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Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge! Week 4 - Master Closet Organization Plan

2015-06-30T18:00:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the final week of our big "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge. To recap, I am focusing on four main areas of our life that need a lot of organizational help. Instead of biting off more than I can chew all at once (and subsequently becoming quite overwhelmed), I am tackling one space each week. We took so much time focusing on the kitchen/living room for the first half of the year, that the rest of our home began to suffer severely. Having certain areas of our lives on the fritz has added to a little renovation burnout. So, I told my hubby to take a little break and I have been working hard to take back neglected bits of our home and life!

And many of you are joining in and working on a few of your own spaces, which I totally love! For this week's organizational challenge, I am focusing on our master bedroom closet. Here is my inspiration....

If that room looks familiar, it is because that is our master bedroom closet. The awkward layout of our lower level didn't allow the space to be considered a bedroom (due to lack of a window), so we turned it into a large dressing room. We could have done a giant wall-to-wall closet, but A) it would have cost us a fortune and B) we just don't have that much to store, nor do we want that much to store. Since we initially divided our belongings between two armoires, a dresser and some open shelving, we have been very happy with our current situation. Boy-oh-boy, it sure does clean up nicely! This week I hope to get it back to that fabulous condition.

Although the room fits all of our belongings, and functions well in general, we have done a poor job keeping it tidy and have lost control of the space. Well, I guess I can take credit for most of this one too... What happens behind Bryan's closet doors, stays behind Bryan's closet doors. That is one of my favorite benefits of having two separate armories; I have no clue how organized or unorganized his closet is. #happywife

But an organized system only works if I work to maintain it. Of course, the goal is to create easy-to-maintain set-ups, but sometimes lack of time, effort and motivation get in the way.

I have quite a few problem areas happening around the room. First, the typical unused clothing problem. It has been over a year since I have done a good closet purge, and inevitably I have some work to do in that department. But this time, I really want to go the less is more route. I hope to come up with a variety of outfit creations that I love, using a few key favorite pieces, and really simplify the amount of clothes that I own. Having too many items to select from causes me to become overwhelmed and I end up wearing the same things anyway. And the other half of the items become ignored/forgotten.

How much one should have or keep can become a touchy subject. There is no right or wrong amount of clothing to own. We all live different lifestyles and have different passions and if you love clothes, I say hooray! I have no judgement towards those who live out of a giant walk-in closet filled with the latest and greatest trends or someone who has their wardrobe narrowed down to a single drawer. You are the only one who can decide how much it makes sense for you to have. That really goes with anything in life right?

When it comes to purging and letting go, I don't typically have too hard of a time saying goodbye to unused things that take up space or that no longer make me happy, because I know the end benefit is worth it. Occasionally, I can even sell items and come out ahead. But I tend to struggle more with clothing (just as I did with certain types of toiletries). Some articles of clothing can be expensive, so even though they ended up being ill fitting or have gone out of style or have become damaged at some point, I am pretty good about making excuses to hold on to something. In fact, during this process I found multiple shirts that I forgot I owned as well as a shirt and a dress that I have been making excuses to keep for about 3 years (yet still haven't worn). Selling clothing can be time consuming, tedious and hard to reap much reward. I prefer to donate, but that is when I become a bit more strict about pieces I let go of. And although it may sound weird, I don't like not knowing where that donated clothing is going. I would like to know that someone in need is benefiting from it, or that it is truly being passed on and receiving new life. The unfortunate fact is that many common donation facilities only use about 10% of the clothing that is donated and the remainder becomes extra work, waste and has alternative impacts to the process.

That said, I am going to sort ruthlessly and not worry right away about what the outcome of the clothing will be. I am just going to ask myself important questions and make decisions accordingly:

Does the item still fit?

Is the item comfortable?

Is the item damaged?

How often is the item worn?

How versatile is the item/How many outfits can I create with the item?

Do I have the space to store the item?

I am not going to ask myself:

How much did this item initially cost me?

Does the item have a sentimental attachment?

What am I going to do with this item once I let go of it?

Will there be a need for this item three years from now?

Will the item fit better if I change my exercise and diet routine?

Because at the end of the day, those last five questions are all ways to make excuses to hold on to something that I no longer need. Once I have my keep pile narrowed down, then I will decide how to handle the items that didn't make the cut:

Sell on eBay
Sell on local garage sale websites/Craigslist
Sell at a garage sale
Sell to a consignment shop
Sell to Thred-Up
Use damaged items as cleaning rags
Use damaged items as stuffing for pet bedding
Donate to charity
Donate to a shelter, church or crisis center
Donate to Dress for Success
Pass on to friends/family who wear similar sizes
Have a clothing swap party

Feel free to leave additional suggestions in the comments below as well.

Every time I go through these sorting and purging sessions, I become that much more aware of any purchasing mistakes I have made and it helps me become better with my intentional shopping.

A reader previously joked about her "chairdrobe", and I loved it so much that I designated this pile in our closet my "benchdrobe".

Because I knew I had a closet clean-out lingering in the near future, I started tossing my clean clothes into piles on my bench vs. hanging them up. It was helpful in me realizing what I don't wear very often (the items still hanging in my closet), but has been a nightmare to find anything I am looking for each day. Time to get my closet back in order.

Other areas that need some love are my jewelry nook....

My makeup vanity...

And my travel/toiletry drawer.

OK, fiiiiine. All of my drawers....

So, let's take a quick look at my plan of attack.

There are some things we have implemented that are working:

The amount of available storage
Jewelry display/holders (I just need to actually use them)
Drawer dividers in vanity
A hook for setting out outfits
Sweater storage boxes
Shoe storage shelves
Accessory storage (belts, swimwear, handbags, tall boots, etc...)

And a few things that are not:

Outfit planning/selection process
Make-up bag
Vanity set-up
Travel/toiletry drawer
Clothing drawers
Scarf storage
Too many articles of clothing
Laziness - I have not been great about putting things back where they belong

I took my jewelry off of the jewelry board to test it out in the kitchen, and the necklaces became a tangled ball and I never took the time to re-hang them. I rarely use my vanity any longer because of poor lighting, the wrong mirror setup, storage and access to it after I am done in our bathroom. My makeup has since been tossed around and broken in a cosmetic bag while other items are still in the drawer. I love adding scarves to my outfits and have outgrown our previous drawer divider system. My travel/toiletry drawer is just a random dumping ground and no longer speeds up my packing process. And again, I need to streamline my morning outfit selecting process and pair down my closet in general. Quite a few little problems have all equated to one big master bedroom closet disaster. And being that the closet is the first space I see in the morning and one of the last I lay eyes on in the evening, it is time for a change.

Just like all of my organizing projects, all surfaces that were problematic were given a blank slate.

Everything was wiped down and vacuumed and ready for a re-do.

Majority of this project will be about letting go and making the most of the items we already have. No painting this time around either, although, I do hope to update the vanity area using this as inspiration.

(via)

However, instead of lamps I am leaning toward some sconces with adequate lighting. I also found a mirror on Craigslist I am hoping to score to keep the budget down, and if I can sell mine, then I may even break even or come out ahead.

Because we use both our master closet and bathroom for getting ready in the morning and at bedtime, we also plan to install a door connecting the two spaces (creating a true ensuite).

Here is our door inspiration:

( 1 | 2 )

We also have a door to install for our coat closet upstairs and hope to get them done at the same time. With two door installations on the agenda, I am not sure this piece of the project will make my Friday reveal, but it is just around the corner and I simply can't wait for the impact that change will make.

With the upcoming holiday weekend, our week has also become jam packed with entertaining and activities. That means this challenge has me on an extremely tight deadline. And I have a feeling that I have hours upon hours of clothing sorting ahead of me, because each article is getting touched assessed and noted. Time to start a new Netflix series. Any suggestions?

You can find all of the challenge details in this post here, and also download some FREE project planning printables to help you get started!

Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge! Week 3 - Master Bathroom Organization (and a link party)

2015-06-26T19:50:00.000-07:00

I couldn't be more excited about the change I made to our Master Bathroom space this week. It is the end of week three of the four week "Wait No More Challenge!", and I have been checking off some major "to do's" from our list. In fact, each week our lives have gotten better and happier as I tackle the major home-front pains we have been feeling.

This update has been a long time coming, as our Master Bathroom is used multiple times per day, yet has really suffered some neglect. My youngest started getting in a habit of using our bathroom and many of his belongings were taking over...

OK, not a cool mom move. Majority of the mess was mine, his bathroom belongings were a minimal part of the problem.

You can read about the planning process here. I started by removing everything not affixed to the floor, and even gave the room a fresh coat of paint to tone things down a bit.

The update to the paint color made SUCH a fabulous difference. The entire room felt twice as big and so much more spa like. The next step was to address the dirty grout, a little Grout Renew made another big difference.

Although I really wanted to freshen up this space and prolong a down-the-road bathroom renovation, I didn't want to spend a fortune. I purchased two new shelf brackets, two storage boxes and two glass canisters. The rest of the changes came as a result of shopping our home and doing a major decluttering and organizing session.

Hello beautiful new-old bathroom! Such a difference a day makes!

A reader asked what I do with old decor as I switch things around, I will cover all of those details in a future post, but look at the benefit of getting creative with things you already have. The mirror was in our Master Bedroom, but I feel like it was always meant to be here. I couldn't be more smitten about the natural wood paired with the new wall color. Sure, it will drive a game of musical mirrors, but a little change is a good thing.

The previous wall shelf was so shallow, it couldn't hold most of our main bathroom items. After I purged everything down, I realized I didn't really need it at all any longer. But I did want to fill the space above the toilet with a place for greens, a candle and cotton swabs. I purchased two new gorgeous shelf brackets and for the shelf we cut down a piece of wood we already had.

I dug out a spare frame and printed one of my own photos to use as inexpensive art. The photo is of a peony in our backyard, the greens are from the same peony bush.

I did purchase two canisters from Target to use for cotton products. I had my eyes on these, but didn't want to shell out the extra cash just to have gold lids. So the ones from Target received a coat of spray paint paired with some gold Rub-n-Buff for a similar effect.

After I was able to relocate many of the bathroom items back to their proper homes, I found that I had plenty of room to put everything else back (children's items were put back in their bathroom, travel toiletries were moved to our closet pile and other random items were also put away). This time, I made sure to really assess how we use the bathroom and put things away according to our daily habits. Here is a quick tour of each cabinet and drawer.

I have been using a nail caddy for years now, and still love it. It just received a quick cleaning and a little re-arranging and it went right back where it was living. I lost the hardware for the handle somewhere along the way.

Quick tip: When displaying daily toiletries in glass faced cabinets or inside of acrylic organizers, simply remove any package labeling that may be distracting. The nail polish removal bottle now looks more decorative than it did when the giant label was showing through.

As I mentioned, I ended up purchasing two decorative storage boxes. One holds cotton pads for face washing and nail polish removal.

While the other is now the home to my hair accessories.

Previously, my hair ties (a.k.a. Loom Bands) and hair pins were spread out all over our home and a hot mess in the bottom of my makeup bag....

The small box paired with some folded cardstock for dividers, now keeps each type of hair accessory nicely divided, yet easy to take out and put away.

Our original "His" and "Hers" baskets were working out nicely, but they were short and added to the visual clutter inside of the cabinet. They both were paired down to daily necessities, and Bryan's items now live in a taller basket inside of the cabinet (so when he tosses items back inside, the mess won't be visible).

My daily supplies now live in a bin hanging on the back of our door.

I had multiple miscellaneous canisters of bath salts, which I condensed down to a single jar. I used one of the empty containers to now hold our dental floss.

Before, the drawers had organizers and held a variety of our supplies, but with little distinction between them, they all just become dumping grounds....

The drawers received a good scrub and were still showing signs of wear, so I got out some drawer liner and cut a few sheets down to size.

This time around, I assigned each drawer a specific duty. Top drawer holds all of my facial care supplies.

While the next drawer now holds extra dental care items.

And the bottom drawer still rocks as hair tool storage (placed inside of empty quart sized paint cans).

Now the only items in each vanity drawer are a single toothbrush and tube of toothpaste.

Under the sink is similar to prior days, one pull out drawer holds all of our bathroom cleaning products.

I can't get enough of these Multi-Purpose bins, they are inexpensive, easy to clean, light weight, narrow and can function for endless organizing tasks. In the past I tried to do stacking bins for cleaning supplies, but these just work so much better for daily use. One bin for cleaning products and one for dirty rags.

The other drawer holds the toiletry items that I don't use each day, but didn't want to purge because they still get used on a weekly or as-needed basis.

On the opposite side of the room, we removed the hand towel rack from the wall. It was just a clutter catcher and we are ultimately going to install a door to our closet, so we have to get use to the lack of wall storage anyway.

As you can see above, the shower was also purged down and empty bottles were recycled.

The small stool received a new coat of paint and works great for holding a towel and robe while showering. We only keep two towels per family member, so while two are being used, two clean ones are waiting in the basket on the hamper.

And that completes the Master Bathroom tour! So fresh, clean and organized and such a dramatic difference from what we have been living with. Even after taking my first shower in the space, I felt so much more relaxed than I had been previously. There is something to be said about the impact that visual clutter can have on your feelings.

Between painting the walls, updating the grout, small DIY's, completely purging and reorganizing the space, I easily invested 12 hours into this project. However, I don't regret a single second of the time spent.

To really celebrate this week's hard work, let's check out a few side-by-sides of the before and after pictures.

Now! Who wants to win a $50 Gift Certificate to The Organizing Store!? Whether I am DIY'ing my own organizer or purchasing something for a project, I love finding storage that is pretty and meshes with our home and decor. The Organizing Store is a prime "go-to" spot for the most beautiful, current, trendy and stunning organizing supplies around. Using random.org, one link party participant will be selected to win the gift card at the end of this week's challenge (no need to participate each week to win)! Time to share your Week 3 stories and projects with me!

An InLinkz Link-up

I really have been in awe of the projects you are sharing each week! And each party is receiving between 35,000-50,000+ views! Let's keep the organizing momentum going this week!

You can find all of the challenge details in this post here, and also download some FREE project planning printables to help you get started!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge! Week 3 - Master Bathroom Grout Renew

2015-06-25T10:38:00.000-07:00

I still have plenty to get done to hit my deadline of having a completely organized master bathroom by the end of the day. But I thought I would stop in quick and share a quick review and tutorial of how I handled our gross grout situation.

The bathroom grout is about 8-9 years old and was originally done in a white color. And it was never sealed. Seal your grout right away people, this was a huge mistake we made. Over the years, it has become dirty, dingy and impossible to keep clean as grime absorbed deep into the unsealed grout. Because I was emptying the bathroom to sort, purge and organize, I knew it was now or never to check this project off of the list. After some quick Googling, I discovered a product called Grout Renew. We were the perfect candidates for this product as it is intended to easily restore and seal old, dirty grout. Count me in!

This is NOT sponsored, I completely opted to research and do this myself after becoming sick of scrubbing clean our bathroom floors. Off to Home Depot I went and picked up a bottle of Grout Renew in Delorean Gray. They have limited colors at our store, but as I was just looking online, it appears they have an endless variety of shades. Learn from me, they have just about any color you would want online! Doh! Now you know.

I stood at the store and read the directions on the back of the bottle, and it recommended using one of their products to get the floors super clean prior to application. Even though I have done my share of tile and grout scrubbing, I decided to use the recommended cleaner just to be sure I was happy with the end result.

This stuff is on the strong side, so it is recommended that you use gloves while scrubbing. But first, a before close-up of the grout.

I started by filling two mop buckets; one with a mild dishsoap water and the other with the Sulfamic Acid cleaner. I also grabbed my gloves and a bristle scrub brush.

Prior to scrubbing with the grout cleaner, I mopped the floor with the mild dishsoap to prep the surface.

Because I was wearing gloves and just trying to get things done, I didn't take any pictures of the scrubbing process, but I essentially just scrubbed the entire floor with the cleaner and bristle brush. I followed up with a damp mop one more time and here was the end result.

The tiles and grout looked great, the cleaner really got things back to a nice start. I let everything dry for a few hours while I played with the kids.

The directions for the Grout Renew stated to place a small blob at the cross section of the tiles and work your way out. With an opening like that, no small blob would be coming out of that bottle. I decided to head to the kitchen and transfer the Grout Renew into a fine tip plastic squeeze bottle instead.

I also quickly learned that a little bit goes a long way!

The directions also state to use a toothbrush to spread the Grout Renew into your grout lines. Um, no. It makes such a big mess and spreads it everywhere. There is zero precision with a toothbrush. Thank goodness I had a slew of craft brushes on hand (a reader also mentioned Young House Love did something similar and a craft brush worked great for them as well).

