Tackle It Tuesday #23 - At long last... Cleaning 'my' space.

We've lived in this house for over 4 years now. And for probably about 3-1/2 of them, my closet and dresser have been a cluttered mess - mostly of clothes that no longer fit, various hidden gifts for the girls, and assorted, well 'junk'.

You know things are bad when your closet is full of clothes and yet you never open the door... I'd been meaning to get to this for a while now but honestly didn't feel up to the tackle. And then my dresser became buried by more junk, and the computer cart was moved into the room after we moved the bassinet out almost 2 years ago - and the bedroom became my 'office' as well. A very messy one. Add in a couple of totes of scrapbooking supplies that I couldn't find another home for, and well, you get the idea.

Until last weekend. Well actually, the weekend before - I meant to post this last Tuesday, but found myself flat on the couch sick all day unable to put together a coherent thought, much less a blog post. But this week I am back to myself (appetite and all, unfortunately), so I'm sharing this with you today. I'm very proud of this tackle. :)

And yes, I'm even going to hide my face in shame and share a couple of 'before' photos with you. Don't run away screaming though - the 'after' pictures are coming, I promise!

See all of the clothes in the closet? Guess how many of them actually fit me - right now, at this very moment? Come on - any guesses?

Let me give you a hint. Here are the piles of clothes that I pulled out - that don't fit:

(Just ignore Becca's pillow and the wet spot on our comforter - I had a little audience for part of this and her sippy cup of water was on the leaky side...)

So here is the closet - after. And honestly, even the dresses that are left are either maternity ones that I'm not quite ready to get rid of yet (just in case), plus a few that I'm hanging onto from pure sentimental value....

Quite a difference, huh! I even have room on the middle shelf to put some of the things that were cluttering up my dresser...

Which left the rest of the room looking like this:

And I'm proud to say that over a week later, the room still looks like this! On my side, that is. Now, Ron's side is a completely different room and a different tackle all together... And no, I'm not sharing any pictures of his side! Although maybe that might get him to think about keeping it picked up more often than every month or so. Or when he runs out of clean clothes... :)

So I have 2 large, bulging trash bags full of clothes to get rid of. Casual clothes, tons of professional clothes (from my previous job which had a more formal dress code) - all in a fairly wide variety of sizes and styles. They're all in pretty good shape - Kristi? Mary? Cheryl? Anybody else? You're all welcome to go through them if you'd like...

I look at it this way. I kept most of these clothes for years thinking that I'll lose weight some day and fit back into them. By getting rid of them now, I'm just about guaranteeing that they'll fit me again - I give it 6 months to a year. But even if that's the case - it'll be worth it! :)

What are you tackling this week? And check out other Tackle It Tuesday posts over at 5 Minutes for Mom!

Did I walk into the right house?

In the evenings, as I round the curve on our street, I always strain my eyes to see if Ron's van is in our garage. It's difficult to tell until we get almost to the driveway, but in general if the garage door is up, then he's home and if it's still down, then I know that I'll be on my own for at least the first part of the evening, and for dinner with the girls. Abby and Hannah usually try to guess whether Daddy will be home or not, and it becomes a great source of disappointment for whichever of them guesses incorrectly.

Friday was a pleasant surprise. The garage door was up, Ron's green van was parked inside, and I immediately noticed that he had already put the garbage toter out by the curb. Given that this wasn't even our usual garbage night due to the holiday, I was impressed that he'd remembered. I'm usually the one panicking at the last minute to make sure that the garbage is out, and I'm embarrassed to say that we've missed a few pickups as well from time to time.

My next clue that something was different happened immediately when I opened the back door, into the kitchen. The spicy aroma of spaghetti sauce filled the air, and when the girls un-piled themselves from their father, I saw the spoon in his hand and realized that not only was he home for dinner - he had made dinner as well. A wonderful, hot dinner that everyone likes and will usually eat. That we could eat together as a complete family.

