August 24, 2012

Bring on the weekend.

It's Friday! It's Friday! It's Friday!

Did you know that it's Friday? Did you know I'm super super stoked to get off work at 5 today and not have to come back for two whole days? Hurray!

Today was another one of those days where I wished I was a stay at home Anna. Not because I really have anything particularly productive to do at home (aside from finally reorganizing my bookshelves back to their original non colour coordinated state, doing dishes, tackling our nightmare of a bedroom, and folding laundry) but because I'm lazy and wanted to stay in bed longer and then read all morning. I guess tomorrow I'll embrace my stay at home Anna identity and my domesticity by riding my bike, making muffins, cleaning up a bit, and then having friends over for breakfast all by 9:30. Apparently in the real world stay at home Anna's have to get out of bed shortly after their working husbands do on Saturdays (but only every other one, to be sure).

I was going to finish painting the bathroom tomorrow, as I've already lamented, but since that's not going to happen I'll probably finish spray painting my picture frames that I started to do a little while ago and attempt to bring some more organization to my living space. We're having a BBQ on Sunday (and I'm apparently hosting breakfast tomorrow) so cleaning up is not an option. It's amazing how, after over two years of living in our place, there is still so much that doesn't have permanent home. Well, I don't consider the top of our fridge to be a good home for anything, just like I don't think strewn across my dresser amidst a pile of other things is acceptable living space for my jewelry, birth control, hair products/appliances/brush, receipts, and random things that have no homes. I think I'm going to have to take a photo of it to show how bad it is but will only share it with the world once I've actually brought some order to it. There's no shame in showing how you overcame a dresser top that looks like a bad scene from hoarders, but there is plenty of shame in showing how you still live the life of a complete slob. It's okay to write about it because words do no justice.

To make myself feel better about my dresser-top hoarding tendencies, I was going to show you a picture of my biggest (and surprisingly easiest) accomplishment to date, the cupboard under the stairs. BUT for some reason I don't seem to have taken a photo of it. What on earth is wrong with me? I love to document all my small victories (baking, nightstand painting, blah blah blah) but I guess you're just going to have to use your imagination on this one. So, without further ado, here is the terrible quality pre-clean up cupboard under the stairs:

This is what nightmares are made of.

Now, it might be a stretch because that looks like a poorly photographed pile of junk, but picture that space neatly organized, complemented by a $25 polka dot storage ottoman from Home Sense (to hide the pillows in) and way less random crap towards the front. Those books and stockings and what I'm thinking might be tule are all either in the giveaway box or sitting organized in our laundry room waiting for a permanent home. I'm just waiting for someone to want to use my tule as wedding decorations. It was such an easy front of the head table decoration, especially when it was used to cover white Christmas lights. 

For the record, I'm actually not a hoarder and one of my latest goals is to get rid of all the stuff we don't actually need and never will. The best example of this is the coffee maker we got from our gift registry. Back when I was on the caffeine I dreamt of morning cups of coffee before school or work and knew that my coffee maker and I were going to have a long and happy relationship. After probably less than a dozen uses (and none of them early morning because I can't make anything less than a pot to save my life and that's just wasteful) I accidentally sent the coffee pot smashing to the floor. I almost cried. For some reason Walmart had generic coffee pots to match every brand of coffee maker except mine. I had to admit defeat and, since we live in Canada ordering a new pot from the manufacturer would have cost a bundle, buy a new coffee maker. We spent an extra $20 to get a nicer one with a metal pot (read: no breaking ever again) that now sits in our cupboard and gets used maybe half a dozen times a year. It was an investment!

Anyway, I kept the old Hamilton Beach coffee maker in the hopes that some day I'd find a replacement for it. It's a brand new coffee maker, after all, I even invested in freaking coffee filters for it (our new one has a permanent/reusable filter). Anyway, my point is that this weekend it's time to let go. I'm going to put our brand new $40 coffee maker online for free. I just want it to find a nice home, maybe get some love, and I'll even throw in the filters that we have no practical use for. Take that hoarding tendencies! Except for books. I will forever and always hoard books.

On a final note, I had a bedroom epiphany yesterday as I was leaving work and it involved shelves. You'll remember that our bedroom is itty bitty with an inch of clearance between our bed and the door and that organizing it is a nightmare. Well yesterday I realized that cheap shelves are the answer. I can find them cheap on craigslist or something and if they're ugly I'll just spray paint them before I hang (meaning Karl because I don't use power tools) hang them up and put all the junk that's piling up on them. It's brilliant I say! That, and I saw a picture of someone putting their hair dryer in a magazine stand. Sheer genius!

Apparently the fact that it's Friday has made me a little over enthusiastic with the punctuation. I just get so excited about organization! Hurray!

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