I still made sure to sort-of scrub it in so the grout could really absorb the new color.

Again, nearly impossible to do without getting the product on your tiles, so be ready to follow behind each line with a damp rag.

Speaking of the damp rag, the wetter the rag, the more the product will smear while touching up. It seemed to work better to let the Grout Renew set for a minute or two (but not too long or it will cure), and then go back over the grooved edge of our tile with my fingertip and the barely damp rag.

It is a time consuming and slow process, you definitely have to practice a bit of patience while you work.

And for the end result?

After getting up close and personal with the project, I think the product worked quite well. As it dried, it seemed quite durable and really did clean up the previous grout to a brand-spanking new finish! Everything is sparkly clean which makes me happy.

On a side note, I think the darker color dated the look of our tiles. Although they will now hide dirt and grime and clean really nicely, I probably should have gone with a slightly lighter shade of gray. I realized it quite early on, but decided it was one of those projects that I had to wait until we were completely finished to make any final judgements. I may do one more coat in the lighter gray if I can muster up the time and motivation.

Now, I must get back to work. I finally get to tackle my favorite part which is the small organizational projects and details. See you back here tomorrow!

Gaga for a Gugu Guru Giveaway!

2015-06-23T21:00:00.000-07:00

Whoa! Say that blog post title five times fast! And then say hello to this week's giveaway sponsor, Gugu Guru!

When I was a first time mom-to-be, I remember spending hours and hours reading up on the best baby products and researching what we thought we needed vs. what we really needed. There was so much information out there, and I really went into the registry process a little blind. 14 years ago, they didn't have the amazing technology and the helpful tools and apps that they have today.

This week's sponsor, Gugu Guru, was created to help you determine your baby registry style. No more walking around stores drowning in a sea of baby products or spending hours researching online. Gugu Guru is a new baby registry website that makes personalized product recommendations based on your unique lifestyle and personal style. Take a quiz and tell Gugu Guru about your lifestyle, the clothing and decor styles that appeal to you, along with your budget and product preferences and Gugu Guru will deliver "perfect match" products for your personalized baby registry.

All product recommendations are completely unbiased and based on ratings from industry experts and fellow moms in the know. You can browse recommendations, add products to your registry and then mark items as “Must Have” or “Nice to Have” to help your friends and family decide what to purchase first. Select the option to have a Gugu Guru team member review before publishing or just go ahead and publish it to share with your friends and family so they can start shopping.

Although we are not having any more babies any time soon, I decided it would be fun to give the site a whirl. I was truly impressed with how spot on the recommendations were after taking the short survey. It was much more interactive, enjoyable and even quicker than spending hours researching and reading. Anything that saves precious time is a win in my book!

This week, Gugu Guru is offering up iHeart Organizing readers the chance to win a $50 gift card to use on Amazon.com for all of your baby product needs.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck everyone!

Must be 18 years old or older. Open to US residents only. No purchase necessary to win. All rules and entries must be followed to be eligible to win. Winner will be selected at random using rafflecopter.com and will be announced on original blog post upon drawing. IHeart Organizing official giveaway entry rules can always be found here.

Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge! Week 3 - Master Bathroom Organization Plan

2015-06-23T12:25:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Week Three of the "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge. To recap, I am focusing on four main areas of our life that need a lot of organizational help. Instead of biting off more than I can chew all at once (and subsequently becoming quite overwhelmed), I am tackling one space each week.

Time Management
Automobiles
Master Bathroom
Master Bedroom Closet

And many of you are joining in and working on a few of your own spaces, which I totally love! For this week's organizational challenge, I am focusing on our master bathroom.

We haven't done anything cosmetically to our bathroom since installing it about 8-9 years ago. It is beginning to show signs of wear and love, and we don't have any plans on doing a major bathroom renovation in the near future. But something needed to be done now. Being that it is so uninspired and dated, I have completely let it fall to the wayside. The counters have become magnets to clutter, the cabinet is a dumping ground for unused toiletries and each wall is covered in small storage solutions, yet we don't properly use any of them.

The view above isn't awful, it could be worse considering the traffic this bathroom receives. But a closer look would show you empty bottles in the shower, random Lego bits on the hamper, miscellaneous items sitting on top of the hand towel holder, tub toys on the floor and a slew of random toiletries. Then, you turn to the sink and counter area and it gets so much worse. I suddenly feel very naked and afraid.

Sorry for the bad photos, this bathroom has always been problematic to photograph due to the lack of natural light. This side of the bathroom is just a cluster of nonsense. Toiletries I use daily are piled near the sink, I have no room to store the towel warmer I was gifted for Christmas, and the cabinet holds items that I only use on occasion, if at all. Sure, my small jars of bath salts are pretty and I love decorative soaps, but are they really necessary to keep if I don't ever use them? I don't even know what is in two out of the three cabinet drawers. And the small shelf above the toilet, although cute, doesn't hold anything of importance.

As I mentioned, the bathroom is tired and dated and although this challenge is more about getting high traffic areas of our life back to a happy place, I decided to take on a little extra this week. Nothing major, just a little refresh to keep me excited to maintain the space and motivate me to bring back some order.

But first, the plan of attack.

There are some things we have implemented that are working:

A place for dirty clothing
His & Hers toiletry bins
Cleaning products under the sink
Hooks on the back of the door
Keeping toiletries pre-packed for travel

And a lot that is not:

Countertop clutter
Makeup storage
Hair accessory storage (do bobby pins reproduce while we sleep?)
Too many unused toiletries
Too many unused storage options
Laziness - we are not always great about putting things back where they belong
Gross grout

What is it about toiletries? I was having a convo with a friend about them the other day. Instead of trying something new and then not loving it and letting it sit in a cabinet or drawer for a few years because I feel too yucky about tossing it out, why not just stick with the products I love time and time again? Darn marketing, I must be a sucker for it!

For this organizing challenge, just like all others, I completely emptied the space.

Like 100% emptied it. I sorted everything into my Keep, Toss, Donate & Sell bins. Any toiletries that were newer and over half full, I set aside to see if any friends or family would be interested in them. I ultimately purged over half of the belongings in the bathroom and was left with a single bin of items to keep.

After I wiped everything down, the bathroom was already in much better shape. But I was ready to freshen things up a bit more, so I reached for a color I had previously tested on the walls for our living room/kitchen, and painted the entire bathroom a coat of Sea Salt by Sherwin Williams. So pretty!

I actually quite loved the color before, but it was always hard to decorate around and felt a little bit dark for the windowless space. In fact, it almost felt like a college student's bathroom, not a space for two grown adults. The new color is essentially a lighter version, and one coat later the room already felt much larger and much more soothing. Definitely worth the few hours of my time.

I am amped up and ready to start putting things back and organizing the heck out of this bathroom, but first I have to address the floors and grout. The last time I cleaned it, it looked amazing for a good month before it started to show wear again. I would never recommend white grout for a bathroom floor. Especially white, unsealed grout.

So today I am back to scrubbing trim and grout, caulking in some bad spots near the shower and then using some grout renew and sealer to fix things up a bit. I have been wanting to do this for well over a year, so no better time to just get it done while the bathroom is emptied out. I will be sure to share my thoughts on the process as I have read a few mixed reviews.

Once the floor is done, then I have a few small projects up my sleeves and a lot of organizing ahead of me. Let the fun begin!

You can find all of the challenge details in this post here, and also download some FREE project planning printables to help you get started!

Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge! Week 2 - Automotive Organization (and a link party)

2015-06-19T20:00:00.000-07:00

Hooray! It is the end of week two of the four week "Wait No More Challenge!" Are you still organizing full speed ahead? I am really loving the challenge and checking off some much needed projects from my list. We are not talking about dramatic room makeovers or major DIY improvements. These projects are the projects that are impacting our day to day lifestyles. The ones that slow us down, cause us frustrations and make us shake our heads in confusion.

This week I tackled our vehicles and I went into the project thinking it would be a walk in the park. Boy was I in for a surprise! It would be a miracle if we could pull off a successful drive to the park with the condition of our vehicles.

In my making excuses defense, it is nearly impossible to clean our vehicle for about 6 months out of the year due to our cold climate. Truthfully, I don't think either of our cars have been touched in over a year though, so I really don't think that my excuse holds that much weight. The funny thing is, I can't stand a dirty car because I just love the feeling of a fresh clean car so much more. But I had some major goggles on or something, because they both just got progressively worse and worse to the point where I didn't even realize how bad they really were.

No joke guys, I went out this week to clean out the cars and had a minor panic attack in the middle of the day, in the middle of our driveway, in the middle of our neighborhood. I knew the cars were bad, but the back of the vehicle that we primarily use to travel as a family, was in far rougher shape than I realized or even could have imagined. Remember, this is a judge free zone friends.

Toys, crumbs, dirt, coloring pages, books, water bottles, clothing, sporting equipment, more clothing... You would think we live out of these vehicles. Wait, we basically do lately!

The front seat wasn't all that bad. Just felt dirty and had a lot of disorganization in the cubbies and crannies.

I am sure cleaning out a car and organizing it isn't the most thrilling post to read, but my goodness, the outcome sure was thrilling to me. I completely underestimated the mess, and therefore, completely underestimated the amount of time it would take to clean out and organize both cars. Here are the steps I took to whip both vehicles back into beautiful shape.

STEP 1: Assess (like really assess). Check out all areas of cars to determine scope of project and potential needs (this is where I failed to realize how bad things really were). I used my project planning printable to come up with a game plan.

STEP 2: Create solutions for trouble spots. We were lacking in preparation and organization, so I put together a few kits to be better prepared while traveling.

STEP 3: Sort and purge! Just like any organizational project, I got out some bins and started the sorting process. You can download your free sorting signs here.

The goal was to empty the cars 100%. I enlisted the help of all of the boys, they were partly responsible for the mess after-all.

STEP 4: Clean! Once we had the cars completely empty, it was time to scrub them top to bottom.

This process probably seems pretty straight forward, and it really was. I used a combination of our shop vac and Dyson attachments to get all of the carpet clean. A slender attachment worked well to vacuum out all of the narrow nooks, door pockets and cup holders. I decided to cheat for this project and purchased some Pledge Multi-Surface cleaner (I usually DIY my cleaners). I was impressed with how well it worked on all of the interior surfaces, including the windows. Not to mention, it smelled amazing. #notsponsored #justlove

A small scrub brush paired with a bucket of warm water and dishsoap removed all of the salt stains from the floor mats. Once they were dry, I went back over them with our upright vac.

STEP 5: Take it all in. Every last minute!

STEP 6: Implement new systems. I had a chat with the kiddos, and we agreed that majority of the items we put in our car kit, should get them through shorter car rides without the need to bring a bunch of extra coloring pages or toys.

We also agreed that part of the problem was not being diligent about bringing things in when we returned home. Our "keep" bin was full of items that needed to be brought back into the house and put away.

I added a small trash bag to the back of the passenger seat in both cars.

The sporting equipment was also put away, and replaced with a bin of essentials and our reusable shopping bags.

I actually divided our reusable shopping bags into two sets of 5 bags each, keeping one set in each car. In the past, they were stored in the house and they were forgotten for far too many grocery shopping trips. The woven basket in our car holds our returns, and can easily be moved from trunk to trunk.

In the front of both cars, I made sure we had a plug and cord for each of our phones.

At this point, it is probably not a surprise that the glove compartments were also a smidge on the messy side...

We keep spare fuses in both glove compartments. Our car had a nice divided case, so I mimicked it for the SUV.

I also added a small container of money for tolls, parking meters or an emergency gas stop. I don't typically recommend leaving money in your vehicle, but I wanted to add a small back-up fund in both cars just in case. Does iced coffee count as an emergency?

I didn't want to continuously purchase Swiffer refills, so I upgraded each vehicle to a reusable duster instead. They are compact enough to fit in the glove compartments.

We were also lacking in any type of document management in the car. We didn't always have insurance cards in the car, and have been trying a few different methods for tracking mileage (we both need to track it for business purposes). To solve the problem, I put together a thin Auto Binder to slide under each passenger seat.

How about a quick look inside?

I used a generic white 1/2" three ring binder and dressed it up with some decorative paper and a label. Inside, I used tabbed binder pockets, which are great for holding miscellaneous documents and receipts.

Right inside the cover, I added our insurance card and proof of vehicle registration.

Behind another tab of more insurance docs/details, I printed out a new auto maintenance log, and filed away the previous one which we had been keeping in our Household Binder. The pocket is great for holding maintenance statements and receipts.

Next tab is a Mileage tracker, which I created for this project.

Would you like one too? OK!

(download your FREE mileage tracker here)

For the final tab, I decided to take my own advice and keep a donation tracker in each car. We are always dropping off a small box of items at local donation facilities, and I find myself jotting down notes at the last minute in my phone or on random scraps of paper. Now, I have a much more organized way of keeping those details straight.

The one shown above is from my shop here, but you can also download another version for free here.

A pen fit perfectly inside each binder, and the cover provides a hard surface to write down all details while on the go.

And that is that my friends! Our cars are no longer embarrassing or gross or dirty! Although I may be hiding under a rock in shame, I am doing so with a smile!

I am sure I am a bit more excited about the before and afters this week than 90% of you, but that is what these organizational challenges are all about. Doing something you have been putting off for far too long and then celebrating your accomplishments. #cheers

Now! Who wants to win a $50 Gift Certificate to Amazon.com!? The majority of the items I used for this week's task, were purchased from Amazon (flashlights, umbrellas, tire repair kits, roadside flashers, fire extinguishers, collapsible pet bowls (thanks for the recommendations), dusters, trash sacks, etc...). These days, I do the majority of my shopping on Amazon because it is convenient and typically less expensive than driving to surrounding bigger cities to shop. You can find just about anything for just about any project. Using random.org, one link party participant will be selected to win the gift card at the end of this week's challenge (no need to participate each week to win)! Time to share your Week 2 stories and projects with me!

An InLinkz Link-up

I was so overjoyed to see how many of you joined in with me last week! Let's keep the organizing momentum going this week!

UPDATE! Congratulations to this week's winner! #16 has been selected by Random.org as the winning participant of Week Two! Keep an eye on your email, I will be contacting soon to coordinate your Amazon.com gift card winnings!

You can find all of the challenge details in this post here, and also download some FREE project planning printables to help you get started!

Have a great weekend everyone!

UHeart Organizing: Ice Ice Baby - Getting Organized with Ice Cube Trays

2015-06-18T14:00:00.000-07:00

As an organizing fanatic, there is nothing better than finding a product that can do double duty. But what if you found a product with at least 25 helpful uses? Can you imagine the crazy excited cartwheels that would take place? Serena, the genius behind Pretty Fluffy blog, has been having a recent love affair with ice cube trays. You may be wondering why... Or how ice cube trays can really be all that amazing?

Well, no need to question it any longer. Serena is here to share 25 ways ice cube trays can help you all around the home. Let's give her a nice and warm welcome!

My love affair with ice cube trays is a new one. While I’ve always used them for ice (duh!) it’s only recently since making baby food for my daughter, that I have jumped deep into the world of ice cube trays and discovered there’s really nothing they can’t do.

Over the last 6 months I have frozen so much you can call me Elsa. I’ve tried all sorts of ice cube trays and found the best ones, and trialed everything from freezing baby food to cocktails. I’ve cleaned out my freezer and now that baby is my pride and joy filled with all my frozen goodies.

I’ve discovered these handy little trays really are a go-to tool for any organized household. They save you money by preventing wastage, they save you time by helping you prepare ahead, and they save you space by neatly stacking away oh so easily.

I hope by the end of this post, you’ll love them as much as me!

ICE CUBE TRAYS – MY FAVORITES

While any old ice cube tray will do, the ice cube trays below have become my secret freezing weapons. There is literally a tray for every purpose…

For: Style Savvy At Home Chefs
Choose: Tovolo Perfect Cube Ice Trays

I love these trays as they produce perfectly square cubes – each equal to 1oz. So if you love cooking at home, or just want to make meal and snack times easy as possible while looking fabulous at the same time, these trays are for you. The BPA-Free silicon design makes it easy to set and freeze, with your cubes sliding out perfectly each time. Dishwasher safe, I love that they come in a range of cute colors too!

