The Friday Declutter Challenge

This week, I declutted my daughter's hair stuff that's been bothering me for a couple of months now.  She's only 6 months old, but she has a whole head of hair.  I can put her hair up in pigtails with no trouble.  We actually had to cut her hair earlier this week - it was getting to the point where it was continually getting in her eyes and she couldn't see, so mommy took some manicure scissors and gave the little princess some stylish bangs.  It's not the best job in the world, and I'm going to admit that it's completely crooked, but hey...no one's going to care about that on an adorable 6 month old.

Anyway, I declutted her hair accessories this week.  Her stuff is mainly made up of a mega pack of hair-ties that I bought at CVS a while back for a $1 as a filler item.  It's perfect because they came in every color of the rainbow, and since they're so cheap it's not a big deal if I lose some or if they snap.  Before, I just threw them all in a recycled mushroom container.  It was basically a grab-box of stuff, so it took a while to find a matching hair tie for her pigtails.

I went to Walmart and bought one of those beading boxes for less than $2, then I spent about 5 minutes sorting her hair-ties by color.  I am more than pleased with the result!  Not only can I find what I'm looking for in a fraction of a second, the box itself also looks so pretty with all the bright colors.  I was surprised to find that she actually has a lot of "special" hair ties and hair clips with various patterns and trinkets on them.  Some of them she's never worn because we just simply threw them into the box and they got lost at the bottom.  Now, I've got 3 separate sections dedicated to these clippies and bows and headbands. 

Daddy also loves the new solution.  He will actually do her hair (I know, isn't it great?), but the problem is that the man is color-challenged.  He grabbed the first color that he saw, because frankly he didn't have the patience to go shifting through the box.  Well, now he can see at a glance what matches and what doesn't, so the days of having orange pigtails with a purple outfit is now over!

I am so happy that I took the time to declutter her hair accessories this week.  It took me less than 5 minutes, but it has saved us a lot of hassle.  My total cost for this project was $2.  It does not take a lot of time or money to get organized...so pick something in your home and start TODAY!

The Friday Declutter Challenge: baby records

Besides decluttering my blog this week with a new design and layout, I also tackled my baby's record file. Since our royal mess of a doctor's appointment on Wednesday, I went back and cleaned it up considering we'll be referring to it on a regular basis now.

I'm just naturally an organized person, so it was never a mess or anything, but basically I kept throwing papers in there thinking I needed all of it. I sat down and got rid of a lot of duplicate paperwork (i.e. the packet they hand you every-time you get shots). Since she was born, I've always kept track of her weights and stuff, but they were on various random pieces of paper. We need a simple go-to point to see her progress (or lack thereof) over the past few months.

The "meat" of her folder is the stuff in the little 3-ring insert thingy. I made a table of her measurements at various ages, along with where they fall percentile wise. It will be a lot easier to keep track of the numbers now, instead of writing it on the first piece of paper on hand and tossing it in the folder. I mean to get to it, but let's face it...I never do. Behind my table are some growth charts, and then I kept one copy of the packet they always hand out when you go in for shots. It covers stuff like reactions and what each vaccine actually is. I never remember that stuff so it's nice to have it on hand, but I certainly didn't need 4 copies of it.

Besides just having all of her weights in one location, I also wanted them on the baby growth chart. After a bit of digging, I came across two very useful websites. Birthcare offers customized baby growth charts - simply register for a free account, enter in your baby's weight and height, and they will not only plot the data for you but also save it. It's not an exact replica of the CDC growth chart that the doctors use, but it's the same idea and the layout is just different. Personally I like this one better, since I won't go blind trying to read it.

The second tool that I found is a children's growth chart percentiles calculator from About.com. This does not produce the actual growth chart, but rather the percentiles. For me, it was important to have both on hand, because I guarantee you I will not be able to determine her percentiles from looking at the chart.

Her records file is basically just a folder. In the front flap, I keep important current information, such as upcoming appointments and her shot records. Since there's about 10 different names for shots and the combinations in which they come, I have her official shot records, and then I have an unofficial checklist that I go by.

In the back pocket, I keep old information like discharge information, test results, and the like. I also keep her Child Safe Kit in the back pocket. I am so proud of us as a family that we managed to make one, because let me tell you...trying to get the fingerprints of a 6 month old is near impossible. Most of them are smudged and pretty much useless, but the fact that we still did it was really important to us. It's all about habit. Besides, it'll be a cute keepsake =).

It's always a good idea to have a copy of your child's medical records, but it's just that much more important when you're a military family and you bounce around constantly like an aimless pinball. She wasn't born here, and the last place we were at used a different system. As a result, they had absolutely NO information whatsoever on her before we came here. They didn't even have her name - she was listed as "baby girl". But even if you're not a military family, it's really not a good idea to have just one copy of medical records, especially shot records. I have her actual shot card, and then the computer system at the doctor's has a record, and every time she gets new shots I scan the card into my computer.