"There's something new in the living room!", Hannah called out to Abby. Curious, I walked to the doorway and peered into the living room. I noticed 2 things right away. First, that the cedar chest from our bedroom was back in its usual place by the front door (it had been re-located to our bedroom first by our living room re-arrangement last year and then by the Christmas tree after we put the living room back to its initial arrangement last month). Considering that the chest had been completely buried in dirty laundry (Ron's, as it was on 'his' side of the room) just that morning, I began to have an inkling that there were more surprises yet to come. This was confirmed by the second thing I saw when looking into the living room - a laundry basket overflowing with what had to be the kids' clean clothes.

Entering our bedroom, I was amazed to realize that there really is a floor on Ron' side of the bed, and that without the cedar chest against the wall, there's really quite a lot of floor there. And wait a minute - not only was the floor unburied, it also appeared to have been vacuumed as well.

I returned to the kitchen and asked the tall being who greatly resembled Ron, "who are you and what have you done with my husband?", and after a moment, I added, "and can you stay for a while?" LOL

While in the kitchen, I glanced in the sink and realized that the pile of dirty dishes that had filled it that morning was missing. Lest I worry that we'd been robbed (as if anyone would want our dirty dishes anyway), the guy who resembled Ron but clearly couldn't be my "messy, can't remember to put his own dishes in the sink much less anyone else's" hubby opened first the dishwasher (wow, I've never seen it actually completely empty before...) and then the cupboards to show me that every single dish was exactly where it belonged.

Now I was a bit scared - had he been taken over by an alien being perhaps? Or brainwashed in some fashion? I mean, it couldn't really be my husband, who I have to beg, threaten, or nag into doing the dishes, who had done all of this. And that wasn't even all of it...

Returning to our bedroom in disbelief and shock, I saw that Ron's closet door was open (a common occurrence). But when I went to close it as I generally do, I got a further shock when I glanced inside. All of his clean clothes were folded and stacked neatly on his shelves, or hanging. From actual hangers. Other things soon came to my attention as well - the carpet in the girls' bedrooms was suspiciously clean as well, and the kitchen floor was devoid of the breakfast cereal pieces that Becca had adorned it with that morning and that I had not had the time or willpower to make myself clean up for the 485th time. In the distance, I could hear the dryer merrily humming away as even more laundry was obviously in the process of being done.

The table was set, dinner served and we sat down as a family to enjoy it. And afterward, this wonderful person who had created the dinner, cleaned it up without a word of complaint.

Am I dreaming, I wondered... Is this some alternate reality that I've suddenly been transported to? For during dinnertime, it had also come out that all of the Christmas decorations (which I had taken down and packed back into their tubs - and had nagged Ron into at least carrying down the stairs into the basement, where he left them at the foot of the steps for me to squeeze back into the tiny closet under the stairs) had been put away, the ping-pong table had also been folded up and returned to its usual storage place and someone (surely not my husband!) had gone through the dozens of old videotapes that have cluttered up the computer room and had gotten rid of almost all of them (Ron collects tv shows and movies that he records on video - he's had this collection since before we met and it's taken up an inordinate amount of space in every apartment and house we've lived in). The computer room had been cleaned up and actually almost even looks like a 'real' room.

Yes, it was indeed my husband who did all of these things. On a day off from work - which he usually spends sleeping and relaxing in front of the tv, but for some reason had decided to spend, in this case, cleaning and sorting and organizing. When I recovered at last from the shock, I made sure he knew how much I appreciated his effort. And that any time he felt like repeating the feat, he was welcome to.

A mama could get used to this. Very easily, in fact. :)

Christmas Tour of Homes - Welcome!

Welcome to this stop on your tour! I hope you enjoy your stay. :)

If you happen to be stopping here at night, you'll be greeted by our outside lights...

They're lovely, especially when the snow is falling...

So please, come inside out of the cold. Our front door is always open for friends...

You can sit for a minute by the Christmas tree...

You may want to take a closer look even...

And enjoy some 'plush' company if you like...

