginia to visit the Hawkins side of my family.

Beantown

Scott and I had a wonderful time in Boston. We will definitely be back and we spent the entire time saying things like, "Tyler would love that!" or "We can't wait to show the boys that!" Here are a few pictures of the highlights!

Ready for takeoff

Taking a break from packing for another work trip while I write this. The exciting thing about this time is that Scott is going with me!!! My mom has graciously agreed to take the boys for the weekend, so Scott and I will BOTH board a plane. The last time this happened was over a year and a half ago. Then, we were headed to Mexico. Tomorrow we'll be bound for Boston. We're really excited to eat leisurely meals out, sleep late (past 7AM) and take in some of the historical sights of a really cool town.

Someone else who is ready to takeoff is Mr Jake! Before I could blink, the child was rolling over. Now, he's probably just a couple weeks away from crawling! Take a look at our little guy in action. 

Hey mom! I'm doing pushups!

Cool! I can get up on my knees!

Uh, oh! Too much momentum!

Maybe next time! Mom, you better start putting up the gates!

 

Wordless Wednesday

Fun with friends!

We were incredibly blessed to have not one but two amazing evenings out with our wonderful friends this weekend. Friday was spent with the Story family. Here is Tyler with his best friend Carson. She is getting ready to start her first dance class, so they spent the evening dancing around. Ever the girlie girl, Carson had not one, but several wardrobe changes during the evening, including the wonderful dance ensemble below. We had such a good time!

Saturday we switched gears from dancing to wrestling! What else is there to do when you get 3 boys together?!? We got the all too rare joy of hanging out with the Pittmans and the Barnes families. We don't get to see them as much as we should, but we have such a ball every time we do!

It's such a blessing to have such wonderful friends where all of the kids (and the parents) get along wonderfully! 

Let the cleansing begin

I've decided to take on another one of the challenges over at I Heart Organizing! Maybe it's because we never purged after Christmas this year or the fact that Jake is seconds away from crawling, but I feel an intense need to cleanse our house of everything extra - particularly in the family areas. I was THRILLED to see that the challenge for this month was exactly what I needed! 

Here's the breakdown that I'm going to try and keep up with.... 

 

Wish me luck!