Decluttering is important, but just as important is making sure that important documents cannot be lost forever. Even if all you have is a copy of something, it's better than nothing at all.

The Friday Declutter Challenge: the digital version

I didn't declutter much of anything this week since I was so focused on developing (and decluttering) My Precious Pennies.  I can see the light at the end of the tunnel though, so hopefully sometime this weekend I will be able to upload the new design, complete with a couple of NEW features that I hope everyone will enjoy and be able to benefit from.

My other piece of decluttering is also digital - I finally got to work on my mess of a start menu.  I took a screenshot before I started, but for some reason it refused to save, so I only have the "after" shot for you.  When I started I had 2 columns of programs though, and right now my one column is even shorter than the entire start menu bar.

I didn't actually uninstall anything, I just reorganized all the little shortcuts and buttons.  I have never read a help file in my entire life, so I seriously don't need a shortcut to that.  I also took a lot of shortcut icons out of their folders, and placed them in more general-category folders. 

Every once in a while I have to go through and declutter my start menu, just because programs like to create their own little folder in there and it's just TOO MUCH.  I only need the shortcut to the program, not all the other crap that comes with it. 

I do a LOT of stuff on my computer, but I am a complete minimalist when it comes to icons and stuff.  I have NO icons on my desktop whatsoever, and I must say that I love the way my desktop looks:

The adorable pea in a pod has absolutely nothing to do with my love obsession with my desktop, honestly.  But seriously now, I just love how clean and brisk my desktop is.  It's relaxing, useful, and completely not cluttered.  I can't stand desktop icons. 

I rank my shortcuts by importance and usage level, and their ranking determines where they go.  Frequently used shortcuts go in my disappearing taskbar.  "Often" shortcuts go in my start menu, and "sometimes" shortcuts go at the top of the start menu list.  The stuff in the actual start menu I don't really use, or I have a different way of getting to.  The only reason they're in the start menu is 1) The computer won't let me remove it, and 2) I want a quick list of all the programs I have on my computer.

So I didn't exactly declutter something physical this week, but in the current digital age it's important to keep the computer free of clutter as well! 

The Friday Declutter Challenge: Baby Clothes

This week I decluttered my daughter's massive amounts of clothing. I've been saying since June that she's got too much clothing, but no one ever listens to me. I'm very grateful that we have so many relatives that love us and our baby enough to send gifts, but honestly...enough is enough. The child has more clothing than my husband and I combined.

And the worst part of it is that they are mostly gifts. Brand-new gifts from a loving doting relative. Who expects pictures of her in the various outfits. As a result, I can't give them away or sell them - I must keep them and hound my child like the paparazzi. But seriously, the next person who sends any article of clothing, socks, shoes, accessories, or anything else that can be worn, will be responsible for purchasing a brand new wardrobe, because mine is now stuffed to the breaking point.

I know I sound like an ungrateful little witch for complaining that my daughter has too much clothing when some kids have nothing, but seriously now...what 5 month old has a full TUB of house onesies? Not just onesies...but "house" onesies. These are onesies that aren't pretty enough to be worn outside. But that's okay, because we've got more than enough dressy onesies - a full basket of short-sleeves, and a full basket of long-sleeves. And don't even get me started on her one-piece footed PJs. She has a full tub of flannel/terry-cloth PJs, and then an overflowing basket of "normal" PJs. She can wear a new set of PJs for every day of the month and still have enough to spare.

The good news to my major clothing overload is that I can not do laundry for a good month and still be okay. And I'll make a small fortune at the consignment store in a year or so. The bad news is that I am seriously running out of space, and it's just downright unfair that a mother can't even buy her first child cute clothing because everyone beat her to the punch.

I seriously have nightmares about this upcoming Christmas. I'm trying to nip the demon in the behind by sending out the above slideshow to demonstrate my clothing overload, and I've already started working on a Christmas wishlist on Wishpot that I'll distribute with our Thanksgiving cards. But you KNOW there will always be those people who don't look at your wishlist or gets you a whole collection of clothing just because "it was too cute to pass up".

Can I please take a raincheck on Christmas? Please?

The Friday Declutter Challenge: Supply closet

I decluttered my supply closet back on day 12 of the August Declutter Challenge, so it's been a while since I've paid attention to it. Lately, I've been getting more stuff than I have room for. A lot of these excess products end up going to the USO, but there are a lot of products that I would like to keep too. I was also having difficulty finding stuff, which is never a good sign. Time to declutter!

Before






After

I know it doesn't look like much, so you'll just have to take my word for it =P. Basically I can now fit probably double of what I could before. And everything's also a lot easier to find and get to - thanks to some recycled USPS boxes. They fit perfectly width AND height-wise in this closet, so I've been able to use them as containers for most of our stuff.