There's more to see in the living room as well:

We are eagerly counting down the days until Christmas on this beautiful advent tree that a friend made for us - every day the tree looks a little more festive - and then on Christmas, Santa will come!

As you move through the hallway, you'll notice the girls stockings are hung with care - but on our coat closet door, since we are unfortunately without a fireplace. This is something that's caused my two older girls a bit of stress, but we have assured them that Santa doesn't let a little thing like no fireplace deter him. Poor Becca still needs her name put on her stocking though.

The kitchen is a bit festive as well - take a look for yourself!

And last, we'll end the tour at our staircase - I apologize that the basement is not fit for visitors right now. We've put up all of the girls' Christmas portraits in place of our usual ones along the staircase wall - except for Becca of course, since this is only her 2nd Christmas and we don't have nearly enough photos to fill her row yet.

From bottom...

to top!

You can head out through the garage door beyond the stairway and please take a Christmas card on your way out!

Thank you for stopping by and visiting - please come again! :)

Deb

Tackle It Tuesday #20 - Kids' bedrooms

Ok, as promised, here's what I did in the girls' bedrooms over the weekend (sorry, it's very long!). For those who have no clue what I'm talking about - I decided on Saturday morning that both of the kid bedrooms needed a major overhaul. I stopped short of anything as drastic as re-painting and I spent a grand total of $0 - my kind of makeover! All I really did was to re-arrange furniture and sort through the toys, removing many that had either been outgrown, broken or that were just plain annoying. I love the way that Becca's room turned out and there's an improvement in Abby and Hannah's room too - although there's not a lot to be done about the fact that the room just isn't terribly big for them both having to share it.

This is what prompted the whole endeavor - Becca's new toddler bed was originally facing in the opposite direction from how she actually sleeps:

Here's a couple of shots of what her room basically looked like going into the weekend. The explosion of toys all over the floor had a lot to do with me pulling the Christmas Little People out when we put our tree up. And the diaper boxes are full of outgrown clothes waiting for our garage sale in the spring.

I started by pulling every toy off of the wire shelves (someone thought that was great fun). I moved all of the diaper boxes out into the hallway, to be stored downstairs, and filled the empty diaper boxes with toys that I decided that Becca had outgrown. She had other ideas, so I had to sneak a few of them into the boxes... I also swapped the (mostly empty) chest of drawers with the small bookshelf in Abby and Hannah's room (prompting a mini-makeover of their room as well).

My goal was to get her room done and 'sleep-able' by nap time. And I made it! Here are some 'after' shots - can you believe the difference? :)

I think I must've put the toys back on her shelves a dozen times - she was pulling them off to play with about as fast as I could get them put away! And yes, she was still in her pajamas... I did get her dressed before lunchtime though. :)

What boxes out in the hallway? I don't see no stinkin' boxes! At least I don't now that they've all been moved downstairs, that is...

This is long already, but I wanted to share a few quick photos of the (not as drastic) transformation in Abby and Hannah's room too. There's not a lot we can do in there since the bunk bed only fits in one position without blocking windows or doors - I don't really like the setup, but at least it's a little better than it was.

Here's pretty much the 'before':

I hated the bookshelf in there because the books all fell down constantly, got piled in there and slid out as you can see... Also, you can't see it, but there's a wooden vanity that someone gave us that was up against the ends of the bunk beds. I moved that to where the book shelf was and put the chest of drawers from Becca's room up against the bunk beds instead, along with the white shelves/baskets thing.

Piling all of the books in the middle of the floor? Just a temporary solution... And notice the 'help' I had, or rather the little one who was taking full advantage of being able to access the big girls' room.

Here are the 'after' shots - it's a bit hard to get a good photo in there because there's just so much stuff, so I tried from a few different angles.

My temporary solution for all of the books is the two fabric storage 'cubes' with the girls' names on them. I don't like this much either though since it's impossible for them to find a specific book without pretty much emptying the whole thing. Anybody have any ideas for how to handle kids' books?