For: Time-Poor Peeps
Choose: Qubies

Whether you’re a busy executive preparing your morning smoothie, or a new mum like me cooking baby food – you want the job done fast, but don’t want to sacrifice quality. With Qubies upside down ice cube trays, there’s no fuss spooning your mixtures into individual squares. You simply pour into the one tray, pop on the molded silicon lid with dividers and you’re done. Qubies are BPA, phthalate & PVC free, dishwasher safe and their slimline design means they will fit anywhere in your freezer. I don’t have a deep freeze – just a freezer door on my fridge, so these are a godsend when I’m cramming everything in there.

For: The Ultimate Entertainers
Choose: Sunny Life Ice Cube Trays

Sunny Life makes ice cubes fun! Their trays come in a variety of designs (think pineapple, flamingo and seahorse shapes) and vibrant colors. Made from 100% silicone they are dishwasher and freezer safe. Whether you’re making fruity snacks for a kid’s birthday party or cocktails for a summer soiree, these trays will put the fun in freezing. When I use mine they totally have me thinking I’m in the movie Cocktail with Tom Cruise.

25 WAYS TO USE ICE CUBE TRAYS

Here are my favorite ways right now I’ve been using ice cube trays…

For Pets

Make your own Pup-sicles! Possibly the easiest way to make dog treats is to freeze them. You can grab my very own Frozen Dog Treats Recipes here.
Kong Stuffers for playtime. Grab your Kong or Treat Ball and stuff it with cubes of your favorite frozen treat flavors. Your dog will love this tasty puzzle and it will keep them entertained for hours.
Superfood Snacks. Puree and freeze healthy superfoods for dogs – such as carrot, kale, and sweet potato – then warm and add to your pup’s dinner for a healthy and tasty boost.
Two-Ingredient Dog Biscuits. The easiest dog biscuits ever made! Simply mix around 4 thawed treat cubes (this works best with ingredients such as pumpkin, apple or sweet potato) with 2 cups of whole wheat flour and you’ve got yourself an instant cookie dough!

For Babies & Young Children

Freeze breast milk in smaller portions. That stuff is like GOLD, so this way you can defrost in smaller batches meaning less goes to waste. (Just always ensure your trays are fully sterilized and you defrost the milk safely for your child according to regulations).
Freeze Baby Food. A lifesaver to parents, simply whip up a whole batch of purees one weekend and, once frozen, pop into Ziploc bags. There you have it – fresh, healthy baby food done! (PS. For some fabulous baby food recipes check out Baby Foode)
Paint Pops! Pour non-toxic children’s paint into trays and freeze with a paddle pop stick in the middle. Once frozen, pop them out and let your kids create a work of art as the paint melts.
Toddler Bento Box. I saw this one on Pinterest and can’t love it enough. A great one for picky eaters, just fill each cube with fresh finger food snacks and let your toddler graze away.

For the Home

For craft lovers, use trays to organize your bits and bobs associated with your crafting and sewing.
A regular ice cube tray is also the perfect size for round eye shadow palettes and lip-glosses. Simply stack them in order of color and clean up that makeup drawer in the process.
And because Jen is always one step ahead of the organization game, I cannot forget to mention her fabulous tip for using ice cube trays to store jewelry – love it!
Homemade Bath Bombs. These are great for you and for gifts. I love this tutorial by Martha Stewart, and your ice cube tray is the perfect way to make them without needing a fancy pants mold.

For Meals & Leftovers

Leftover herbs. I don’t know about you but I hate throwing away perfectly good herbs because I won’t be cooking with them again that week. This way you don’t have to. Simply fill your ice tray cubes about half way with your herbs and then top them up with olive oil or stock. Once frozen pop your cubes Ziploc bags for storage. Then the next time you need that herb simply grab a cube.
Leftover stock. Don’t let it go to waste – grab those ice cube trays and freeze away!
Leftover yoghurt and buttermilk. Don’t throw it out or left it go past it’s used by date. Freeze it for future use in desserts and smoothies.
Leftover wine. In some houses there is NO such thing as leftover wine ha ha! But, if your recipe called for half a cup and you have the rest of the bottle left, freeze it into portions for the next time you’re cooking.
Freeze onion and garlic in vegetable stock for quick bursts of flavor to add to meals.
Home made tomato sauce and pesto. Make up a big batch all in one go and then thaw as needed.

For Drinks, Snacks & Sweets

Smoothie ingredients. If you love smoothies, your ice cube tray will become your new best friend. Use it to freeze leftover berries, greens, coconut milk…you name it, save it and freeze it for next time. If you want to get really organized, freeze your smoothie ingredients ahead of time and pop into labeled Ziploc bags. Then each morning there’s no prep required, just grab your frozen smoothie cubes and pop into the blender. As someone who loves a sleep in, I promise you this gives you an extra 15 minutes with your pillow!
Flavored Ice Cubes. These cubes turn a plain glass of water into a party in your mouth! Ideas include – frozen coffee/tea to make iced coffee and tea, frozen lemon slices for a tangy treat, fresh mint cubes, and even edible flowers in an ice cube! These cubes are also great for adding to pitchers of water when entertaining as a tasty and visual treat.
Homemade Jello – This one’s great for portion control (just set in the fridge as normal, don’t freeze) and you have ready-made jello cubes in bite sized pieces (no more eating half the bowl in one sitting).
Homemade Cheesecake & Chocolate. If you’re like me, and one slice of cheesecake turns into eating the whole thing, freezing sweets into cube portions is the way to go so you don’t over do it. I love this recipe for an after dinner snack.
Fresh Berries & Yoghurt/Coconut Cream. Pop your berries in the tray and top with fresh yoghurt/coconut cream. For a healthy summer day snack, this is a great alternative to store bought ice cream.
Hot Chocolate Cubes. So many ice cube tray ideas are for summer, but this one is a winter warmer. Make your own hot chocolate on a stick by simply pouring milk chocolate into your ice cube tray with a paddle pop stick in the center. Let harden in the fridge and then remove as needed to stir into hot milk to make a tasty hot treat.
Cocktails. Saving the best for last! Puree your favorite fruits (think yummy flavors like watermelon, strawberries, and kiwi) and freeze in cubes. Then just add to your favorite liquor – either blending them all together, or serving straight poured over the cubes.

FREEZER ORGANIZATION

Now that I have all of these fabulous way to use ice cube trays, the last step was to make sure my freezer didn’t become a hot mess of trays and bags. Enter a simple filing system:

I designed and printed out my own folder dividers (you could totally just use thick cardboard store bought ones though!) – to split my frozen goodies into sections (i.e. baby food, herbs, smoothies etc). I opted to color code them just to make it easy to see the entire freezer contents at a quick glance. I then simply covered my dividers with clear contact (so they are protected and can be wiped down).

I then made sure my ice cubes were stacked neatly into the freezer bags one to two rows wide, so they are as slim line as possible. I labeled each bag just with a marker, however if you wanted to re-use them you could definitely use some colorful washi tape to label the contents and mark the frozen/use by date.

Lastly, I simply filed each bag in the freezer side by side like they were documents in a filing cabinet, leaving not one ounce of space wasted. My freezer has an inbuilt drawer, but this could be replicated using a simple plastic bin for storage. I now can quickly scan my freezer contents without digging around and getting frozen hands!

Whew! Who could of thought one tray could do so much?
What are your favorite ways to use ice-cube trays in your home?

"I am Serena Faber Nelson, a television producer, writer and fluffy dog owner. Obsessed with home décor, fashion, lifestyle and dogs – I set about creating Pretty Fluffy as a go-to guide for the modern pet owner. Featuring a range of stylish products, celebrity pooches, DIY projects and handy hints, Pretty Fluffy is a daily stop for smiles and inspiration, giving readers the tools they need to enjoy full and happy lives with their furry friends. My greatest loves include fresh peonies, Dirty Dancing (Nobody puts Baby in a corner), Banoffe Pie, spending waaay too much time on Pinterest, and hugging random dogs at the park. I currently live in Sydney, Australia with my husband, Andy, and my 11 year old Border Collie, Soda. As a long time fan, I am super excited to be joining the IHeart Organizing Team!"

May Organizing Challenge: Link Party Recap!

2015-06-17T21:00:00.000-07:00

Just when I thought you guys couldn't get any more awesome, you went ahead and linked up over 300 organizing projects during the May Organizing Challenge! That is an iHeart Organizing record! I am so proud of all you accomplished and so grateful that you all took time to link up and share. I enjoyed every last hour I spent looking at each post.

I always recommend taking time to sneak a peek at all of the link party goodness, but with so many amazing posts to browse though, I thought I would do a little recap today to highlight why these parties are so great. If these real life reader projects don't inspire you to empty out a cabinet or fill your "donate" bin, then I don't know what will. And with so many of you working on specific spaces during the "Wait-No-More" challenge this month, these projects should offer a little extra nudge and motivation.

Let's hop right in and start things off with a bang. Brit amazes me each time I visit her blog, and the DIY buffet created from stock IKEA cabinets is a prime example of why!

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There are always a slew of amazing pantry projects during each link party, and Cheryl's is no exception. I appreciate that she kept it real, and created a super functional and practical before and after story.

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Not only did Juliana share her DIY laundry detergent recipe, she is also offering the adorable label as a free download!

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Mary Beth has the ability to see a diamond in the rough, and you won't believe what her new charming island was in a previous life. I will give you a hint, it starts with a "D" and ends with an "ESK". Incredible.

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Maggie shows us that organizing jewelry doesn't have to be expensive or complicated. In fact, simple dollar-spot organizers paired with a pretty vinyl label does the trick!

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I admit, I quickly become the victim of a crazy inbox. I really enjoyed Katie's helpful tips for getting it back under control. I was only slightly disappointed that she didn't recommend a magical email fairy. #iwish

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Memo boards make the organizing world go round, and Sharon's new system is sure to work hard for her!

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A few of you took on garage spaces, which in my opinion, can be some of the hardest organizational projects to tackle. But you all really wowed me with your ambition and vision.

The always amazing Samantha created the functionality of a jumbo sized mudroom on a single garage wall.

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And I couldn't peel my eyes away from Jo's garage organizing video! She really covers the entire step-by-step process and shares ways she was able to make the most of what she already owned.

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There were a couple of crazy cool closet projects too! Maria shared how she made the most of a super narrow hallway closet.

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While Darnetha proves that coral and closets go together like peanut butter and jelly. I am crushing on this hallway closet makeover big time and digging out my coral paint as I type this!

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Who doesn't love a thrifty makeover? Especially when you are able to completely transform a piece you already owned, giving it a whole new look and life on a budget. Katie is always doing something creative, but this time she has outdone herself. In fact, she has DIY'd one of the best filing cabinet updates I have seen yet.

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Katies must have been really motivated to improve their furniture situations, because this table transformation (also done by a Katie) is absolutely jaw dropping.

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Samantha's new playroom nook makes me happy. The addition of the easy-to-access bookshelves are not only functional, but also provide splashes of color in a space meant for imaginations.

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Do you have an empty nook that could use a little attention? The lovely ladies over at 11 Magnolia Lane shared their gorgeous open shelving tutorial.

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Amy is the Queen Bee at creating crafty storage treasures. I always get excited to see what she is up to and once again, she blows my mind with the power of paint. Pink paint at that!

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Another crafty idea, only this one comes in the form of a vintage crate and spice jars. Who knew they could create such a magical combination? Lora knew, that's who!

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I was a fan of Heather's recipe box the moment I spotted it! The only thing that made it better was the fact that it only cost her three dollar bills.

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Sue shared her high/low project, which was initially inspired by some stunning pencil cups she found at London's Liberty store. I think her version turned out just as beautiful (if not more) than her inspiration.

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Jamie's blog is one to watch, and as a current fitted sheet stuffer (I toss them into a linen drawer and never look back), I tend to agree that I should just figure out how to fold them already!

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Did you make it through the post or are you already halfway through a major closet clean out? Maybe you are updating an old piece of furniture? Or learning how to fold a fitted sheet? A huge thank you to everyone who linked up and shared. Reading through so many unique, real life organizing stories always makes me warm and fuzzy inside. And remember, these projects are only a piece of the awesome pie, find many more ideas and storage solutions here.

IHeart Thirty-One Storage and a GIVEAWAY!

2015-06-17T04:00:00.000-07:00

Being that I am working on cleaning out and organizing both of our cars this week, today's Thirty-One giveaway couldn't come at a better time!

Thirty-One has made a super-sized appearance in the organizational world. They are known for offering an endless array of storage and organizing solutions in a wide variety of color and pattern options. To top it off, many of the items can be personalized to satisfy your love for labeling.

Although I was eying up their automotive solutions, they have options that work in any room of the home. Below are just a few examples of how their storage bins, baskets and wall organizers make an appearance in a pantry, home office, mudroom and playroom.

Jenny Hillenburg is a consultant with Thirty-One, and she is here today to offer up a great giveaway to you! Now, whatever space your are tackling will become more organized with beautiful and versatile storage. (Perfect whether you are joining in on the weekly challenges or just working bit by bit on your personal spaces.)

This week's giveaway is for two "Your Way Cubes":

Re-think how you organize! This smart solution features rigid sides, handles, a clear PVC window on one side to help find what you’re after and an embroidery option for labeling. Approximately 12.5”H x 12.5”W x 12.5”D. Available in a variety of color and personalization options.

Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge! Week 2 - Organized Car Kits

2015-06-16T12:43:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Week Two of the "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge. To recap, I am focusing on four main areas of our life that need a lot of organizational help. Instead of biting off more than I can chew all at once (and subsequently becoming quite overwhelmed), I am tackling one space each week.

Time Management
Automobiles
Master Bathroom
Master Bedroom Closet

And many of you are joining in and working on a few of your own spaces, which I totally love! For this week's organizational challenge, I am focusing on our vehicles. More and more, it feels like our cars are our second homes. We are always heading to school and sporting events as well as running frequent errands, trips to the park and taking off for a weekend away. We live in a small town, so we have to take trips to "the city" quite frequently. All of those miles add up and the interior of our cars have been feeling the traveling pains.

We snack in the car, we sleep in the car, we read and play games in the car. I am not one to keep strict rules about food, drinks and toys because I want everyone to be happy and comfortable while traveling. However, my goal is to take back the room on wheels that we spend so much time in, and to find a few ways to better maintain them moving forward.

Above you can see my plans for the cars. By Friday, I will (fingers crossed) have before and afters of two messy vehicles turned nice, clean and organized vehicles. Wish me luck!

My first step in the process was to address some areas we have been lacking. We have umbrellas near our front door, but what happens when we are heading to the grocery store and a rain cloud comes out of nowhere? We keep our sunglasses in our shoe cabinet, but again, what if we forget them at home and happen to be driving into the sun? What if our oldest gets hit with motion sickness or I happen to get a headache? When we head to the park, there is a high probability that our accident prone kiddo will scrape up his elbow, forehead or knee. And after having three flat tires in the past two years, I can't risk not being prepared for another. All of these things have happened and have left us feeling frustrated that we didn't have some basics on hand.

So I decided to put together some kits to help us be better prepared on the road (you all know I love a good kit!). We are still using some of the pouches we put together two years ago here, but since then we have ditched the basket and the rest of the system. The lidded basket was too bulky and we found we didn't move it from car to car (the basket has been working much better in my closet storing off-season items). This time around, I decided to create two of each kit, so that we don't have to do any moving between vehicles.

I started by picking up two large fabric bins (similar) from Target. They are a grey, felt-like material and reminded me of the interior of our cars. I also picked up two small craft cases and four plastic shoe boxes.

Kit number one is a very simple and basic First-Aid kit. The small craft case was the perfect size for the bandage boxes and medicine bottles.

Inside each kit I added the following items:

Pain Reliever
Digestive Relief
Motion Sickness Relief
Itch Relief
Instant Cold Pack
Antiseptic/Pain Relieving Spray
Bandages
Kleenex
Athletic Tape
Gauze
Scissors
Tweezers

There is still room to add a few additional items if we find we have missed anything, however, we are pretty covered for accidents at the park or ball field. I used my Silhouette die-cutting machine to create vinyl labels for each lid.

Next up I created a kit to keep behind the driver's seat in each car. My goal is to completely clean out the cars and only keep this single bin of items in each. I used an Avery Office template to create the labels for each kit.

Inside each of these bins I added the following items:

Wipes
Umbrella
Storage Bags
Spare Charging Adapter
Lip Gloss
Lotion
Markers
Notebook
Pens
Kleenex
Sanitizer
Sunglasses
Playing Cards

Now, if the kids forget their travel bags, they still have activities to keep them busy. These items are intended to always stay in the car and never go into our home. My guess is the contents may evolve or be swapped out, but I already feel much more prepared knowing that we have some basics on hand anywhere we head. Because you know, hands get sticky and accidents will happen.

