Category: Home Decor

I’m Kind of in Love with an Organized Closet

I’ve never had one of those huge walk-in closets. I’ve always wanted one, but have never been lucky enough to have one of my own. It’s probably a good thing though, because I wouldn’t know what to do with all that space and would probably just have a ton of clothes that I don’t wear crowding along the racks.

In our townhouse, I had a closet in my bedroom AND a closet in the office.  So, I’d have all of my current season clothes in my room and all of the off-season stuff put away in the office closet. Now that we’ve moved, I’m back to having one closet. I could take over a closet in another room, but I’d rather just cut the clutter and become a bit more organized.

So if you’d like to join me, here are my tips to spring cleaning your closet:

Here’s my insane amount of boxes of off-season clothes. What’s funny is that I pretty much wear the same thing every day.

Take Everything Out of Your Closet & Drawers and Throw it on your Bed
And I mean everything – underwear, socks, t-shirts, jeans, work clothes… the whole kit and kaboodle (or kitten kaboodle if you’re a cat person). Then, I go and get my off-season bins of clothes and dump them on the bed too.

Spreading everything out into a great heap of mess does a couple things for you. First, if you’re like me you’ll look at the shear mass of crap you own and decide to get rid of a lot of it. Second, it makes it easier to get rid of stuff when it’s already thrown on your bed in a pile.

Take a Deep Breath and Get Ready to Purge              
Okay, now is where I usually bring in a trash bag and a couple of empty boxes. I also have the now empty off-season clothes bins to put things into for the next season.

Start Sorting
For each piece of clothing, you need to decide whether to keep it, throw it away, or donate it.

I ended up with two big boxes of clothes to donate and one bag of trash.

Ask yourself:

  • Is it in good condition?
  • Does it fit?
  • Does it look good on me?
  • Have I worn it within the last 2 years?

If the clothing passes the test, put it either in your drawer/closet for current season stuff, or in a labeled bin for off-season stuff. If it doesn’t pass the test then it goes immediately into the donation pile or trash bag.

Pat Yourself on the Back & Immediately Go to Goodwill
Yay, you’re done! Great job, you totally rock and now you’ll be able to reach into your closet and grab clothes that you will actually wear! Take all the plastic bins of off-season clothes and shove them under your bed or in another room’s closet.

Ahhh, an organized closet feels so good!

For the boxes of clothes that you’ve decided to donate – make a quick list of what each box contains so that you’ll be able to get a receipt back for your taxes. Then, load the boxes into your car and immediately take them to Goodwill, The Salvation Army, or your choice of places to donate them.

Trust me – DON’T WAIT and do it now. Otherwise, you’ll think it’s a good idea to go back through the box and pull stuff out that you’ve already decided to get rid of!

Maternity Leave Superlatives

It has been exactly 8 weeks since my last day at work. Part of me feels like the time has gone by supersonically fast and the other part feels like it has been forever since I’ve been there.

I go back to work tomorrow and I’m surprisingly feeling pretty okay about it. But what in the heck have I actually done in the last 8 weeks?

In the style of my favorite blog, here are my Maternity Leave Superlatives:

Most Productive: Using the time that I was stuck at home without my baby to unpack the house do home improvement projects. One of my favorites is the den!

Most Repetitive and Annoying: All the calls I’ve had to make to various insurance companies. After having Jack I kept receiving bill after bill for things that should have been paid through my insurance. After literally dozens of calls, we finally figured out that although my doctor’s office updated my plan number, they did not update the claims address. Now, the bills are finally being paid and I no longer have to freak out when I get one in the mail for thousands of dollars.

This is my Nana from my wedding in 2008

Most Heartbreaking: The death of my grandmother.  She had fought back so many times before, and I really thought she was going to pull through again this time. I’m just thankful that she was able to meet Jack before she passed away.

Most Amazing: That I rock at being a mommy. Somehow I found this deep pit of patience that I’ve never had before. I can magically deal with the cries and screams and somehow know how to make it all better. I really thought I was going to be bored out of my mind at home for these last 8 weeks, but I’ve enjoyed every single minute of hanging out with Jack.

Winner of the “I said I’d never do that” Award: After years of saying that I was never going to be one of those people who posts a zillion pictures of their kid on Facebook, I can now say that my foot is firmly lodged in my mouth because I totally do it too. I try not to be too obnoxious about it, but with our family spread out all over the place it really is the easiest way to keep in touch with everyone.

Happy (Belated) Easter!

Kid Room Decor: Monkeys, Giraffes & Babies

Okay my fabulous Pocketful readers, here’s another decorating post for you – the nursery.

We weren’t really sure if we were still going to be in the rental apartment when Jack was born, so I started working on my nursery plans while we were still there. However, just in case we moved I made sure not to spend time on anything that couldn’t go with us. So, when we moved into our new house we had all the pieces I needed to put the nursery back together, we just needed the time to do it.

Well, you find time when your baby is born two months early! Within a couple days of my return from the hospital, we had thrown everything back together so that it was ready for Jack’s impending arrival home.

Luckily, the room was already painted a neutral brown tone with fun green carpet (well, fun if you’re doing a monkey and giraffe room). I really didn’t have the time or energy to paint another room, and I definitely did not want any lingering fumes left in there for my little preemie baby.

Here is a shot of the room before I prepared it for Jack:

What’s funny is that they already had a safari theme going on, or at least a huge wooden giraffe hanging out in the room. I would have loved it if they left that behind, but they totally took Hector with them (yes, I named their giraffe Hector).

Here’s the nursery after I finished with it:

Here are my favorite parts about the nursery:

I found a few jungle-ish fabrics that I loved and created a cute little pennant to hang over Jack’s crib. There are lots of tutorials online to show you how to do this, but I just kind of made it up as I went along and love the finished product. I also framed three of the fabrics as ‘art’ and hung them over the changing area.

So, I have an issue with spray paint… I LOVE to spray paint things random colors. So when I saw a drab wooden nightstand at Goodwill for $30 I immediately took it home so that I could sand it down and paint it a fun color. Love, love, LOVE this nightstand and it almost ended up in our hallway instead of Jack’s room.

The best part of the room is that we now have a baby home to enjoy it! Here is Jack on one of his very first tryouts of his new crib.

Speaking of my little stinker, he’s calling me with his request to be fed — so I’d better run! I’m thinking my blog posts will be ending quite abruptly for the next few weeks, um, months…