Since this is the supply closet, I wasn't too worried about accessibility, so I stacked a couple of boxes on top of each other. The "baby" box is on top of the "toothpaste" box, and then "air fresheners" box is on top of the "candles" box. Just this simple stacking created a whole bunch of room in the closet, and I managed to create better categories for everything. Instead of lumping all things mommy into one "mommy box", mommy now has a deodorant box, a hair products box, and a beauty box (perfumes and makeup). Baby also gets a box too, because her things used to be spread out over the "lotions" box, the "shampoo" box, and the "body-wash" box. I don't know about you, but diaper rash doesn't exactly fit my lotioning needs.

I just want to stress that decluttering the supply closet was not about fitting more junk in it, but rather being able to find things easier. I am always getting shampoo and toothpaste for "free", and it is completely unreasonable for me to even attempt to hold onto everything that I buy. I know we don't need any, but I get them anyway because I know there are people who could use them. The "selfish" thing that I do is weed out the products that we're not a major fan of, or have no preference towards, and donate those instead. For example, I love Garnier, so I kept all of that but donated all the Pert Plus.

I'm sorry. I'm a bad person. At least I decluttered this week. Surely that means I won't be heading straight to hell for hoarding shampoo, right?

The Friday Declutter challenge

Forgive me, for I have sinned. It's been 2 weeks since I participated in the Declutter challenge! Honestly though, it wasn't my fault that I missed last week. After all, I had absolutely no sleep on Thursday since we had to take the baby to the ER, and I spent Friday running errands at Walgreens and the commissary before making and delivering dinner to my husband, who had duty all weekend and left me at home with the sick baby. So see, it's really not my fault.

This week, I decluttered my kitchen. Or rather, my kitchen sink. You see, for the past couple of days my husband has been cooking dinner. I love him and I'm so grateful to him for doing it, but the man does not know how to clean while he cooks! Or how to clean, for that matter. This is the sorry state of my kitchen earlier this week:

I had to spend an HOUR cleaning everything. And the entire time I was doing dishes Chloe was sitting behind me barking and whining. Why? Because it was 6:45pm and her class starts at 7:45pm. I swear, that dog can read.

And that's not the end of my declutter either...because after Chloe's class my husband offered to make dinner so I can play with the baby. I love that man. Until I woke up this morning to this:

I'm refusing to touch this pile. We had homemade mac 'n cheese last night, for crying out loud! Homemade mac 'n cheese does not result in that huge pile of dishes! He can come home and do the dishes, thank you very much. Maybe then he'll stop using a small army of pots and pans for a one-dish meal.

This Sunday is our anniversary, and instead of going out to dinner he's going to surprise me with dinner at home. He's a really good cook, so I don't mind at all. But I'm starting to rethink that plan - if mac 'n cheese produces that huge pile of dishes, I can't imagine what will happen after a gourmet dinner.

So this week, it's looks like it will be a family declutter challenge effort. Together, as a family, we'll get our kitchen looking like this again:

If you want a full tour of my kitchen, check out my Works for Me Wednesday post here!

The Friday Declutter challenge

This week was one of my more productive weeks. I finally got around to vacuuming and doing general cleaning around the house. I'm not a fan of cleaning, but this house makes it all that much more difficult due to the fact that it's two stories. I have a torn ligament from my competitive figure skating days, and it just never really healed right. I can function well enough on a day-to-day basis, but certain things just plain old hurts - like going up stairs, or cold weather, both of which we've got plenty of in this new place.

I'm also in major injury-preventative mode.  It is not possible to carry a baby on crutches, or go up the stairs on crutches.  Or go up the stairs with the baby in your arms on crutches.  And it's not like my husband can just take 3 weeks off work to help me out.  Nor is staying put on the couch during his entire 15-hour workday an option either. 

Anyway, I created a new couponing system this week. It was long overdue, and I'm very happy with the results. I've been using it all week to put together my CVS, Walgreens, and Walmart deals, and so far it's working like magic. With my old album system, it was literally a chore to add new coupons. This new system makes adding coupons a lot easier, because I can just stick them in the corresponding envelope immediately after clipping them, instead of having to flip through the pages and find a open slot.

And now that I have a new couponing system, I must have a new couponing station! I'm still using our sofa table as the main couponing area, but since the coupon box won't fit in any of the drawers, I've decided to give it a spot at my desk. It really makes sense though, considering I put together all of my shopping lists at my desk next to the computer. The sofa table faces the TV, while my desk faces the wall, so the sofa table is still going to be where I clip my coupons.

It was just a mere reorganization of the top two shelves of my desk. The only things that moved were my scrap paper pile, which is now on the top shelf, and my pile of binder paper, which now sits under the wicker basket on the top shelf. The white shoe box that I used for my couponing system used to be on the top shelf, but it was just an empty box that I had no better place for. I rarely use binder paper, so I don't really have a problem with it being on the top shelf. I can still reach my scrap paper while sitting, so it's not really a big deal.