The last kit I put together is in case of a roadside emergency:

Fix-A-Flat
Tire Plug Kit
Headlamp
Roadside Flare Light
Tire Gauge
Glass Breaker/Seatbelt Cutter (which will ultimately live in the glove compartment once the cars are cleaned out and organized)
Booster Cables

And again, everything went inside one of the small plastic bins.

So to recap, each car will be equipped with the following:

Each container is quite compact, and the shoe box sized bins fit perfectly in the larger canvas bin.

The larger tote will sit in the trunk of each vehicle and the extra space will be used to hold a few reusable grocery bags and a picnic blanket in each (the "Happy Travels" bin will stay behind the driver's seat in the car).

To prevent the bins from sliding around in the trunk, I added a few heavy-duty Velcro strips to the bottom side of each.

No two families are the same, so what you opt to store in your vehicle most likely looks different than the items I selected. To prepare, I thought about sticky situations where we didn't have what we needed... And just literal sticky situations. Plus, I am always digging in my purse for chapstick, lotion, pens and sunglasses, so it is nice to know that the basics are always within reach.

It is a beautiful week for us to get outside and start vacuuming, scrubbing and cleaning out each vehicle, and I can't wait for us to get back that "new car" smell. In fact, that reminds me, I need a few air fresheners to battle the wonderful aroma of baseball socks. #savemynostrils

Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge! Week 1 - Time Management Organization (and a link party)

2015-06-12T14:00:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the first week of our Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge! I wish I had some astonishing before and after photos for you, however, I decided that this first week I needed to focus on the area where we needed the most help... time management. However, I have a feeling a few of you will be able to fill the before and after void.

I don't know what it is. I can tackle a closet and organize it down to the last shoestring, but time management? It is a whole different ball game. And with the number of ball games we attend each week... Managing time effectively is really crucial to daily success, far more so than an organized closet. It can completely impact day-to-day life, and lately it has been evident around here as our schedules and home have been a bit out of control. So much so that we are all feeling the negative results of it.

I am sure that time management is a far more personal type of organization than most things; what works well for one person may fail for someone else. Over the years I have recognized that when we have a family "hot spot" holding a cleaning checklist, calendar and schedule, we are far more in-sync than when we have nothing at all (which has been our life for the past six months). So obviously, we went back to that system this week, and it has been amazing the difference it has made with the kids already. And myself. No more need to repeat myself 5,268 times when the kids ask what chores need to be done or what we have going on each evening.

But this entire challenge ran much deeper than just popping up a calendar and schedule on our memo board. My days are an entirely different challenge. I love to work and have always been a busy body, and I haven't found that working from home causes me to want to lounge in front of the television all day. In fact, it is typically the opposite. I don't know how to stop when I get going on something. And I don't know how to look past a messy house in order to sit down and focus on my work. It always seems that when my work flourishes, my home suffers. And when my home is rockin', I am behind on my work. Although I do blog, I also run an online shop, contribute to other websites, and ultimately have long term goals for my business that I need to focus on. I don't plan to rely on a blogging/Etsy shop income long term, so it is important to remain focused on my future business goals as well.

On top of it all, I always feel like I am ten steps behind and that I don't have the time to focus on items that matter most to me. But the funny thing is, I have 16 hours in a day! 16 hours you guys! Do you know how much someone can do in 16 hours? It is amazing that not having a clear plan or focus each day allows those 16 hours to fly by, leaving me to wonder where the day went. And why I didn't go for my nightly run. Or why we don't have enough time for more fun family outings.

I think it is safe to say I have been struggling, and I was so excited to focus on taking back my days this week. It was all I could think about and I did a lot of idea jotting and analysis of how we could/should be spending our time.

I started out spilling so many thoughts on multiple pages in a notebook, I thought I would create a few printables to compile my ideas and to share with any of you looking to make changes to time management as well. It may seem like a lot of work, or silly to some, but I have to say that in just a couple days I began to notice some difference. At the same time, I know that consistency while also being flexible will ultimately be the key to long term success.

You can download your own Time Management Bundle HERE!

STEP 1 - DAILY TASKS

My first step in the process was to list out all of my day-to-day tasks. Everything from taking a shower to checking emails to chores and exercise. I listed the items I do without any thought each day, as well as the items I want to make sure I have time for, things like reading and running. This is not intended to be a "to-do" list. This is just to recognize reoccurring items that build your day from sun up to sun down.

STEP 2 - DAILY SCHEDULE

One of my biggest goals in this process is to get my tush in bed by 11:00 PM each weeknight. I am a night owl and super slooooow in the morning, so this is never easy. But the days I am up earlier tend to be the days I am also the most productive. Being that I never get 8 hours of sleep makes this by far the most important goal of this entire process. Starting at 7:00 AM through 11:00 PM, I began filling in the tasks I listed in Step 1. I placed tasks in the time slots that made the most sense, and made quite a few adjustments to how my day was previously laid out.

I have done this activity in the past, and it is always super enlightening! This is when I realize how hard it really should be to fill those 16 hours per day. I am able to put all of my desired daily tasks into time slots and still have a few spaces free while also getting a full 8 hours of sleep!? Knowing that makes me wonder how many hours I spend lost on my computer with little direction; checking email one minute, working on a printable the next. Oh! Hello Instagram feed! What? You blogged about that? Must read it! I forgot, I have to search Pinterest for dramatic bathroom colors. Hey! I wonder if that top comes in my size!

Please tell me it is not just me who falls down the Internet trap so easily.

By completing the daily schedule, it allowed me to fill in time to work on emails each day. When my time is up, my email will be closed until the next day. No more hitting refresh in the middle of writing a post, and no more not even checking in on emails because I never got to them. I blocked specific times of the day for my daily reoccurring tasks, and other times I just blocked with a generic "work" title (more on that in a moment).

Generally, my biggest problem is transitioning from one task to the next; knowing that I have a cut-off time and that I need to stick to my schedule. To enforce the blocked times, I set a timer on my oven. This will require me to get up and out of my seat to shut it off after each given task. I always joke with Bryan that I am glued to my chair by lunch time (gross right?), so hopefully the action of getting up to shut off a timer will also keep my body moving periodically throughout the day.

Now, of course no two days are the same. There are days with sporting events and doctor appointments and travel... The goal is just to fill out a typical day. And if baseball games are typical, maybe do a second one for those types of days. My biggest tip while doing this is to leave spots for FREE time! Do not book yourself solid throughout the day. I made sure to give myself a lunch hour, free time before dinner and more free time right before bed. Knowing I have breaks in there is already refreshing and will drive me to be more focused on specific tasks during the scheduled periods of time. Also, try to over estimate your time whenever possible. This will ensure that you can have even more free time or feel ahead of the game vs. always feeling behind.

I did two schedules; one for myself and one for the boys. I popped mine into my planner and I placed the one for the boy's up on the memo board for summer. School just got out this week, so we will have a lot of adjusting to do and the kids needed ideas for filling their days while I still try and balance working, house chores and quality family time.

STEP 3 - DAILY GOALS

As I mentioned in Step 2, while I was filling in my daily schedule there were times I blocked specific reoccurring work tasks, like working on emails, and other times I just blocked generic work shifts. This is where the time to work on my website, my shop, writing posts, evolving/growing, contributing work, etc... comes in to play. Instead of going into the week and basically winging things, I decided to fill out a general schedule for each day.

For example, our kiddos LOVE Sunday brunch so I wrote that in as an important reoccurring Sunday task. We have to grocery shop each week, so I now scheduled in a specific day to go. Friday nights should be FUN nights, so I blocked those and told myself no more working or house chores on Friday nights. When it comes to work, I picked days to write posts, and I selected days to focus on my other work tasks. Hopefully, by dividing out some of my daily tasks throughout the week vs. working on each one as I have time, I can become more efficient with each one. Each one will now receive the attention it deserves. I also plan to schedule meetings, phone calls, appointments, etc... around those blocked times.

STEP 4 - PLAN DAILY

One of the tips I read while looking into the topic of time management, was to take a few minutes at the beginning of each day to make a plan of attack. So, I included a printable for that within the kit. I typically rely on my daily planner for this, but now I have it built in to my morning routine to look at my planner, compare it to my daily schedule, and mash them together. It also allows me to take a few minutes to list a couple specific goals for the day.

STEP 5 - MONTHLY VIEW

Now that I have a teenager, I get asked on a daily basis, "Mom, what do we have going on tonight? How about this weekend?" OK, I get asked the same questions by my husband each day as well. It was time to get a visible calendar back in a central location. I transferred all family related items to the calendar from my planner, so the entire crew can see what each day holds. My kids do so much better when they know what is coming ahead of time and have a set routine, so having their chores, schedules and calendars out in the open really prevents meltdowns. There are no more surprises when I have to tell them, "No" to going to a friend's home if their chores are not done or if we already had something else on the calendar.

STEP 6 - DAILY/WEEKLY CHORES

Speaking of chores... I have really slacked at holding the boys accountable to doing their daily chores. I felt this sense of mom-guilt about the destruction of our home and the impact it was also having on the boys. They still helped, but there were so many times I just found myself doing something because it was easier to keep them out of the construction mess or because the lack of main living spaces caused a trickle effect to the rest of the home. But now that things are finally back to a functional and livable state, they can pick back up where they left off. We sat down and reassigned daily house chores to each member of the family. This was a family discussion and they all felt satisfied with the chores they ended up with. My hubby laughed when he saw his list was shorter than the rest of ours (he said, "Great, now the world will think I don't do anything around the house!"), but seeing that he does most of the cooking and building, we do the rest. Team work!

So cheers to taking back our days! I know it won't make everything roses and that we will still have to be flexible, but hopefully there will be a lot more definition and awareness of how our time is spent. Mostly mine, because as much as I love working from home, it is so easy to get lost in the hours of the day. And to balance the difference between housework and work work. I hope that I can now stay focused on both my long and short term goals while also achieving a better sense of work/life balance.

You can download your own Time Management Bundle HERE!

Now! Who wants to win a $50 Gift Certificate to HomeGoods!? I popped in there the other day to pick up the gift, and couldn't walk out empty handed. I managed to cross a few items off of our home wish list. HomeGoods is one of the first places I turn to for storage solutions when working on organizing projects, so they seemed like the perfect fit for this week's prize. Using random.org, one link party participant will be selected to win the gift card at the end of this week's challenge (no need to participate each week to win)! Time to share your Week 1 stories and projects with me!

An InLinkz Link-up

I was so excited to hear how many of you were planning on participating in the weekly challenges with me! I am even more excited to see what y'all have been up to this week!

UPDATE! Congratulations to this week's winner! #23 has been selected by Random.org as the winning participant of Week One! Keep an eye on your email, I will be contacting soon to coordinate your HomeGoods gift card winnings!

You can find all of the challenge details in this post here, and also download some FREE project planning printables to help you get started!

Have a great weekend everyone!

UHeart Organizing: A Party in the Pantry!

2015-06-11T10:40:00.000-07:00

Today's post is another fab example of how changes in schedules and seasons can cause major organizational updates.

Cassie, of Hi Sugarplum, has been writing for me for quite awhile now and I always appreciate that she finds ways to make me laugh, feel inspired and ready to make something with tassels. She is one stylish chic in all areas of her life; everything from the home she is decorating to her daily wears. Speaking of! She is working on a blank slate of a house which means all sorts of pretty organizing. And today she is here to share how the recent onset of summer has driven her to whip her pantry into shape. Are any of you working on your pantry as part of this week's organizational challenge? If so, be ready for some ideas and eye candy to keep you motivated!

Hello iHeart friends! I'm thrilled to be back on Jen's rockstar blog sharing my latest organized space. I had the honor of participating in the {One Room Challenge} with her, and am still blown away by their Living Room! And don't get me started on her Kitchen. We have girl-time planned for next month, and I can't wait to see her cute face.

School's out in our neck of the woods, which means it's officially Summer. Which also means our house is a revolving door of hungry kids, constantly hitting up the pantry for snacks. It only took a few days before I realized I needed a better system...for both me when trying to put together a meal, and for the all-day snackers!

That's the After...you don't want to see the Before! Which is crazy because we've only lived in this house a few months! But it just proves that without a good system, a space will become prime clutter-zone in no time!

I began like I do every organizing project...emptied everything out, got rid of the junk hiding in the back, and started with a clean slate. I thought about lining the shelves or the back with cute paper...but decided to keep it simple since food packages are so busy. And honestly, I just wanted this done before the next wave of kids stopped by!

Just like our last house's pantry, I used Ikea and Dollar Store bins and canisters to group like items. I've found they keep items from getting lost in the back, and overlooked, especially once they've been opened. It also helps me shop because I can quickly check each category and see what needs replenishing. At the same time, it keeps me from overspending because I only shop for what fits in each bin! #sneaky

The bottom shelves hold the foods the kids reach for most often...cereal, crackers, and snack bars. Labels in my treasured bookplates make finding things easily.

Sidenote: Can we pause a moment to mourn the discontinuation of these Martha Stewart bookplates?! What are she and Staples thinking no longer selling them?!? #asyouwere

Removing individually-wrapped foods from their packages saves a ton of space in bins. And saves you from finding the inevitably empty carton still on the shelf!

A long tiered rack makes the cans and bottles easily seen and accessible.

The higher shelves hold items I use for most meal prep...pasta, rice, baking supplies.

Items that require measuring are stored in air-tight canisters. And I recommend labeling them unless you're absolutely sure you can tell the difference between flour and powdered sugar. #oops

Tip: Flour and sugar packages are rarely the same size as my canisters, so I store the leftover in ziplock bags in the separate bins on the top shelf.

Don't overlook vertical space....the side of the cabinet is a great spot for baskets holding small packets.

We have a hard-core Crystal Light addiction...yes I'm aware our insides are probably the color of Red Dye #9. #dontjudge

The bins at the very top hold extras of the items I buy in bulk. The kids aren't allowed to get a new box of cereal down until one has been emptied! #momlaw

Now I'm ready to face the Summer snackers! What spaces do you need to tackle before the kids descend? You can see more of my organized spaces here, and the rooms we've decorated in the new house here and here. Happy organizing, lovebugs!

"Hi, I'm Cassie, a DIY and design-obsessed Texas girl, and lover of travel, fashion, sarcasm and Mexican food. When I'm not hanging with my sweet and funny family, you can find me kicking the '80s out of our home, one budget project at a time, on my blog Hi Sugarplum!"

Reader Space: Don't Disturb This Laundry Groove!

2015-06-10T08:12:00.000-07:00

Not only do I love to showcase the work y'all do on your homes, I also love to introduce you to blogs I have found over the years and provide me with daily ideas and excitement. Don't Disturb This Groove is one of those blogs, and I am so honored to have Brandi here today to share her very beautiful yet very budget friendly laundry space.

Maybe I am tired of kitchens and maybe it is because my own laundry room needs a little lovin' right now, but I am sharing another space today that I just love. Yet it is a completely different design than the last laundry room I featured. A little something for everyone because I am generous like that. (wink)

Brandi gave her laundry space a refresh by saying goodbye to tired wire shelving and adding a few new special touches. New paint and a little creative love go a long way, especially when you are staying on a strict budget. I asked her to come by today and share more about her chore ready hot spot.

What is the main function of the space?

"Although my laundry room is a space to wash our clothes, it also functions as a mudroom; the door opens up to our backyard and place for my dogs to sleep at night."

Any superstar tips for keeping it organized?

"I kept the room simple to avoid clutter. The pipe shelves we added are convenient for storing detergent, fabric softener and storing other supplies."

What items did you find were essential when organizing this space and why?

"The woven baskets I purchased from Target are great to conceal pet supplies. At the end of the day, we just toss in their toys while keeping their daily vitamins on hand. I purchased a couple of wire baskets from Home Goods to store extra blankets and paper towels. Laundry detergent is stored in pretty glass jars and few plants brighten the space."

What did you do to go the extra mile and "make it pretty"?

"I had the light fixture replaced with something that was more my style. I added a rug for warmth and texture. Inexpensive artwork from Ikea really gave the room some personality."

What items did you DIY to stay on a budget?

"I painted the walls Revere Pewter, by Benjamin Moore and gave the trim a fresh coat of white paint. I wanted to paint the door a cheerful color. After going through a few samples, I chose Outer Space by Sherwin Williams. Both colors were matched to Glidden Paint to save money. Our DIY pipe shelves were inspired by tutorial I found on the blog, 7th House on the Left."

How has it impacted your life for the better?

"Creating a space that is pretty and functional makes doing laundry less of a chore. The style of the room compliments the rest of the house. It's much easier to keep the room neat and tidy because everything has its place!"