The small chest from Becca's room gives Abby and Hannah each 2 drawers to keep 'their' stuff in. That's something they didn't really have before - all of the toys were pretty much mixed together and I really wanted to be able to give them someplace for their own things.

What are you tackling this week? And check out other Tackle It Tuesday posts over at 5 Minutes for Mom!

Was that really a weekend?

Wow, don't you hate it when the weekdays drag on so long and then the weekends just zip right on by? That's what seems to have happened over this past weekend - I really have almost no idea where it all went.

Ok, so I have a little bit of an idea where it went. And I thought I'd share some of the highlights, even if just to prove that we really did just have 2 days off. :)

Ron had to work on Saturday of course, so the girls and I had a lazy morning as we usually do. Our Saturday mornings typically involve the girls watching more Playhouse Disney in one sitting than they usually get all week while I attempt to doze in the recliner - not an easy task while being poked with elbows and asked to referee the wrestling contests that usually take place on my lap. One (tired) Mommy with one lap and 3 kids usually equals not much dozing taking place.

Once I finally decided to wake up, I found myself in Becca's room, looking around and actually seeing the state of it. Since we took the crib out and put in the toddler bed, nothing had been moved around or put away and there were toys scattered everywhere. Not to mention that her bed now faced the wrong direction since she always sleeps facing one way and the head of her bed was the opposite (see the pictures at this post if what I just said makes absolutely no sense to you). I did think for a long moment about simply turning her bed around and putting the foot of it against the wall, but then from somewhere I got a burst of energy and drive and decided that it was finally time to make some real changes.

I'm saving the rest of the story for my post on Tuesday, but I'll give you a quick sneak peek...

In the end, both Becca's room and the big girls' room looked about like this for at least a portion of the day. I promise though that the 'after' photos are pretty awesome, so check back on Tuesday... And yes, Becca had a field day with all of the toys within easy reach in the middle of her floor while I was 're-arranging' things. :)

Yesterday was Ron's day off. The older girls sang at church in the morning - I was very proud of both of them! You can see some of the photos I took in the Flickr montage in my sidebar. Abby was in a pink shirt and Hannah in a brown one if you have a hard time picking them out. I have some video of them singing, but haven't gotten those up online yet.

After a quick nap/quiet time, we all headed out to a local mall to meet up with Ron's siblings and their families. The last time that there was a photo taken of everyone was in 2003, so his sister decided that it was time for a new one as a surprise gift for their parents for Christmas this year.

Imagine if you will, 6 adults and 12 kids (ranging in age from Becca at 22 months all the way up to 17 years old), trying to find a decent place to pose by a shopping mall Christmas tree and using my brother-in-law's tripod and self-timer on his digital camera to get a decent shot of the group. Can you imagine that? I could - and had a few doubts about getting any kind of a good photo as a result - but I was somewhat surprised that it actually went very smooth and painless. I got a quick glimpse of the photo and it looked pretty good even. I know that Ron's parents will be thrilled (and I'm positive that they don't read my blog, so I'm not giving anything away here!).

Seeing that the mall was fairly empty, we took advantage of the short lines to see Santa Claus. We saved a lot of money by taking our own photos (thankfully they had no problem with that) and I think they turned out rather well in general.

Here's Abby:

And Hannah:

And both of them together:

And our attempt to have Becca get anywhere near Santa, which was a dismal failure, so this is the best we could do:

Then we let the girls play for a while in the mall's play area - it's one they hadn't been to before since it's across town from where we live. They had a blast - running and sliding and playing tag with other kids.

Not to mention sitting in a giant plastic snake - something which apparently was quite fun to play on and in.

It was the getting in and out of things that seemed to be the most fun.

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And the slide (of course)!

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It was about then that my camera batteries died, so that's it for pictures.

You know, now that I think about it - we really did have a rather packed weekend. Maybe that's why it seemed to rush by so quickly...

Is it Friday yet? :)