My desk is so much more efficient now, because I can just slide the coupon box out to find what I'm looking for - I don't even need to remove it completely from the shelf. It's also right next to my drop boxes - the pink box in the back holds my accordion file and EasySaver booklets, and the metal "love" tin in the front is my drop-box for coupons to be filed. I should be able to get rid of that tin now though, because it's so easy to file coupons away that my drop-box will be the actual coupon box itself!

I also reorganized my blog this week to celebrate my 200th post.  I'm getting back into shape with my coding and HTML-ing, but I'm still very rusty.  I did manage to tidy things up a bit though, so it's less distracting and scroll-hectic now.  I sure hope everyone likes it...!

The Friday Declutter challenge: kitchen!

Like the new button for the declutter challenge?  Yours truly designed it.  I'm by no means a professional - I just took a year of digital art back in the day in high school, and it's always just kind of stuck with me and became a hobby of mine.  I love designing, but unfortunately I have no muse so I can't just sit down at my computer and whip something up just because - I need a purpose and a goal to complete.  So I jumped on the fact that Marcia needed a button for the new Friday Declutter challenge...besides, it was the least I could do for her after she was the driving force behind getting my house looking more like a house and less like a storage unit.

Anyway, this week I decluttered my kitchen.  Our stuff got here on July 14th, and we unpacked the kitchen the very next day on July 15th.  Back then my daughter was only 2 months old and I hadn't started pumping milk or anything, so we had absolutely no baby paraphernalia to speak of as far as the kitchen was concerned.  Well, she's now 4 months old and starting baby cereal.  I've also started pumping, and we keep some formula on hand as a "just in case". 

All this new baby stuff have been taking a tour of the kitchen cabinets for the past couple of weeks.  They would start off on the counter, and then when I couldn't stand the clutter anymore, I would open a random cabinet and shove them in.  Well, needless to say, they would get in the way a couple days later, and then I would open another random cabinet and shove them in there.  Rinse and repeat until the formula ended up on a top shelf that I can't reach, the bottles are next to the Tupperware, the breast pump is next to the plates, and the cereal is stored with my pots and pans. 

Obviously this is ridiculous.  As my daughter grows older, we are just going to get more baby eating stuff, and we can't just keep throwing it random places.  She needs her own shelf in the kitchen cabinets.  I ended up giving her the middle shelf in our "cup" cabinet.  All of our cups fit onto one shelf, and our water bottles fit into another...so it really left the middle shelf wide open.  I was storing my glass bake-ware in there for the moment, but I decided that a better storage place would be the broiler.  So I'll have clutter on my counter-top on the rare occasion that I use the broiler - I think I can live with it. 

What I -really- need is a high chair that comes with a storage cabinet on the bottom, but somehow I don't think it'll happen.  When I was pregnant I had this vision where things would be completely separated in each part of my house.  We'll just have baby stations and baby corners in every room, but for the most part my house was not going to look like a daycare center.  Well, I've since given up hope of that, unless I win the lottery next week and can buy a 12 bedroom house.  It really drives me nuts to see baby stuff everywhere, but maybe the next house we get will be bigger, or just better laid-out, and I can at least dedicate a small section in each room for all that endless baby stuff. 

Declutter Challenge LAST day 31: Laundry closet

Eek! Today's the LAST "official" day of the declutter challenge. A HUGE thanks go out to Marcia for continuing this declutter thing with a weekly round-up. My poor tiny little house needs it!

I really wish I did something grandiose to celebrate the last official day, but alas all I did was declutter my laundry closet. And I don't even have a picture to show for it. Not that I didn't try mind you, but it was just impossible, unless I could be like that girl from Xmen and walk through walls, and had a camera that took pictures through walls. The hallway was just too narrow, but too long to allow me to take an angled picture from the end of it. So no picture today...but it wasn't my fault!!

Anyway, what I did was made my own laundry cart. Except that it's not so much of a cart because it doesn't move. We have a lot of those wire cubby shelf things, and they actually fit PERFECTLY between my washer and dryer. A set of these cost like $15 at Target and we have PLENTY of them, so I am definately not going to pay $150+ for those laundry tower cart thingys. They may look nicer, but I have a lot better use for $150. Besides, we have a closet door to the laundry closet, so most of the time you can't even see inside it. Definitely not paying $150 for something I can't see.

I ended up building a small tower that's 3 cubbys high. All of our laundry detergent fit into just one cubby, so I decided to use a second one for our stain-removal stuff, laundry samples, and laundry bags. I reused an old post office box to keep the bags from going everywhere. The bottom cubby just holds a trashcan since I didn't want to put anything else there in case of water damage. On top of this whole "tower", I reused a small laundry basket that was broken in the move for our plastic grocery bags. The grocery bags aren't exactly a laundry item, but they needed a home and it doesn't look too out of place because of the laundry basket.