_________________

A common theme for majority of the projects I feature, is the "everything has a place" motto. It is so, so true that when you consider your needs and implement storage solutions to give each type of item a home, it is much easier to clean up those piles. When you begin putting those piles away, if something doesn't have a home, you can instantly decide if it is worth creating a home for, or say goodbye to it for good. And I love that Brandi really kept the items in the space to a minimum. Less upkeep and just the items she needs to use within the space each day. For me, the biggest impact are the beautiful shelves she DIY'd paired with the charming light fixture. Toss in a few warm accessories and you have a room ideal for getting into your laundry groove.

Now, go get hooked on Brandi's blog like I did! You can find all of her laundry room makeover details here.

* All images courtesy of Don't Disturb This Groove.

ATTENTION!! Want to be featured in a Reader Space edition? Have an awesome organizing story to share? I am looking for projects that have made a positive impact to your life, big or small. They can be anything from an organized drawer or cabinet to an entire room. Please submit your story and photos to iheartreaderspace@gmail.com, and I would heart to feature them right here on the blog!! Photos should be high resolution and unedited. Please include a description of the project and how it has changed your life or routine for the better! Oh, and no worries my friends, we will NEVER judge "before" pictures because that just wouldn't be nice! Only love goes on at this blog!

DIY Magnetic Memo Board

2015-06-08T17:08:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my latest therapy session. I say that, because it seems like so many of my posts recently have been all about "keepin' it real" and sharing our stumbles. Today is no different pals. Today's project could be summarized as follows:

BUDGET: Too much, probably could have purchased something new for less
TIME: Felt like 82 Hours
NUMBER OF TRIES: 3

But hey! Third time is a charm right? And everything that didn't go right over the course of the past five days, all worked out in the end. In fact, I think all of the frustrations and errors ended up creating an outcome better than I had hoped!

That's right. This post was initially slated to go live on Friday. But by Friday, I was still gazing not-so-lovingly at this pile.

One thing we have been missing since removing our kitchen wall is some sort of a command station. Previously, it was hidden on the side of our fridge and was a spot to place cleaning checklists and calendars. Sometimes in decorative frames, sometimes just with magnets; it didn't really matter how cluttered it got because it was not visible to anyone but us.

The newer kitchen layout doesn't offer the same clutter catching corner, so this time around I wanted to create something much more intentional and attractive. For quite awhile, I have had it in my mind we would create something similar to this. I liked the idea of having a place to put up notes, calendars, memos, etc... as well as a temporary mail holder and hooks for keys. So much function in such a small amount of space!

Above, you can see my original plan was to utilize an inexpensive cork board purchased from Target, a decorative towel bar, cup hooks and Command Strips. I covered a similar style cork board to create a jewelry zone in our closet, and I really liked the outcome of that project. I figured I would do the same for the side of our fridge, but I never found a fabric I liked well enough and the proportions of the cork board were all wrong (too wide and not tall enough).

So after thinking of ways to make it work, I decided to scratch that idea all together.

Then, I recalled we already had made a pretty menu board in our old kitchen about four years ago. I dusted it off, and was excited that the size was much closer to what I had in mind!

The only problem was that the chalkboard portion was not functional other than for writing (could not be used with pushpins or magnets) and I didn't love the painted finish. I really wanted something with a wood tone and knew I would be able to add some metal sheeting to make the board magnetic.

I began researching stripping techniques (whooooah fellas, I am not talking pole dancing type moves here) and went out to purchase the necessary supplies to remove the painted finish.

I quickly remembered I had painted this board two different colors at two different times. And I don't know what I was doing wrong, but it took me hour after hour to remove the memo board paint. I followed the directions on the can and from YouTube tutorials to a T, yet the wood had absorbed some of the blue and it wasn't coming out. I scrubbed. I tried to curse the paint away. I put all of my muscles into it and got it as bare wood as I could. Over four hours of wood stripping later and I decided it was ready to take a new stain color.

Let's just say that after sanding, staining and giving it a coat of poly, it was so far from the look I was after, I was ready to scrap this entire project all together.

But I am not a quitter. Knowing that we need to get our acts together and work on time management and household responsibilities again, this project just HAD to get done.

So back to Home Depot I went, and I picked up 1/2" inch poplar boards in both 3" and 4" widths (actually, as you can see above, I picked up a few different options but below is what we ended up using). A total of 18" wide and 40" tall, we set out to DIY a frame for the magnetic sheet metal.

The idea was to add a small ledge to hold incoming mail and catalogs. Plus, it is a cute little added detail. We measured out the notch, used a square to draw straight lines and a jig-saw to cut it to fit.

When it came to stain options, I tried out the Special Walnut I had planned to use, and I was happy with the outcome just by dipping the rag, blotting it on a scrap piece of wood and rubbing it over the poplar boards.

To tone it down a smidge and add a little extra dimension, I brushed on a little Weathered Oak. I really liked the outcome of the two combined.

After I stained the frame boards, I followed up with a coat of poly.

While the stain and poly were drying, we began cutting the sheet metal. This was a very long and tedious process, given the size of the piece we were working with. We purchased a 2'x4' piece of steel sheet metal from Fleet Farm; it is important to make sure the type you are purchasing is actually magnetic. To get it to our desired size, we measured and then used a tin snips to slowly cut along our lines (bending and rolling the excess side away as we cut).

Once the piece was cut to size, I rolled on two coats of deep charcoal paint as well as two coats of clear chalkboard paint.

After everything was dry, we began assembling the frame. To give us a little stability while we worked, we used our staple gun to connect all of the frame pieces at the corners.

Using some heavy duty construction adhesive, we ran the glue around the entire backside of the frame.

We then placed down the painted sheet metal, pre-drilled and screwed the sheet metal into the wood frame around the entire perimeter with 1/2" wood screws.

After we flipped over the assembled memo board, I noticed that the construction adhesive was oozing onto the painted sheet metal. In an effort to remove the glue, all of the paint began scratching off with it. Sigh...

So, I fake smiled as I hand scraped the entire magnetic sheet clean to create a blank slate (a now completely assembled and framed out slate). Another blessing in disguise, I was out of the deep charcoal color, so I went to my paint cabinet to begin experimenting with alternative options.

I mixed our current wall color with white to lighten it and also tried mixing it with our coat closet color to darken it. I liked the darker option best.

This time, I taped things off and painted two coats of white primer onto the steel sheet metal with a microfiber mini-roller.

Once dry, I followed up with two more coats of the custom mixed paint color.

I love the lighter and brighter effect vs. the deep charcoal I originally had selected.

While all of this was happening, we also had to address the long towel bar rod.

The way the rod from IKEA works, is that it fits between the two holders on either end, and is then capped off for a finished look. To shorten the rod, we easily cut it with a plumbing pipe cutter.

I knew I wanted the rod to be gold to balance out all of the polished nickel and stainless steel that we have been adding lately, so I got out my primer and aged brass spray paint (same method I used for the hanging pendants).

After the rod was sprayed, it was still a little lack-luster against the stained wood frame, so I followed it up with a coat of gold Rub-n-Buff.

Once the new paint color was dry, we continued to finish up the frame by affixing the top piece of moulding and the lower shelf with our brad nailer (I may still add the clear chalkboard paint down the road again once the new paint is fully cured).

And the final step in the assembly process was to add a few gold cup hooks to the bottom portion of the frame to hold our keys (pre-drill and then screw-in the hooks tightly). It is important to select hooks that will not poke through the back side of the frame and scratch your wall surface when hung.

The entire thing is a bit heavy, so I picked up two packages of 16 pound rated Command Strips. Following the directions on the package, we wiped everything down with Isopropyl Alcohol prior to affixing the strips.

Level, stick, press, hold, press, run, pray.

Ready to see how lovely she finally turned out, multiple days later?

Like I said, so many blessings in disguise and it turned out so much better than I initially imagined. So very excited about the magnetic feature, I went to my fabric scraps and button making kit and whipped up a few colorful magnets for the new board!

And although the board will ultimately hold daily mail and our calendars/schedules (working on those this week), I couldn't wait to give it a test spin.

The wood tone turned out so lovely, and I really like how the new color plays with everything else we already have going on.

And the hooks at the bottom add such a sweet and special little detail to the entire project.

While the rail does its job at holding mail and magazines in place.

I purchased some strong magnets from the hardware store and affixed them to the bottom side of the buttons with superglue. They can hold through multiple layers of paper so those also get a thumbs up from me!

Plus, they really just make the board happier!

So there you have it! Now that you have learned from all of our mistakes, it shouldn't be too hard to actually DIY one of these beauties. And total cost was approximately:

Wood: $12.00
Sheet Metal: $30.00
Stain/Paint: Had on hand, approx $4.50 for small stain and $3-4 for paint tester.
Rail: $9.00
Hooks: $3.00
Command Strips (optional): $10.00
My Happiness: Priceless

This was definitely a turning lemons into lemonade type of story. And also an "If at first you don't succeed; try and try again" process. So happy we stuck it out! And I am also smitten that it turned out to be something that I enjoy looking at.

Now to get back to the rest of our weekly "Wait-No-More" challenge, I still have so much to do before Friday. I am so excited to see what you all have been working on as well!

UHeart Organizing: A Summer Ready Mudroom

2015-06-04T07:00:00.000-07:00

Seasonal changes are always welcomed, but I tend to get most excited for the arrival of spring and summer (hello warm weather and pretty lawns!). Not only does the climate change significantly each season, but our lifestyle changes seasonally as well. How we utilize our home and our systems are all impacted by the type of weather and activities that correlate with specific times of the year. With the first day of summer right around the corner, are you prepared for trips to the beach, parks, the longer days and sporting events? I know I had to get our baseball bleacher bag all stocked up again a few weeks ago.

Megan, of Honey We're Home, is also getting into the summer swing of things. Although I think she has one of the most amazing mudrooms in all the land, I really appreciate that her tips can inspire and work for anyone (mudroom or no mudroom). Here she is now to share how she has made a summer-ready home.

Hi friends! It's happy summertime over here since our 5 year-old just got out of school for the summer. He'll be starting kindergarten next year and he told me that he's ready, having worked so hard in Pre-K4! I swear, these times with our kiddos are so precious and I seriously want to bottle this current age.

We don't have any major summer vacations or trips planned this year, but in Houston it is super hot and humid, so we will be making multiple trips to the local swimming pool. Having everything ready to go in a portion of our mudroom makes impromptu pool trips easy. Welcome to our hardworking summer mudroom!

The light blue door shown above leads to my garage, so bags and pool supplies are appropriately stored here for quick grab and go. Everything from our insulated picnic basket, towels, sunscreen, koozies, and pool toys are kept in the upper cabinets.

In the cubbies below, we store flip flops in a woven basket that I picked up at Target.

This giant pool bag is too big to use as an everyday tote, but for the pool, it works perfectly. I picked it up at a local holiday fair last year and this year I'll have to pick up a few as gifts. It would be super cute with a monogram too. I keep sunscreen, an extra pair of sunglasses, my son's goggles, a hat for us both, and a few squirt guns in there at all times so they're never forgotten. Other things like towels, change of clothes, snacks, floaties, and magazines can be piled in too and still fit.

The key to keeping our shelves organized is not having too much stuff. As much as I'd love to buy new colorful beach towels, the ones we have suffice, especially since our pool supplies towels. We mainly take these towels (that we've had for years) to the beach or use them in our own backyard.

And my son likes to bring his own cartoon towel to the pool, so we do bring one of those for him.

My label-loving self had to create a couple cute tags for the sunscreen and koozies, but it was easy with my label maker and pre-cut tags from my craft store.

This summer, my son is signed up at a few different day camps that he can go to each week (although he doesn't have to go if we decide to stay home). He'll also resume swimming lessons since he still needs help becoming a stronger swimmer. We'll be starting with an everyday for two-weeks class to give him the most exposure and water time.

To keep track of these summer activities, I made a sign in PicMonkey (free online photo/design editing tool) with clip art and fun fonts. You can see more of how I use PicMonkey here if you need a tutorial. I also printed out our Summer Fun Bucket List that we created last year. It was awesome to see that James can actually read the list now! He has worked hard in PK4!

My trusty laminator will help keep the pages from tearing.

I originally planned to hang these signs inside the cabinet doors, but our doors are so high, they would've been hard to read. I opted to place them on the wall near the door and figured keeping them at my son's height is more appropriate anyway.

Washi tape is practical for hanging since it won't take the paint off the wall, but also adds a fun pop of color to the space!

I think we are off to a great start to our summer! I hope you have a lovely summer too! Big thank you to Jen and all her sweet readers for letting me stop by and share our summer mudroom with you!

______________________

"My name is Megan and I am a lawyer by day, design and decor lover by night, and Mama to the sweetest 5-year old boy you've ever seen. I'm passionate about fitness (and chocolate!) and could not live without my relationships, girl talk, and my morning coffee. I've been blogging for four years over at Honey We're Home, sharing my love of keeping things organized and beautiful at our house. My efforts to live in the moment and cook more are an adventure in progress."

Four Week "Wait-No-More" Organizing Challenge!

2015-06-02T20:04:00.000-07:00

I have come to a point where I need to take back our home. And I keep trying to figure out how to get to the meat of this post without it sounding like we are:

Slobs
Lazy
Whining
Lame
Un-motivated

When it fact, that really has never been our style. Although we will forever have problem spaces lingering, we have always prided ourselves on our ability to stay on top of our home. Whether it be with cleaning plans or meal plans or organized kits and caddies galore, our systems have been years in the making. Our goal is not perfection; our friends, family and neighbors have definitely seen our home in a tornado-esque state... We just love to find ways to make our routines easier (and our home prettier).

But wow. Over the course of the last five months and being knee deep in a home renovation, we have somehow lost our way. It is amazing how quickly we can fall out of our routines, create piles, and let our daily chores slide. And not having storage in the main areas of our home for many months, has had a trickle effect to almost every other room in our home. The moment we took down our wall and tore apart our kitchen, not only did we remove a few systems that we heavily relied on, we also shifted our priorities. Suddenly everything else could wait and getting our kitchen / living room finished was more important. It feels as though we are always focusing on some sort of project or running here and there. And when we have a few spare seconds, we want to spend them with the boys, not cleaning or doing more house chores. Always a balancing act right?

Well, it has gotten to a point that the kids have forgotten what their daily responsibilities are and I can't seem to focus on a single thing due to all of the chaos going on around me. I have always been one to thrive when my surroundings are clean and clutter free, so as the months have gone by, my drive has slowed down. I am totally, completely overwhelmed with our home. There, I said it. I already feel better. Say it with me? Just saying it is the first step.

I decided that I don't care that the kitchen still needs trim and the spices need to be labeled. The rest of the house needs my attention. It is time to take back control of a few spaces that have been controlling us, and our moods. I am not waiting any longer!

For the next four weeks, I am going to tackle our top four trouble areas. And I am not talking about the garage, which definitely has seen better days, I am talking about the spaces we use all of the time and have a real impact on our days.

Will you play along with me? Do you have an organizing project you have been putting off? Are you in an organizing slump? (cough, Courtney, cough)

Although I typically look for some sort of motivator when it comes to organizing a drawer, closet or entire room... this time, my motivator is quality of life! Not crafting or painting or listening to an audio book while I sort. Those are the perks, but not the drivers this time. But that doesn't mean I can't find ways to make it fun, stay on track, and be sure that I achieve my goals. So I put together a printable to get myself started.

And because I plan to bribe you all to organize with me, I am giving you this printable for free here.

Let me just say it was fun designing a printable again. It has been far too long. It was a nice way to ramp up for the next Planner release! Moving on...

Using the form is really straight forward, but I thought I would show you an example of how it will help with each project I take on over the next few weeks.

My first step was to identify my four biggest problem areas. I selected the following:

Master Bathroom
Master Closet
Both Vehicles
Daily Schedules/Papers/Time Management

The example shown above is filled out for our Master Bathroom project. An important part of the process was also to set some sort of a due date goal. Because I want to tackle a new space each week, I selected the first Friday as my due date to complete the space.

Before just diving in, I really want to reflect on why the spaces got so bad. Sure, a lot of it is because we have just been too busy to maintain them. But I also questioned whether it is because we are just not utilizing our existing systems, or if the existing systems are truly failing us (and most of the time it is both). It is important to recognize both the good and the bad here; list out things that are working, and think about those yay-areas as you also reflect on what is not working.

Now that I know what is not working, I can start coming up with a plan for the organizing project. Things like addressing my make-up storage and dealing with too many un-used toiletries. And of course, each project always starts out with a good blank slate, a deep cleaning and a purging of clutter.