Well, since today is the last official day, I'm going to share what I've learned. And besides the fact that I have a LOT of crap, I've come to appreciate how easy and cheap it is to declutter. I've always been under the impression that in order to seriously organize my house, I need to go and blow about $100 on organizational things like rubbermaid drawers and containers. Well, when this declutter challenge started and I decided to dedicate myself to it, we didn't have $100 OR the time to spend buying things, so I've found out just how much I can do by reusing containers.

The next recap is kind of a mute point in my case because when I started my house was full of moving boxes, but the biggest impact that I can see in my home is well...my entire home. I know it sounds like I'm dodging the question, but it's true. We were living out of boxes at the beginning of the month for the most part, or living off the floor because we emptied out of the boxes just to get rid of boxes and didn't bother putting things where they really belonged. But an "upgrade" as a result of my declutter from the old house is that I now actually have an office/desk area, where all of my electronics have a home. In the old house, the printer was in the scrapbooking closet, the laptop was on the coffee table, the camera was on the side table, the camcorder was in the bedroom, and the bluetooth was in the kitchen. None of that craziness anymore!

From now on, I think I'll just do one post every Friday for the weekly roundup instead of daily posts, but I am still going to declutter something everyday. They may not have pictures attached, and they may be a bit abnormal like "I decluttered my dog (read: I gave him a haircut)", but I will still do something everyday! I've done so good for 31 days...I can surely keep going!

Declutter Challenge Day 30: Our fridge

This isn't really a declutter, but more of a re-organization day. I decided that our fridge needed some help.

Since we've been menu planning this month, our fridge has been very bare and empty, and a result we've taken to just tossing things in there. It's not a huge problem, but when you get into the habit of just throwing things you tend to lose sight of things and overbuying. I also didn't want to ever have to dig through our fridge - I just want to open it and see at a glance what we have. We've got a big enough fridge that I should never have to move something to see what's behind it.

I know it seems like I didn't do much, but I reorganized the fridge so each section was designated for something. The bottom of the door is now reserved for spices/bottles that need to refrigerated. The top is currently open for any and all things. I put two old containers in the fridge to further organize things - the clear one that you see the carrots is my "grab box" for dinner. I basically use that to pull out everything that I need to cook dinner with. I hate making 10 trips to the fridge, and then deciphering what goes back in the fridge and what doesn't amongst all of the cooking materials.

The little pink container in the back is responsible for holding all of our "halved" veggies. Basically if I happen to use half a tomato for lunch one day, the other half would go in this container. I definately don't want to throw it back in with the untouched veggies, because the half a tomato needs to be finished off ASAP. The pink container needs to be checked every time I make dinner, so I can see if I can include those things in dinner somehow. The rest of the bottom shelf is reserved for drinks.

The top two shelves are empty, but I like it that way! The middle shelf is for miscellaneous supplies that need to be refrigerated (butter, marinade sauce...etc.), and the top is for leftovers. This system will really help us out, because it's a very simple grab-and-go!

Declutter Challenge Day 29: Bookcase & coupon stuff...again

Is it against the rules to declutter the same thing twice? Well, it doesn't matter, because I decluttered TWO things today. Yesterday I talked about how we keep all of our books that are in a series in a separate bookcase. This was never the original plan, but everything just would not fit under the sofa table, so this is plan B. And I'm starting to like plan B, because books that are in a series are actually quite nice of a decor item.

Sorry for the poor quality of the picture, but the one thing I've noticed about this house is that we have some REALLY weird angles going on. It all looks a lot better in person...it's just really hard to photograph.

It's actually the perfect place for a bookcase because we have a lamp right behind it. The lamp was a Target brand and normally sells for $50+, but I found it at the Salvation Army in its unopened box for $6. But anyway, it's the perfect reading spot, and having series of books out makes for a lot neater look than random books. It's a bit taller than I would have liked, but it doesn't look too bad. And besides, the extra height gives Mickey a clear view of everything. He's one of those original rotary dial phones. I love Mickey, and my husband thinks I'm nuts for getting a huge kick out of dialing with him.

Now, the second thing that I decluttered (again) is my coupon organizing system. A while back I told you about how I have a store envelope system, which is basically an envelope for each store with all the coupons and deals inside it. I had an index card inside that separated my register coupons, and in the CVS envelope I had a ECB card too.

Well, all those envelopes got tiring fast. The envelopes are so weak, and although I reused envelopes from junk mail, it just got tiring to have to replace them all the time. So I bought a $1 accordion folder from Target. It's red like my coupon album, and fits perfectly in my little tote.

Today I am going out to Walgreens and the Commissary, so I will report back on how I like this new system. But I'm positive that I'm going to fall completely in love with it. It was already so easy putting together all my coupons and lists, and I didn't have to worry about grabbing the wrong envelope or something falling out.

Here's my week in recap:
Declutter Challenge Day 28: The sofa table/my couponing area
Declutter Challenge Day 27: My desk!
Declutter Challenge Day 26: Baby stockpile
Declutter Challenge Day 23 - 25: Living Room continued

Yes I know I know, I never showed off pictures of the living room, but bear with me! I'm a perfectionist, and I want EVERYTHING in its correct place before I make the big reveal. Right now I'm just down to deciding where to hang pictures, for an OCD perfectionist, that takes a LOT longer than you would think!