There is also a section on the printable to list out any organizational and storage needs. This is a good time to think about items you already own, what you can easily DIY, and what you may need to purchase.

And last but not least, give yourself some realistic goals to strive for over the course of each week. It is a busy time of the year with kids getting out of school, nightly sports and picnic dates at the park. So match up the Project Planner Printable with your personal calendar and utilize the space at the bottom of the form to schedule in your organizing tasks.

There! Not so bad! We have already recognized and planned! We are halfway there!

And because things are about to get real, and we are going to be ruthless, I got out my handy sorting signs!

I printed them, cut them, glued them to colored cardstock and pushed them through my laminator. Now, I can just clip them to any box, bin or basket during a good organizing session. Did I just hear that you would like a set for your organizing sessions as well? You can download the Sorting Signs for free here.

And if you are looking for more printables to help during the sorting, donating and decision making process, you can find my Donation Kit here.

Now for the REALLY fun part! My goal is to share my personal results with you each Friday. When I do, I am going to provide a place for you to link your project back to me! You don't need to have a blog to play along, you will be able to link from Instagram as well as other photo sharing sites. And remember that I said I was also going to bribe you to participate in this challenge with me? Because sometimes our own messes aren't motivation enough, I am going to use random.org to select one person from the link party each week to win a $50.00 Gift Card to one of my favorite organizing-friendly stores (no need to participate each week to win). Not sponsored, just my personal way of saying THANK YOU for hanging out with me.

The fun starts next week! I am not sure which space I will tackle first, but it is on! I can't wait to see what projects you all select.

So get out your sorting bins, print off your worksheet and labels and get ready to tackle the organizing projects you have been putting off for far too long. Your "Monica" closet is calling your name! You in?

IHeart Kitchen Reno: Four Weeks Later!

2015-05-29T15:12:00.000-07:00

Wow! Another month has come and gone since our previous kitchen update. I was really hoping that we would be able to wrangle both kitchen and living room projects and updates all at once, but the living room sort of took over at the end, both on the blog and in our lives. After the last update, I had a few questions I will be chatting through today, and I will also be sharing a few big things that have happened over the past few weeks. Although we were so focused on the living room side, there are quite a few changes here as well. It is finally starting to look and act more like the space we have been working for!

Based on the photo above, I am guessing there are a few differences that stand out from the last update.

We installed and set the island as soon as we could, which allowed us to finish installing our flooring. That was a major game changer. Like wow. It really unified our entire kitchen and living area and added so much more warmth in contrast to all of the white. And it is so clean! Looking back at the last post, my photos seemed to have a blue hue which was throwing some you off. I totally get it, I just revisited the photos and they are pretty bad. My guess is that much of it had to do with the cloudy day paired with reflections bouncing off of all of the white. Not really sure. The picture above is a much truer photo of how our kitchen really reads, especially now that the floors ground things a bit more (floor installation post coming soon).

Some of you asked about measurements... We currently have about 3 1/2 feet between the outer cabinets and island. We always read that between three and four feet is best, and we have been really happy with the amount of room and flow that the 3 1/2' provides. We are able to easily navigate around the dishwasher when it is completely pulled out for unloading, and the refrigerator has plenty of room to open and get around without any crowding (more on that in a minute).

When coming up with a kitchen design, we were extremely limited with where we could place our oven and stove. Our fridge and pantry had to go on the outer walls, and with the window and plumbing on the outer walls as well, we had no other choice than to place our cooking pieces in the island. In the end, I am happy it worked out this way as we will be able to face the living area while we cook (great for watching the fam and television). We also had to go with a larger island to accommodate the oven, cooktop and downdraft without compromising countertop work surface space and to provide enough distance between the cooktop and stools on the opposite side. This allowed us to add a lot more storage in the island, so it all worked out in the end. Plus, I got the oven I was lusting after for a couple of years! It is a beautiful white glass option which was originally purchased from IKEA (and was discontinued when they released their new kitchen line).

As you can see, we also installed the remainder of the hardware on the island cabinets to match the rest of the kitchen.

I also received a couple questions and emails regarding the island details. The doors are full overlay, meaning that there is very little cabinet frame showing around each door and drawer front. It creates more of a seamless appearance and is also quite similar to our IKEA white cabinets across the way. The color is an option offered by the cabinet company that built the pieces, so I don't have a specific name or number (other than a generic Slate), but I did have it color matched at Sherwin Williams and you can see the code here. It is a beautiful color in person, just extremely challenging to photograph because it reads a bit differently depending on how the light hits it (as illustrated between the photos above and below).

You may also have noticed that we only have about half of our counters installed. They always say to prepare for the worse when it comes to major home renovations, and we have experienced a few different hiccups along the way. I think it is just important to know that a few things will go wrong at some point, and do your best not to turn into a Kitchenzilla when they do. You have heard about our dishwasher saga and maybe also read about our first refrigerator being delivered damaged. Both were no big deal in my eyes. Truly nothing to get upset about and maybe they simply prepared us for the next uh-oh. The day the beautiful counters arrived to be installed, we went to place our oven into the oven cavity of the custom cabinets. Guess what guys! It didn't fit. Um, what? The cabinet was built to the dimension of the appliances we had already purchased. They were able to install the outer counters and sink while they were here, and now that we have since been able to figure out the cabinet situation and set our oven, will be coming back next week to finish things up (counters can typically be set without the oven installed, but we didn't know if our island would need to be taken apart or changed so we opted to wait it out). As frustrating as the cabinet situation was (it caused a three week delay in the island counter install), the counters are about the most beautiful moment this entire renovation has seen yet.

When we first built our home, I selected green faux marble laminate counters because I was 19 years old and thought they were so cool and grown up (ha). It only took me about four months to no longer like them. For the next 13+ years, I was left trying to work with something that I didn't love. I am pretty positive that experience has scarred me, and may be why a lot of our newer kitchen finishes and selections are a bit more neutral and classic. Being this is such an investment, we don't want to change things each time a trend comes and goes. And we don't want to have regrets four months from now (although, I am sure there will still be a few lessons learned). Just like a lot of the other decisions we have made in the space, we did a lot of reading online when selecting the types of countertops to install. Ultimately, quartz won out. Both durability and the fact that it is non-porous (which means it won't harbor bacteria), were the main reasons we selected quartz.

I don't think we will regret these counters four months or even ten years from now. They are Cambria in Torquay finish and another thing I am smitten with is that they are manufactured right in Minnesota. (For local readers, we shopped around and ultimately decided to purchase from Selective Countertops and we couldn't be happier with the results). The veining and colors are a mix of beiges and grays and are quite subtle, almost a marble-like result but in a much more kitchen friendly finish.

We also ordered our sink with the counters, and once again, a major difference has been made in how we use the kitchen.

The sink is a total of 30" x 17" and 10" deep. We went with a stainless split sink, about 2/3 is the main bowl and the side bowl is the remaining 1/3. And it is all seamless. I knew I wanted a deeper sink for washing large pots and pans and filling my mop bucket...

But little did I know it would also be amazing for hiding a pile of dirty dishes when the dishwasher is full/being ran. Definitely a jumbo sized bonus in an open concept layout. Another new-to-us feature is a pull out faucet. The kids and I have been having fun with this! It reaches all corners of the sink which is great for cleaning, and offers two spray options.

We purchased a model that complimented the cabinet hardware, not super modern but not overly ornate either; it was juuuuust right.

But wait, there is more! I had no idea how much really has changed in the last month. Big post today folks.

One thing I have been challenged with throughout the entire process, is knowing that we have a garage door to work around. And it was a previously very unsightly door with about eight different layers of paint and dings and dents. Although not an ideal setup, moving the door really wasn't an option as there is other place to move it to. Keep in mind that we really only use the garage for projects, and even when we start parking in there again, we will most likely be carrying in a handbag and groceries. The boys always come off of the bus and enter through our front door, which is why their belongings are all located there. So fortunately, we don't need much of a system for more than a pair or two of shoes, maybe keys and some hooks. But visually, oy!

Our solution was to build the fireplace built-ins in the living room, to mimic the cabinets in the kitchen. Once the moulding is installed on the kitchen cabinets, they will be the same height and color as the built-ins, as well as the same distance on either side of the door. Our very lovely new paneled door!

See how we only trimmed the living room side? Haha, darn One Room Challenge. And no, we weren't really that lazy, we only purchased enough to do the living room side and that is exactly where we ran out. Hoping to get the rest finished up in the next week or two. Just sort of funny how that worked out.

Anyway, still not the most amazing setup, but I love how it worked out to create more of a nook or alcove for the door, making it almost look like intentional placement. And the paneled look on the door is much more polished and matches the remainder of our interior doors. Definitely happy with how it all is turning out.

Last but not least, we finally have a fridge! It is counter depth, and also finally framed out. Or in? Whichever way, it is so much cleaner.

When we began the kitchen planning process, we realized quickly that to maximize our space and to accommodate the island with cooking appliances, that our fridge would be best at a countertop depth. First, I ordered a white side-by-side option. There are not a lot of white countertop depth refrigerators on the market, especially with great reviews and decorative bar pulls. And the ones that did have good reviews, were about a few thousand dollars over our budget. But I found one and ordered it and when it arrived, it was completely dinged and dented and the pulls were nothing like they were pictured online. The company took back the refrigerator at no charge, and we were left starting over with our search. We thought that a side by side was the way to go since that was what we were use to, but after quite a few recommendations to try out the french door option, that is what we ultimately landed on. I have to say, I love how much more space there is in this style and that the doors can swing wide open and leave us a ton of room to navigate, even with the island directly behind us (we purchased this model).

What I don't love is the freezer drawer. This thing terrifies me. But I always love a good organizational challenge so I will let you know if I ever get this thing figured out. We also kept our previous fridge in our garage as a replacement to our freezer chest, which we will love for holding six packs of be... I mean soda. And for party throwing and entertaining and freezer overflow. Also, for some reason my regular stainless cleaning solution does not work on this fridge, so I would love recommendations on streak-free stainless cleaning.

So, a month later we have a fully functioning sink and fridge and even started unloading (but not organizing) our fridge and cabinets. After the counters are in next week, we can have our stovetop hooked up and start cooking on real appliances again! If anything, this process has given us a much deeper appreciation for everyday kitchen conveniences. Like making coffee.

And just when I am feeling like the end is near, it is time to get real and take a look at what is left before we call this renovation complete.

Install ~~HVAC~~/Oven/Cooktop
~~Install~~ counters
~~Set island cabinets~~
~~Install hardware on island cabinets~~
~~Replace garage door~~
~~Install flooring~~
~~Frame in refrigerator~~
~~Finish installing cabinet side panels~~
Install cabinet toe-kick
Install cabinet crown moulding
Panel gap above fridge
Trim floors, doors and windows
Install backsplash
DIY a coat closet door
Add shelving and doors to nook above coat closet (?)
Install legs to built-in side cabinet
DIY message center
Hang window panels and roman shade

I can't wait for layering in finishing touches to really start warming up the space. Things like rugs and new dining chairs and window panels, oh my. And cutting boards. We still have a lot of items to pick-out that we haven't landed on yet like backsplash (although my heart is set on one) and also have to troubleshoot a moulding issue we may run into with the beams and cabinets. But everything left is really just a lot of finishing touches at this point! And after next week, it should at least be 100% functional (fingers crossed). With that big list lingering above, I think you know where you will be able to find us when we aren't at the baseball fields. Happy weekend everyone!

You can follow all of the kitchen progress here.

UHeart Organizing: A Handy Craft Station

2015-05-28T08:30:00.000-07:00

Pegboard is here to rescue another crafting fanatic! I must say, it must be about the most functional type of storage in existence. The lovely Courtney from A Thoughtful Place Blog, always has a knack for making her projects look simple yet elegant. Who knew pegboard could be associated with elegance? But my girl did it again! She has created the perfect spot to work on projects for around her home, and now she won't ever lose her favorite "go-to" supplies again.

So I have a confession to make. I have been in an organizational slump for quite some time. Can any of you relate? I swoon over other people’s spaces as of late, but have had trouble getting motivated to create changes in own home. While we have many procedures in place around our home that do keep us relatively organized, it is my own craft supplies and project necessities that I continue to trip over or lose. I finally took some action and with very little effort refreshed my garage craft station.

So here is the deal. I know not everyone has a little spot in their garage for crafting. Truth be told, there is no real crafting space in my home {every project takes place on my dining room table} but my craft supplies seem to be multiplying. Funny how that happens, right?! A couple of years ago we installed some cabinets in the garage. This was after I took over a rolling cart elsewhere in the garage. My husband uses the tall cabinet for tools and the shorter cabinets are for my supplies. But there are so many "go-to" items that I go to grab all the time. I needed an organized spot for them. This easy pegboard solution provides just that.

I went to my local big box store and grabbed everything I needed to put this on the wall. In total, I only spent about $36. So worth it to have these supplies so handy. And it means I have a clear work space for putting together my projects.

They sell the pegboard already in white so I was able to give them the dimensions and they made the cuts for me. I love that. We also picked up wood to use as supports to mount to the wall. I also grabbed a set of three bins and racks to hang supplies from. And no project is complete without my trusted gold spray paint.

These were a breeze to spray and dried very quickly. While I sprayed these, my husband worked on mounting the pegboard for me. Just don’t forget to clean your items before you spray them to eliminate any dust or dirt which can create a poor final product.

We were lucky enough to hit a stud with the support on the right. We mounted three pieces of wood to the wall and then drilled the pegboard directly into those. That was enough to secure it and keep it steady.

Pretty craft supplies hanging on this white board make me giddy. I am almost afraid to admit that.

These scissors are actually quite special to me. They were my moms and I love having them. They remind me of all of the sewing projects she created while we were growing up. I gave the handles a quick spray of gold paint. I think she’ll like the update. And now I can’t misplace them!

My husband is thrilled that I have these key items in a known spot now. I can’t tell you how many times I have lost that large paint brush {I use it with the vintage décor paint}. The hanging buckets also disguise the outlet. We used a jigsaw to cut out a hole so that we can still use it.

So now I can easily remove the bucket and plug in a glue gun or lamp if I am working without natural light.

Crafting tip: Stock up on those sponge brushes. They are very inexpensive and clean so well. I use them almost every time I use craft paint. I created the Greek Key trim on the work surface with black electrical tape.

This sweet little jar was a salsa jar from Trader Joe's. With a bit of gold spray paint it’s a nice spot for my markers. I always keep a journal nearby when I do projects so I can write down measurements or ideas.

Here is one last look. And thank you to my sweet friend, Krystine, for the darling “Hey Y’all!” print. It brings a smile to my face when I work in here. And side note. . . the TV is in our garage because we often entertain and the boys migrate out there to watch sports while they play table tennis. It’s the hardest working garage around {if only we had a basement!}. Hoping this newly refreshed space will keep me crating without losing my favorite pair of scissors every five minutes. You can see the other part of our garage organization here.

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"Do you believe in love at first sight? I sure do because when I first stumbled upon I Heart Organizing I immediately fell in love with Jen's mad organizational skills. I think we all long for a calm, organized, well styled life. I am the author of A Thoughtful Place blog where I dish on all things related to decorating, organizing, entertaining, and of course DIY-ing! To be quite honest, working on making my house a home is my happy place. It fulfills my need to be creative and I love sharing ideas {both big and small} with my readers. Along with my blog, I am a contributing writer to House of Fifty and have recently started my own decorating firm, Casey Grace Design, LLC, with my talented sister. I call Orange County, California home where I live with amazing husband and two children. At the end of a busy day, I love to enjoy an ice cold beer on the front porch with my hubby while we watch our children ride their bikes or run around. Life is sweet and I am thrilled to be a part of the IHeart Organizing Team."

Reader Space: Loads of Love for Laundry

2015-05-27T10:17:00.000-07:00

Reader Spaces, oh how I have missed you! Today's space is just what I needed to feel re-inspired about my own laundry situation. Our laundry room makes me happy and isn't the most troubled spot in our home, but lately it has become a tornado of a mess and I have fallen behind with our daily washing routine. There are a few lingering projects I would love to tackle in there, and I think that Jessica just bumped those up on our priority list.

Jessica blogs over at Live the Fancy Life, and I love her mission! Live the Fancy Life is all about making every day count, living life to the fullest and enjoying the days we’ve been given. And she is practically my neighbor, so I can't help but feel a connection with her! Not to mention, she offers amazing advice for dressing little dudes.

When I first saw her laundry room, I quickly showed Bryan and begged him to finish up our laundry room projects. He reminded me that we have a different project to finish up first, but he agreed, this is one heck of a transformation.