Eeek...it's already day 29...there's only 2 days left! Can I just continue my own declutter challenge afterwards? Can I be weird and a loner like that, or would someone actually join me? It's really not my fault that I have so much crap that needs to be decluttered...really!

Declutter Challenge Day 28: The sofa table/my couponing area

Unfortunately I do not have an adequate picture to share today, because I was so surprised by my husband offering to help me clip my coupons that I forgot to take one. I was running behind on a lot of things, and he ended up clipping and sorting all of my coupons. And we're not talking about one or two coupons, people. We're talking about the entire Sunday paper AND all of the coupons that I received from the giveaways. I'd be willing to bet that there were over 500 coupons in there. Just to give you an idea of exactly how many coupons we're talking about...here's a picture of the coupon drawer BEFORE he sorted them:

When he was done the ENTIRE sofa table top was full of piles of coupons. All I had to do then was to go through and put them into my coupon album, which is something he drew the line at since my categories confused him...he didn't understand the importance of having a "Colgate" and "Crest" category instead of just a "Toothpaste" category. And I tried explaining to him that it wouldn't work out too well if I handed the store a "Crest" coupon for a "Colgate" item, but I think he'd tuned me out by then.

Anyway, here is what our table looks like:

This is the sofa table that I ordered online from Target for 25% off and free shipping. Target.com had a promotion of 15% off and free shipping on select furniture, and my Borders Perks 10% off stacked, so I got 25% off. It is so pretty and stylish that no one can guess that I got it for under $100. The blue boxes you see underneath hides our miscellaneous books, while another bookcase in the living room holds our series books.

The top three drawers have officially be designated as the couping area. In the left drawer I keep current ads and such. The middle drawer is reserved for coupons (which you saw), and the right hand drawer has all of my tools in it (scissors, pen, envelopes for sorting). It's also where I keep my giveaway coupons, my special surprises, and my coupons for troops.

And in case you didn't notice, it is right behind the couch with a perfect view of our wonderful 42" HD TV that I named Phil. Yes I know, I'm weird. But the positioning of my coupon table means that when we finally get TV service, I can pull up a chair and clip my coupons while watching TV (or watching hubby get blown up by grenades that he repeatedly fails to see in Call of Duty).

I am so pleased with this furniture purchase. It was an economically smart decision, because it serves 3 different purposes. It's a sofa table, a bookcase, and coupon central for me!

Declutter Challenge Day 27: My desk!

Today I can finally reveal a small part of the past couple days of work. Due to lack of space, my desk/work area is downstairs in the living room. This is a brand new desk that we got at Ikea this weekend. The desk was $99, and the hutch was in their As-Is section for a mere $25. The chair was also from Ikea for only $8 - but that was because they forgot to ring up the bottom half of it and I didn't realize this until after the 40 minute drive home. Sorry Ikea! But I am so very happy with this desk - it looks awesome, didn't cost a fortune, and fits everything in it.

I even have a whiteboard space to write down all my notes and stuff! And even better, my printer can fit on my desk! You have no idea how happy I am about this - we used to have to keep the printer in the closet and only bring it out when we need it, so this is a SUPER luxury to have it right on the desk.

As you can tell, I used old shoe boxes to hold papers on the upper shelves. I have a box of notecards, greeting cards, and envelopes, and then I reused that box's lid to hold scrap pieces of paper. I also have a box for all of my couponing/deal-making devices. All of my uncut coupons are in our sofa table (and that's for tomorrow!), but since I need to be on the computer when putting together my shopping list, it only made sense to put the store envelopes and my clipped coupons in my desk.

And it gets even better. All of our electronics are now in one place:

The camcorder, camera, and bluetooth are all in my top drawer. This is so great, because they used to be wherever we can find an open plug, and I cannot tell you how many times I had a mild heart attack because we couldn't find the connection cable for something. It also helps that they have a set location now, because my husband knows where my camera is and will automatically go to get it to take pictures of our little princess and capture whatever adorable thing she's doing. Before, all these adorable moments just went uncaptured.

I am so very very happy with this desk, and I'm sure little Chippy is too (note the dog bed under the desk)!

Declutter Challenge Day 26: Baby stockpile

I'm still working on the living room, and I am very close to finishing the desk, but today I decided to branch off and do something else as well. I decided to go through my baby stockpile of diapers and wipes, and it's a mighty big stockpile:

I've been doing a lot of baby care deals lately, and I wanted to know exactly what my stockpile consisted of. Normally I don't see it because diapers are stashed under the crib, and wipes are under the changing table. Well, now I know that I have 5 packs of wipes refills, 3 travel packs, 6 packs of unopened diapers, and 2 boxes and a bag of opened diapers. I think it's safe to say that we probably won't need more diapers for a while. But that's not going to stop me from taking advantage of diaper deals...because although I might not be using the diapers in the next month or so, I will definately be using them eventually. The little princess is only four months old, so I've got many many many diapers in my future.

The other reason for going through my baby stockpile is that it was time to switch out my newborn diapers with size 1s. My precious little princess is no longer a newborn! Granted, she's nearly four months old and it's high time for her to be out of newborn diapers, but it's a bittersweet moment nonetheless. We probably still have a day or two worth of newborn diapers, which I moved downstairs for the pack-n-play. So she'll be wearing both newborns and size 1s at the same time...oh well! I wonder if daddy will notice the difference in diapers when he changes her for bed tonight...

One thing I did notice with stockpiling diapers is that you have to make an guesstimate on how big your baby is going to be at a certain point in time. The two boxes of size 1s were shower gifts, but I bought the Huggies and Luvs in size 1s because I figured that by the time we get to them, she would be big enough. Maintaining a huge stockpile of diapers requires a good judge of the future, simply because the pack of diapers that I buy today may not even be touched again for a good 3 or 4 months.

Declutter Challenge Day 23 - 25: Living Room continued

We worked VERY hard this weekend, but unfortunately it's taking much much longer than I anticipated to make our living room a family space. I won't be sharing pictures just yet, simply because I want to show off the complete version versus the half-done version, but here's just a highlight of what we've been doing the past couple of days:

• Assembled and organized my new desk & hutch
• Set up our wireless network FINALLY
  
• Bought and hooked up our 42" HD LCD TV
• My life is now complete - I have an xbox 360!
• Assembled our sofa table that also doubles as my "Coupon Central" and bookcase
• Assembled our new entertainment center that is about a quarter in size of our old center, but somehow we still managed to fit everything in it. I love Ikea.
  
• Assembled and organized a new bookcase for many of our beloved book series

Although it seems like we've done a lot, there is still MORE to do. Most of these projects are only half-complete. Our main goal this weekend was just to get things out of their boxes and functional. The finer details of organizing objects within our new furniture has yet to be tackled, but we have definately taken a huge step in getting our house presentable.

Hopefully in the next couple of days I will be able to share pictures of my completed living room!

Declutter Day 22: My daughter's clothes

This is going to be a quick-y post, because we spent $375 at Ikea last night and need to build our desk, chair, and entertainment center, but yesterday I decluttered my daughter's clothes. She had bins for house onesies, dressy onesies, bottoms, and PJs, but ever since we moved, we've just been tossing clothes into a random bin. Well, every-time she needed an outfit change, it took forever for us to find what we were looking for.

This was another case of how taking 5 minutes to organize something can save you hours over time. Anyway, I will share pictures as soon as things calm down a bit, but we need to build all of our stuff from Ikea and then go get our new 42" TV!!!

Here are the links from the rest of my decluttering week...it wasn't a bad week, but it will soon get better because I FINALLY get to properly declutter my desk since I now have a desk! Just wait till you see the gorgeous desk that I got for a mere $125.

Declutter Challenge Day 21: My car
Declutter Challenge Day 20: Front door area
Declutter Challenge Day 19: Photo Albums
Declutter Challenge Day 18: Scrapbooking Stuff!
Declutter Challenge Day 17: Our Living Room
Declutter Challenge Day 16: Our budget spreadsheet

Declutter Challenge Day 21: My car

No no no...I didn't forget to declutter yesterday. It's just that I decluttered the car, and then my husband took it and I couldn't take pictures.

A while back, I had bought some adorable collapsible storage boxes from the Dollar Tree. They are perfect to use in the car. They are PERFECT for use in the car, simply because if I need that room for my shopping, I can collapse the boxes and slide them between the seats.

My husband leaves his many many hats for work in our car, and instead of finding them under the seat or on the shifting thingymigy, I decided to give him a place to put them. He now puts them under the car seat in the green box. That green box is also responsible for holding our sunshade cover, and spare paper bags. The pink collapsible box is the little princess'...and holds all of her toys, blankets, burp clothes, and spare wipes and diapers.

The little twin stars hanging thing you see is a great way to keep all of our little miscellaneous items. I put spare scrunchies/clips, lip balm and hand lotion, and a paper and pencil in the top. On the bottom two pockets I put plastic bags, and a rag with a small free sample of Clorox cleaning spray. The lint roller is also stuck in there, because come winter my husband will have to lint-roll every 5 minutes to keep the dog hair off.

I also organized all of our car paperwork into a binder with sheet protectors, and put it in the seat pocket in front of the carseat. This frees up our glove-box for all of our car electronics (iPod, GPS system, phone chargers...etc.)

What you do not see in this picture is our cargo area. The dogs sit back there, so I took another one of those hanging storage things (this one was free from Disney), and put all of our dog supplies in there. Extra leashes, crummy old collars for the dog park, and pick-up bags. I also included a towel and brush to clean them up a bit after the park. They wear pretty martingale collars, which are not only expensive but hard to find, so when they go to the park they wear their old collars.