Let's begin by taking a look at Jessica's laundry room before her recent makeover.

As you can see, it was begging for a little love and updating. And that is just what happened! I asked Jessica to stop by today to share more details.

What is the main function of the space?

"Laundry, laundry, laundry. I LOVE that this space allows us to fold and hang everything. If our boys are in bed, our clothes aren't stuck in baskets or laying on our bed. That always turns into a bad situation where they don't get put away for weeks."

Any superstar tips for keeping the space organized?

"For us, the individual baskets for each member of our family and different colored hangers and spaces on the hanging bar make a huge difference. Keeping the laundry detergent and dryer sheets organized is easy with a beautiful tray. The cabinets allow us to keep dirty clothes separate from clean clothes and even allow for extra storage for things like sheets. And a hidden trash can is a pretty nice bonus."

What items did you find were essential when organizing this space and why?

"Hands down, the hanging bar, built-in hampers and counter spaces. Several friends recommended the little tray for random pocket change and that is also so nice vs. having everything just laying on the counter."

What did you do to go the extra mile and "Make it Pretty"?

"Two words. Marble backsplash! Oh my! The backsplash has my heart. Is it necessary in a laundry room? Absolutely not, but it gives the room a stunning finish that could not be achieved with paint. I also love the laminate counters that are faux marble. They were exceptionally budget friendly, but make the room look higher end than it actually is. And the simple but pretty art from Rifle Paper Co. is so nice to look at."

What items did you DIY to stay on a budget?

"Please keep in mind that this project was mostly sponsored, but I did buy cabinets that were in stock and affordable. I went with very inexpensive laminate countertops that still achieved the look I was going for. And finally, the tile on the floor looks great, but it is actually vinyl and is a very budget-friendly option."

How has it impacted your life for the better?

"Besides being pretty, this space is incredibly functional. It allows us to fold laundry and leave it until we have time to put it away. We have space to create organized piles and hanging things immediately means it doesn't end up in a basket for weeks. We have been caught up on laundry for the full two months since this space wrapped up. I definitely couldn't say that before. I don't even want to tell you how many loads of laundry were sitting in our hampers before this room change occurred."

A complete transformation at its finest!

Having a similar setup with the folding counter and hanging bar, I can attest that it makes such a dramatic difference in our laundering process to have a place to fold and hang items to dry. Toss in all of the added storage within the cabinets above and below, and you are able to display the pretty and tuck away the day-to-day visual clutter.

What we don't have and have always lusted after, is a counter over the washer and dryer. What a difference it makes to have accessible solid surface for both storage and stacks of clothing. It also provides a streamlined appearance in the space. I adore that Jessica now has a place to display her decorative bins of laundry care items, as well as a catch-all tray for pocket items. Pretty flowers are a plus.

Other takeaways are a tucked away trash can and color coded hangers for the family. And backsplash. Glorious, beautiful backsplash. I agree, it was a game changer.

A load of thanks to Jessica for sharing her incredible makeover with all of us today. I hope she is ready for all of the grumbling husbands around blogland. I think many have laundry room projects in their future.

You can read more about Jessica's smashing space on her blog here.

* All images courtesy of Live the Fancy Life and Melissa Oholendt Photography.

IHeart Murchison-Hume & a GIVEAWAY!

2015-05-26T21:25:00.000-07:00

I hope you all had a lovely holiday weekend! The boys had a four day school vacation and I really enjoyed their daily company. We were able to mix some housework with a lot of play, leaving us all exhausted in the very best of ways.

Speaking of chores, although spring is already almost over, we are just starting to think about our spring cleaning sessions around here. The fact that spring always seems to arrive later here in the Midwest paired with our major home projects as of late, we are a bit behind our normal cleaning and decluttering schedule. But I am ready! In fact, I personally find an odd excitement in a good deep cleaning session. But you already knew that. You also probably know that we made the switch the more homemade and healthy cleaning products a few years ago. It is always nice to know that I don't have to worry about what I am spraying into the air that we all breath each day. And that I don't have to be concerned when the dogs lick up random crumbs from under the kitchen table.

But I know not everyone wishes to take the time to make homemade cleaners. Or maybe you are skeptical about how well they really work? Whether you have never used green cleaners or you spend your evenings whipping up a batch of laundry detergent during your favorite sitcom, I have an AMAZING giveaway for you all this week. It is definitely one near and dear to my heart. Say hello to Murchison-Hume!

Murchison-Hume was created by former Fashion Editor and mother of two, Max Kater, when her son developed allergic sensitivities to common household cleaning products. She made it her mission to create products that would be stylish to look at, safe and easy to use and still work just as well as ordinary supermarket brands. Clean is beautiful.

And let's be brutally honest for a minute. Stylish packaging is HUGE! Having the ability to leave cleaning products out in the open only promotes more cleaning. Am I right?

OK, so we have healthy and earth friendly (check, check), stylish (check), portable cleaning caddy (check) and they also clean really well (check)! What could make them any better? Why an iHeart Organizing chore chart of course! I just love seeing it in their most recent promotional photo! ♥ See, we are a match made in cleaning and organizational heaven!

OK everyone, I want to get these cleaners into your paws.

This week, I am giveaway away an amazing cleaning prize pack. So whether you are ready to change your daily cleaning routine or are about to dive into a deep spring cleaning like myself, be ready to fall in love with your chores (it really is possible).

One lucky winner will receive the Classic Six Box Cleaning Set which includes:

Boys’ Bathroom Cleaner
Premium Glass Polish
Spit & Polish Stainless Steel Cleaner
Everyday Furniture & Upholstery Cleaner
Counter Safe All-Purpose Cleaner
Effortless Floor Cleaner
Bamboo Caddy (Measures - 10”L x 7"W x 4.5” H)

I am also throwing in a $40 gift credit to my Etsy printable shop!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

From now through Wednesday, June 3rd, Murchison-Hume is offering 20% off to iHeart Organizing readers with the code iheart20 at checkout. And I am offering 20% off all printables in my shop with code iheartspringcleaning at checkout. Win, win friends!

Good luck everyone!

Must be 18 years old or older. Open to continental US residents only. No purchase necessary to win. All rules and entries must be followed to be eligible to win. Winner will be selected at random using rafflecopter.com and will be announced on original blog post upon drawing. IHeart Organizing official giveaway entry rules can always be found here.

UHeart Organizing: Painted & Pretty Bath Storage

2015-05-22T08:30:00.000-07:00

Long time color fanatic here, and I know I am not alone. Maybe we should start a color loving club? Do they have those? I could probably be president. Pair color with organizing and my heart really goes wild. That is one of the many reasons I fell in love with Aniko's blog, Place Of My Taste. She shares that love of color and organization and always knows how to inject happiness into each project she tackles. That includes some recent bathroom updates she made, which she is sharing with us today. And not only do we have the privilege of oohing and aahing over her beautiful and bright bathroom, she is also gifting us with some beautiful, free artwork! Thank you Aniko!

Today I am going to show you how I quickly refreshed our bathroom with a little pop of color. At the end of last year we tackled our bathroom makeover and I haven't really touched anything in there since then. The bathroom wasn't completely finished (and it still isn't which seems to be the story of my life), however, we were so pleased with the how far we came with the it because it is now bright, cheery and definitely more spacious. You can see more of the bathroom remodel here, you may want to see the before picture, it is pretty dramatic. If you have been to my blog, you know that I am not afraid to use color. Not at all. I found a terrific coral shower curtain at Target, my favorite one stop shop, and it was the driving factor to use coral as an accent color throughout the entire bathroom.

I recently spied a $1 ceramic soap dispenser and soap tray at Dollar Tree, and I immediately put them in my basket. I just knew that a little coral paint would make these the perfect addition to our space.

I am going to show you a quick tutorial of how you can make your own custom painted soap dispenser. Super easy and no, you don't have to be an artist to do this.

Things you will need:

Ceramic soap dispenser and tray (Dollar Store)
Glass paint (I used Martha Stewart - Coral color)
Paint brush
Gold sharpie pen - optional

As I said, you don't have to be an artist to do this. My lines were not perfect at all, but in my opinion, they don't really have to be. I just went on with my paint brush and painted my simple design. For the tray, I used the golden sharpie to highlight the edges.

I re-purposed the soap tray for my rings. I like to take them off before I shower and this pretty tray makes perfect holding spot. The design is so imperfect and that is what I love most about it. It gives these ceramic pieces a super custom look.

I wanted to go further and show you how I keep my bathroom organized and pretty at the same time. I use baskets, small vases and plastic bins to hold things that we use on a daily basis. I love to have everything handy in the morning because I don't have much time to get ready and look for things at the same time. I keep my quick make-up items handy, as well as my facial products, cotton balls, shaving products for hubby, and few wash cloths.

I have a shelf unit that I placed between my two vanities and it has baskets that hold extra hand towels, bathing and hair products. It fit perfectly and they keep everything easily accessible.

To make this bathroom feel a little more summery and beachy, I painted a piece of lobster artwork that I display right in front of my mirror. I am offering this watercolor art for FREE if you like it. I have been feeling a little artsy lately (if you follow me on Instagram you can see sneak peeks of my creations) and I have to admit, I absolutely love creating new designs. I am lucky to have talent in my hands from my dad, who also paints wonderful artwork.

Download your FREE copy here

Thank you for reading today. I hope you are inspired to run to dollar store and grab a few ceramic pieces that you can custom paint. I will be back here in a couple of months, but until then I would love for you to visit me over at Place Of My Taste where I share lots of fun, colorful projects and yummy recipes, or go check out my shop and my creations over at Society 6.

Cheers for a long and sunny weekend!

"Hey there. My name is Aniko and I blog over at Place Of My Taste. I am a wife, mother, business owner by day, DIY-er by night, design, decor and photography lover by heart who loves to cook, taste wine, dance for therapy and create all things beautiful. I share all this love over at my blog - at my happy place. Come see me there. xo"

One Room Challenge: The Reveal After the Reveal

2015-05-21T11:30:00.000-07:00

I have to start off this post by saying, "Thank you!" There were so many kind and encouraging comments on the living room reveal post, and even over the course of the six week challenge. I truly didn't think we would make it to reveal day, but it has been amazing having a space to use daily again. I really appreciate everyone that took the time to check in on the progress, share ideas and help me through much of my indecision.

Room reveal days are always full of fluff and happiness and are really just a pure celebration of all of the hard work that has lead up to that day. They show the best sides of the space and highlight favorite moments and accomplishments. Hopefully, we all know by now that no lived in room always has a throw blanket perfectly folded on the back of the sofa which is also filled with beautiful pillows. That the room is not always sporting multiple vases of fresh flowers and neatly stacked books near a reading chair. I believe that there are design choices that can be made that will keep a room/home looking lovely even with kicked up feet and popcorn bowls, but I also believe that room "reveals" can be equated to stepping out on a Saturday night. You spend a few hours working on your hair and makeup and even put on your favorite cocktail dress, and although you don't wear that dress everyday, you sure enjoy it when you do. You are putting your best dressed self forward.

Knowing that, I thought I would take a moment and recap my thoughts on the entire living room makeover process, being that this was the very first time we have ever tackled a room of this size in such a short amount of time. As much as I love focusing on the positives and happy moments (cough, reveal post, cough), I also think it is important to be real about all the rest. Sharing both the highs and the lows, our successes and mistakes and even lessons learned. That is why we blog about our home story and DIY adventures right?

Linda, from Calling It Home, has been hosting the One Room Challenge for a few years now, and I have always enjoyed following along as folks work hard to completely transform rooms in short periods of time. There is definitely a shock factor seeing what can be done over the course of 5-6 weeks. Taking the challenge is an amazing way to check off goals from your home to-do list, for lighting a much needed fire under your tush to get things done, and for learning about yourself and your design style.

So when Linda initially contacted me to join in this round, I felt like I had just won the Final Showcase on The Price is Right! And I hadn't even started playing yet! It was such an honor and before I knew it, I was placed on a list with really amazing blog talent. #pinchme

When it came to picking a room, it didn't make sense to start an entirely new project when we already had something big happening (the kitchen/living room renovation). And I am really, really good at being overly optimistic about projects and time frames. "It will be easy!" Those are always my famous last words paired with a knowing better eye roll from my husband. "Our kitchen will be done in time for the Super Bowl", I said! Enter eye roll here.

But we somehow managed to pull off a living room from start to finish in a total of five full weeks. Just after I photographed and posted our starting off photos for Week 1, we began installing flooring and trim. We ordered furniture, window treatments and accessories. We painted and shopped and built. We stayed up late with photography lighting kits while we cut tile in the front yard at 11:30 p.m. (I am sure our neighbors were thrilled). For five weeks, the majority of our spare time was spent on turning a completely blank slate into a livable and functional family space.

At the end of those five weeks, we high-fived and celebrated all we were able to check off the list. I even cracked open a bottle of wine and let out the biggest sigh of relief. There were times when it was easy to get caught up with what we didn't get done or make happen, but I had to get over that real fast. And although we called it a Room Reveal at the end of the challenge, we were not really done. In fact, our home is never done. As we live in our spaces, they evolve and are tweaked and modified to fit our needs. That is my favorite part... those smaller room layering changes.

To be completely honest, six weeks was not enough time to build a living room from scratch. Maybe to revamp or refresh a living room, or for a designer with resources and experience, but for us? Nope.

I found that due to the tight deadline, I was left making impulsive and compromised decisions. Things that I generally would wait on, had to be purchased now. For me, this is costly and goes against my goal to shop with intention. I even selected a few pieces I wouldn't have necessarily picked if I would have had more time. We didn't have time to revamp our credenza or build our coffee table or wallpaper down the stairs or even add in a few various elements we planned on initially. Generally speaking, when working on our home there are no deadlines... we just make changes as we live here.

When one is designing a space over time and not for a challenge, and the fabric they love is on back-order, they wait for it to come in. When I found out at the beginning of the challenge my initial fabric choice couldn't be purchased, I was left ordering piles of swatches and ultimately spending more on alternative pillow covers than I would have liked. I still picked colors and patterns that will be versatile down the road, but it was just one example of how I fought with the six week deadline.

The same story for our coffee table/ottoman situation. We tried to use what we had and when those weren't working, we were left with limited time to find a new solution. 20+ stores later, and I was unable to track down a wooden coffee table or tufted ottoman that fit our space. Everything either needed to be ordered in / delivered outside of our time frame or was just completely out of our budget altogether. 2:00 a.m. the night before photos were being taken, Bryan and I were pulling button tufts and stapling ottoman fabric. And painting and re-painting chairs at all hours of the night.

On the flip side, not being able to track down my dream mirror ended up being a fairy tale happy ending. The time crunch really forced me to be resourceful and creative and we wouldn't trade our new DIY mirror for any other. Sometimes, a little push is a good thing!

It was during those moments; forcing paint choices and driving around for hours sourcing objects, that I actually began resenting the room and the process. Allowing myself to feel stressed and frustrated about furniture and accessories seemed so silly to me when ultimately it was just material objects. I had a lot of internal struggles with this...

The six week deadline also caused us to make a few backwards decisions. We knew we would need a sofa and that they don't tend to show up at your doorstep overnight. We ended up measuring for it so early on in the process, that we only had sub-floors and exterior cabinets installed. We taped out our center island and started planning based off of a "three foot walk-around rule" that we had in our heads. We came up with a size and began shopping around locally for options. On the last day of a big sale, I ordered one that fit our wish list (rolled arms, pretty furniture legs, neutral color, no pillow back). When the sofa arrived, I loved the shape, style and color and was relieved to have found something that fit all of our criteria. We also had three adults give it a whirl and we were all able to fit and sit comfortably. I felt content with our choice.

After we began bringing pieces into our living room and kitchen, I then realized that we had more space than we initially planned for. We really didn't need three feet on both sides of the sofa. Honestly, so much space on either side seems to make the sofa look small in comparison to the rest of the space. Especially once the rug and built-ins were added combined with the vaulted ceilings. So although this Goldilocks and her three bears can fit on it just right, in the world of sofas, is bigger always better?

Trying to measure for a sofa when we had absolutely nothing to base off of and no other furniture or built-ins in place, was not the best strategy. In fact, we probably should have done it last.

Finally, I have learned over my years of blogging, that projects should not be rushed for the sake of content. In 90% of the cases that I have forced content, I ended up tweaking or changing things all together after I posted. I guess this challenge goes against that thought process, and I should have realized that right from the start. As weeks went by, I found myself uncomfortable sharing posts and room shots before I was ready because things were not panning out, making sense or coming together the way I had envisioned. Those insecurities paired with the brilliant and creative community I was sharing with and receiving feedback from, complicated my thought process even more. If anything, I learned that I really appreciate taking the time to think things through, work at a slow pace, and post when we are ready to share. I go through creative slumps and hit walls all of the time, but there was no time for that during the challenge.