Our little Honda Fit looks crowded, but believe it or not I have fit a full day of shopping in there with its current contents, AND a queen-size bedframe. We took the broken console table from Walmart fully assembled standing upright in this car. The car might look tiny, but it has a LOT of potential, and in my opinion is worth every single one of our pennies. We get 29mpg around town, and 35 - 40mpg on the highway. When my husband was away from home and I took the car on full-day errand runs, I regularly got 35mpg just around town. The only reason we've been reduced to 29mpg or even 25mpg some weeks is the fact that my husband drives 10 minutes to work and back a total of four times a day, and those short trips just kill our mileage. If any of you are considering purchasing a new vehicle, buy a Honda Fit. Doesn't have to be brand spanking new - ours wasn't. But trust me, you will not regret it.

Declutter Challenge Day 20: Front door area

Today I decided to do some decluttering outside...mainly in the tiny area in front of our door. Now, I moved from a house with a very lovely front lawn, and I've been reduced to having a tiny 3 feet area instead. Needless to say, many of our lawn ornaments found themselves homeless. I did, however, manage to display some of my favorite items. This is the final result:

I know it's not much, but it was the best I could do with what I was given. The really bad news though is that my beloved fountain is broken. There's a leak somewhere, but I don't know exactly where. All I know is I have to keep refilling it on an hourly basis, and I never used to have to do that.

But, the good news is when I went to Kmart today I found a replacement "Go Away" dog:

The sign is reversible to say either "Go Away" or "Welcome", and I just get the biggest kick out of having it turned to "Go Away". I'm not a very welcoming person to people I don't know and have the guts to come a-knocking at my door. And all the people that I do know get the biggest crack out of it. We love that little guy! The decapitated dog with its head on a pike was our old "Go Away" dog. The lawn services at the old house kept chopping off his legs when we had him on the lawn, and eventually my husband tried to break off just the bone and the sign for me. Well, he ended up breaking the head off but smashed the sign in the process. But I was just so in love with the dog that I had to keep him. And I'm still in love with him, which is why I'm keeping him even though Junior has entered the picture =). I know, I'm weird.

I also took some time to post a special notice to our guests:

I had fun today decluttering, and although I no longer have a yard, the final result isn't too bad. I'm not too bothered, because we're only going to be here for 4 months...so I'm alright with what I've got right now.

Declutter Challenge Day 19: Photo Albums

Yesterday I decluttered my scrapbooking items, and in the process I found a lot of loose pictures and keepsakes that should really be properly put away in either a scrapbook or a photo album. I also had a lot of supplies that I bought specifically for a certain project, but just never got around to doing it. As I'm decluttering around our home, I'm starting to find more and more items left over from projects that I began but never finished. It's not entirely my fault since we moved and the little princess needs constant entertaining during the day, but this newly formed bad habit of mine has got to change. So today I sat down and finished three scrapbooking/photo album projects that I've been meaning to do for the past 3 months.

As I mentioned yesterday, I actually don't like to scrapbook because I'm too much of a perfectionist and it takes too long. However, I love the way a scrapbook looks, and thankfully Target sells a great scrapbook-photo album hybrid. Each page is printed with decorations and room for notes, but it follows the traditional photo album with flip covers for the pictures. It comes in a 4 x 7 size, and I put all of my daughter's pictures in it and added little notes on the pages, such as which hospital she was born in and who came to visit her.

The other two are actually binders that I also bought from Target. The lighter white and pink binder is for my baby shower and the baby welcome cards, and the brown and pink binder is for all of my 5 x 7 pictures. For the baby shower/welcome binder, I used the old school sticky photo pages so if I wanted to I could pull the card out and read it again. There were advice cards at my baby shower, so I took some time to match up the advice card to the same shower card...they served a double purpose of letting me know who sent that card. I used a couple of 4 x 7 picture inserts to put pictures of the baby shower in there, since I actually despise the sticky photo pages, but it's just the best solution to the problem that I had. I also included extra copies of our shower games, guest list, and gift list in there, protected by sheet protectors. In the second half of the binder I did the same thing with all of the baby welcome cards, and I used pretty paper scraps to write down who sent the card, since I didn't have any advice cards in this section to indicate the sender.

The second binder was simple compared to the first. I have a lot of 5 x 7s, and most albums come in 4 x 7 size. I like to order 5 x 7s because I like to frame them, but a lot of times I have leftovers that are just loose pictures because they don't fit anywhere. Well, I got more inserts from Target in the 5 x 7 size and just put all of my loose pictures in there.

I've had all of these supplies for a long while, but I just kept procrastinating and never put it together. Well, all of that stuff separated lead to a lot of unnecessary clutter. Just think about it - 2 binders, a photo albums, a thick stack of inserts, a stack of cards, and a whole bunch of loose pictures.

Unfinished projects = lots of clutter!!