Those creative roadblocks paired with some timing issues with the fireplace installation ultimately meant that the room was "thrown" together at the last minute. The paint on the built-in was final coated on the Saturday before pictures were shot on Monday. Once they were dry enough, I had a matter of a few hours to style shelves and the entire room before fighting light for photos. It felt like one of those down to the wire TV design challenges! We literally came down to the final hours to get this space done in time, and as you can imagine, not everything stayed where it landed that day. The flowers have withered, pillows and blankets are tossed in a nearby basket and books I read with the boys each night are piled right where they belong. Basically, I took my Saturday night makeup off and now we are living with a much more toned down version of the room. My goal is to let those continuous tweaks and changes happen as we use the space day after day.

Although we pushed ourselves and stumbled and lived and learned, I have zero regrets for joining in on the challenge and taking on our living room. After living without any space for over four months, the fact we can actually use it on a daily basis again is such a gift. I learned so much about myself and our home during this process, and have endless respect for designers who can flawlessly transform a space from scratch in such a short amount of time. I am always up for a good challenge, and may even play along again someday, just on a much smaller scale. We have never lived in an open concept home before, so to take on a project in a space that I am not familiar with utilizing, probably wasn't the best fit. But it was an eye opening experience and I am happy to share things we learned from it along the way.

This post may feel a bit opposite of the sunshine I spread around here, but we really are so in love with the new space we created and are extremely grateful for how far it has come. We only have minor adjustments to make, and for rushing a project, I say that is a giant win!

Oh! And last thought. Always steam and iron fabric before your project. We hung the curtains first and after steaming them, they started to slightly puddle on the floor. So now they need to be re-hung. Ditto for the ottoman. We pulled it so tight day one when upholstering it, and now it has become loose from being sat on and played on... totally should have ironed it first. Oops! Nothing lost, just rookie mistakes.

Now, enough living room chat for awhile... Next week we are back to kitchen updates!

Quick Tip Tuesday: "Sole" Mate - Shoe Care Kit

2015-05-19T15:56:00.000-07:00

For those of you who love to be prepared, and adore projects that involve zero DIY skills, this one is for you!

Truly, today's task was as simple as stocking up on a few essentials and corralling them in an easy-to-access bin.

This was definitely another case of, "Why did I wait so long to do this?!"

I don't purchase new clothing seasonally, but shoes? I have a bit of a love affair with shoes. And just like everything else, there are times when I might save big on clearance flats or splurge on comfort and style.

And while I appreciate having footwear for various outfit types and seasons, our Wisconsin weather does not always love our shoes in return. My boots are always covered in a salty film, the boy's tennies tend to be mud magnets and the hubby's dress shoes become dull and dirty after multiple days of wear.

Shoes are an investment, but how do we extend their life and keep them looking nice season after season? We create a shoe care kit, that is how!

What you put in your shoe care kit will vary based on your environment and shoe types. Different types of shoes require different types of care. So to create our kit, I took note of the types of the shoes we wear most frequently.

Suede: I added both a suede cleaner and an eraser bar (similar).
Leather: I added saddle soap and a rag (to clean and soften) as well as shoe polish and an applicator brush.
Tennis Shoes: I added baking soda and a toothbrush (combine baking soda with dish/laundry detergent and gently scrub shoe and soles with the toothbrush).

I also added a variety of spare shoe laces, comfort pads and an anti-friction stick. Those items were tossed into containers found at the dollar store and labeled with vinyl cut from my Silhouette.

A few other items that could be added to the kit are: a magic eraser (for those really tough cleanings - not to be used on delicate shoe finishes), rain and stain repellent, color shine, conditioning cream, shoe grips, shoe horns, shoe whitener, etc... Whatever footwear maintenance items that make sense based on your shoe wearing habits. (Should we start taking a drink every time I type out the word shoe?)

I found a narrow bin that can tuck away on our coat closet shelf, and printed off a label for the front. Popped everything inside and boom, done!

Part of being organized, is being prepared ahead of time. For me, that comes in the form of small kits or zones around our home. In fact, I am a kit-making fanatic! Sewing kits, cleaning kits, medical kits, stain kits, tool kits... I love and frequently use them all! This is one more I know I will be grateful I took the time to put together, especially now that I will be able to extend the life (and looks) of my favorite foot candy.

What are your top shoe cleaning tips and tricks? Any footwear maintenance essentials that we should add to our new caddy?

Looking for more quick tips? Check out the entire series here!

DIY Fireplace Built-In Tutorial

2015-05-18T16:05:00.000-07:00

Today I am giving a warm welcome to Monday. We took the weekend to focus on family fun activities and hosting some friends and family. It felt really good to take a break from projects and the renovation, Bryan and I both needed a bit of a breather.

It is still a giant post day! I have finally compiled all of our photos and notes to share our fireplace built-in project, which we revealed here. We started purchasing the supplies on a Friday evening and about a week and a half later, we were tossing items onto the bookshelves for final photos. A total of ten days in the making, this wasn't an overnight project, but it is one we are so incredibly happy with. Given the number of photos and steps, I probably should have broken this into a couple of posts, but it always creates confusion down the road so I am piling all of it in a single place today. Who's ready?!

Things have already changed a bit in the living room since the reveal, however, I will share more about that in an upcoming post. Nothing major, just little tweaks as we live with things. But now that you have seen the finished fireplace project, let's start back at the beginning.

A fireplace has been on our wishlist for many years, and as an effort to keep this our "forever" home, we decided it was now or never. Of course, we love how they look, but more importantly, it will be a nice source of heat for over half of the year in our cold weathered climate. And is there anything better than curling up near a fireplace with a good book or magazine? I have already done this multiple times and I have to say, it is fabulous! Truly a home dream come true for us.

As we began visiting local fireplace companies to get the scoop and research our options, we also started gathering ideas and coming up with a design for the built-ins. The following items were on the built-in wish list:

Wall mounted television to allow us to view it while cooking at the island in the kitchen, while sitting at the dining table and of course, while relaxing in the living area.
A combination of open and concealed storage.
Hidden component cords.
A design that would mimic the style of the cabinets in the kitchen to marry the two spaces.
Narrow enough to reduce the amount of lost floor space.
Salvage the DIY'd glass doors we created last year.

Based on those bullets, I whipped up a design that fit all of our wishes and presented it to Bryan.

Given the overall size of the built-in, we knew it would have to start in the corner of the room, vs. being centered and leaving negative space in the corner. After we measured out the existing mirrored cabinets as well as the fireplace insert, we came up with the remaining measurements for the surround and shelving. In total, the built-in ended up at 134" wide x 92"/96" tall x 16 1/2" deep.

Supplies used for this project:

2x4's
2'x6's
1x4x8 poplar boards
3/4" 4x8 birch plywood
1/4" 4x8 birch plywood
Lattice Moulding
Crown moulding
Wood screws
Brad nails/nailer
Iron-on edging
Fireplace insert - American Hearth DVD32 Series
1/2" Backer board
Backer board screws
Tile adhesive
Tile cutter - borrowed
Trowel
Tile
PVC pipe
Television mount
Painter's caulk
Primer
Paint
Rollers, brushes, trays
Shelving pegs

Because we wanted the fireplace mantle to be embellished with decorative moulding, the moulding needed a solid surface to return to on either side. That surface would be the sides of each bookcase, and we ultimately landed on a 3 1/2" wide frame for the bookcase walls (using the poplar 1x4's on the bookcase faces).

We began by using 2x4's and the 3/4" birch plywood to create a box to surround our previous mirrored glass bookcases. We pre-measured our components with their cords attached, and determined we needed shelves that were at least 16" deep to hold the electronics. Once the exterior of the box was built, we added a 1/4" birch plywood backing. Wood screws were used for building the 2x4 frame while the brad nailer was used to affix the plywood sides and backing.

We had a few shelving options, but I preferred something that offered flexibility vs. affixed permanent shelves. We simply used pegboard to create a template to drill shelving peg holes.

We were able to time the building of this unit with our electrician, and he was on-site running the wires for the outlets, fireplace and television as we constructed the unit. He was able to have our outlets moved to provide electrical for lighting and electronics in our bookcases.

The beautiful bookcase frame was finished and we held our breath as we inserted the previous glass-doored unit. Wahoo, it fit like a glove!

Once the first bookcase was built, we used the measurements provided to us by the fireplace company to construct the fireplace surround from more 2x4's.

Speaking of fireplace, prior to ordering, we asked 1,265 questions. Here are some questions we asked that we found extremely helpful come build day:

Can the fireplace be set on flooring and if so, what types are OK? (The answer for our model was yes, it could be placed directly on our laminate floors)
What are the model's surround requirements? (Tile recommended)
What are the model's overall installation dimensions? (We were provided the installation specs by the fireplace company)
How/where does the fireplace vent? (The fireplace was vented directly out to our garage and then piped up and out through the roof, which prevented the need to have the piping run directly up the wall behind the television inside of our home)
What type of clearance is recommended for a television above? (Recommended to add a minimum of a 2" lip/mantle past the face of the fireplace to displace the heat.)

As I mentioned, I really didn't want to see component cords. I find them to be visually distracting and was ultimately trying to achieve a nice and clean look. Not wanting to do anything permanent that we wouldn't be able to access once everything was built-in, Bryan came up with the solution to add a PVC tunnel to run all of the cords between the television and components. That way, should we swap out a DVD player or need to replace our Dish receiver, we can do so without any difficulties. Electrical, Internet and cable was run by our electrician to a location behind the television and eventually boxed into the built-in, while the PVC pipe was installed to run between the TV and side bookcase cabinet.

And this is where we were at the end of our first weekend of building. We needed to have our building inspector check on the electrical and gas updates Monday morning, prior to the fireplace insert installation (which was also scheduled on Monday).

We didn't install the fireplace, we hired that part out (we went with Comfort By Design for this). Once again, we sighed with relief when everything fit like a glove. Above, you can also see how the television boxes were placed and everything was concealed by another piece of the 3/4" birch plywood.

For the crown moulding, we used IKEA moulding on the outer cabinets and primed moulding from Home Depot for the center unit. The outer bookcases were built to the exact height as the cabinets in the kitchen, which will also be moulded with the IKEA trim. This was one of the ways we began creating cohesion between the kitchen and living spaces.

We also added small stripes of trim to the faces of the 3/4" plywood shelves. Wood glue and brad nailer for the win.

Now that the fireplace was installed and the moulding, shelves and built-in were complete, we were able to start tiling the fireplace surround.

To prep the fireplace for tile, we purchased cement backer board. The board cut like drywall, scored with a utility knife.

To affix the boards to the 2x4 framing, we used special backer board screws.

I originally had selected a herringbone marble from The Tile Shop, but when we were walking the aisles at Home Depot, I spotted a herringbone tile like nothing I had seen before. It offered a basketweave-like texture, which I loved because it almost looked more like a stone than a polished marble. We were able to borrow a friend's tile saw, and it cut like butta!

We drew out a template of the fireplace on a board to utilize while measuring and cutting each sheet of the tile. This allowed us to be sure that everything was going to line up and install without issues once we began spreading the adhesive.

To affix the tile, we went with a tile adhesive which we spread on the backer board with a fine tooth trowel.

We followed the directions on the container and worked our way around the fireplace accordingly.

After all of the tile is set, we recommend holding it in place with painter's tape or masking tape to prevent any shifting while it dries.

For now, we have not grouted this tile because it is so tightly woven and the texture would make it nearly impossible. In fact, Home Depot told us not to use grout, however, we are still looking into that because we have never not grouted a tile project before (and we can add grout at any point in time). Once we decide, we will also add a sealer to the tile as well.

After the tile was set and cured, we began constructing the mantle. The mantle was another piece of the 3/4" plywood paired with the decorative crown moulding. We also finished adding 3/4" boards to the perimeter of the tile.

The lattice strips were cut and affixed to the surround and upper TV portion to add a decorative embellishment (based on my diagram above - I forgot to photograph this simple step).

We also added some iron-on edging to the cut edge of the mantle as well as the top moulded cap, and proceeded to fill in every last nail hole and gap with painter's caulk for a seamless look.

When it came time to paint, I used Zinsser Smart Prime paired with Benjamin Moore Advanced Paint in Simply White Satin. I was really happy with the quality and finish of both.

I used a microfiber roller on all of the flat surfaces, and my favorite brush for all of the cracks and corners.

One coat of primer and two coats later, it was already looking good! The paint really cleaned up the entire build and made it feel like one meant-to-be unit.

I ended up doing one more coat before pulling the tape and celebrating!

The TV mount offers both tilt and swivel features, allowing us to pull it out and face it wherever we would like.

We started off with a variety of shelving pegs that we found in our tool box, however, I ended up purchasing some smaller pegs that were less visually distracting.

We eventually plan to create a "faux" panel that I can add to the backs of the bookcases when the painting or wallpapering mood strikes. That way I can change things up without doing anything permanent I may regret down the road. We also hope to add decorative lighting to the tops, and the outlets added to each side will come in handy when that day comes as well.

I am so in love with the tile and all of the moulding and trim details. The final result is definitely a functional moment-maker!

Most of this project was far from pretty and I had multiple moments throughout the construction process where I wondered if it would all come together as envisioned. But it did! In fact, it exceeded our expectations and we are happy we were able to achieve all of the goals and finally check off a big home wish list item. Just in time for the hot summer, ha!

UHeart Organizing: Upcycled Toiletry Storage

2015-05-14T14:00:00.000-07:00

When it comes to organizing and searching for storage solutions, I always recommend shopping your home first. It is amazing what you might find to solve a problem at hand. Recycled food packaging is always my "go-to" and if that doesn't work out, I start looking through cabinets, drawers and my donate pile. If all else fails, I may even try to DIY something just to save a little cash and create something specific to fit my needs. My friend Karen blogs at A House Full of Sunshine, and she recently upcycled some unused storage boxes she already had on hand. She is here today to share more about her special toiletry project and inspire us to search our homes prior to heading out to the stores as well.

My bathroom storage situation has been feeling a little uninspired lately. Bottles and jars that start out lined up neatly inside the cupboard seem to always end up in a messy clutter all over the shelf.

I wanted some way to dedicate an area for face products and fragrances and make those bottles look neat and orderly, but also keep them easily accessible so I could see and grab what I needed.

Solution: a pair of old CD storage boxes. I don't know about you, but CDs are practically redundant at our place now. Time to repurpose! (If you don't have any unwanted CD boxes lying around, these pretty birch boxes would be a fun starting point as well.)

I used thin masking tape to mark out a simple geometric pattern on each box.

I also taped two of the inside surfaces with clear packing tape, to preserve the wood finish for a bit of contrast. Because it's not a painted surface, there's no danger of paint lifting off when you remove the tape, so you don't need to worry about using painter's tape.

Since the wood had a varnished finish, I gave the boxes a quick coat of primer to ensure the paint would adhere properly.

Then I rolled on my colors using a small foam roller. I chose a pretty peach...

Soft mint...

And lipstick pink for a pop of fun.

Time to remove the tape.

I love the contrast of the blonde timber against the colour-blocked pastels.

The last step was to spraypaint a pair of adhesive bookplates with gold, and print some labels to slip inside. The font I used is Peinture.

I debated about what to "call" my boxes (Face and Fragrance? Skin and Scent?) but in the end went with "Lotions and Potions" purely for the fun factor.

All loaded up with bottles of product, these sweet little caddies would be fun peeking out from a bathroom cupboard, but I think they're also pretty enough to display on a dressing table in plain sight.

I hope you feel inspired to repurpose some unwanted storage boxes in your home and tame that lotion and perfume clutter.

Thanks so much for having me here today, Jen!

__________________________

Hi friends, I’m Karen from A House Full of Sunshine. Do you see that grin I can’t wipe off my face? That’s how thrilled I am to be here! I live in Australia where I’m blessed to be a stay-home mummy to my three little people. I’m also a part-time interior decorator and a former teacher of Creative Arts. Basically, I’m happiest when I’m squeezing every drop of creativity out of life – whether that means decorating a room, inventing a fun new activity to do with the kids, thinking up pretty organizing solutions or putting together a DIY project. I believe life is meant to be beautiful, and home is an expression of the heart. My blog, A house full of sunshine, is the place where I share my adventures in creative home-making with kids. The coffee’s on and the welcome mat is out – I’d love to see you there!