Closet clean out progress...

Last week I said I was going to be cleaning out my closet...again.

Straight off, let me tell you that this first photo was the 'before' photo from a couple of years ago when I did a previous closet clean out.  One of the things that drove me the craziest was the little cubby type shelves on the back wall...the ones the big white arrows are pointing to.  Uh-huh...didn't see them back there did ya?  The tall one in the center is built in and it's okay, but the little ones I brought with me from another room in another house, and they just were never accessible due to clothing hanging in front of them.  

 In fact, they weren't really even visible except when the closet was empty.  LOL

Work has been slow on the closet.  I had a headache all weekend.  And I had a little girl come spend the afternoon with me on Saturday.

This is the closet so far.  I have moved the four small shelves off of the back wall, and they now are installed just inside the right-hand door.  I also stacked them, so now they make two tall shelves instead of four short ones.

On the left, just inside the other door, I stacked two shoe cubbies.

When Carey gets home, I'm hoping that he will relocate the hanging rods for me.  He has promised awhile back that he would, he's just been waiting for me to make some working room for him.  

Instead of the rods hanging parallel to the side walls, I want them to hang across the back wall on either side of the tall shelf unit.   I think I have reduced my wardrobe enough to fit on shorter rods across the back, and I think **hope** that with the clothes hanging at the back I won't get that claustrophobic tunnel-like effect that I abhor.

While taking a break from my closet clean out, I was viewing an article on closet organization where I found a link to Project 333.  It is a minimalist fashion challenge to limit your wardrobe to 33 items or less for 3 months.  Apparently the 33 items do not include workout clothing, underwear, sleepwear, or outerwear; though I would imagine anyone participating in the challenge would cut back on those items as well.  Interesting concept.  I don't think I'm down that far, but I do think I donated about as much as I kept.

In the same article, I found a link to an interesting read on The Science of Simplicity which discusses decision fatigue.  Apparently when repeatedly faced with making numerous, albeit irrelevant, decisions, one's productivity suffers.  You may or may not have noticed that some very successful people have taken the decision of what to wear out of their day-to-day routine and simplified their everyday wardrobes to somewhat of a uniform.  Some of these include President Obama (he wears only blue or gray suits), Mark Zuckerberg (gray t-shirt, black hoodie, and jeans), Vera Wang (black top and jeans), and the late Steve Jobs (black turtleneck and jeans) and Albert Einstein (gray suits).

Maybe a properly simplified wardrobe/closet will spur me on to greater productivity!  One can only hope.

Chaos here, chaos there, chaos, chaos everywhere...

As if my entire house were not in enough chaos, what with the kitchen remodel and having to cook in the laundry room, it now looks like my closet has exploded all over my bedroom.

My closet has been beyond insanity inducing for way too long.  I never have found an adequate arrangement.  You can see my last clean out here.  I was happy with it for awhile, but still it just wasn't a comfortable fit.

I had to work today, but when I got home I decided to take advantage of Carey being gone for a few days, and I just started emptying it out.  I'll finish clearing it out after work tomorrow.  Then on the weekend I will sort through everything before putting a drastically reduced inventory back in.  I am going to donate the majority of my 'work' clothes.  Now that I'm only working sporadically, usually never more than 2 or 3 days in any given week, I do not need to have as many different outfits as when I was full time.  

And of my casual clothes, I am only going to keep what I really like.

There.  It's written down.  Hold me to it.

What I'm reading Wednesday...

I haven't been reading much.  Too many other things to keep me busy at the present.  And I also had myself believing that I should finish the few remaining of my 2014 goal books before I moved on to others.  I gave a couple of them a shot, but didn't enjoy them, and have given myself permission to skip them.

The Journey by John A Heldt

I finished The Journey a few days ago.  Just okay.  Won't read any others in series.

New Mercies by Sandra Dallas

Just started New Mercies.  I wanted to read something I could count on liking, so I searched my Kindle list and found this one by an author that hasn't let me down yet.  

Today I am...

Writing down my list of goals and to-do's for the week.

Listening to my husband in the other room completing chores that he just does...without ever writing them down.

Knitting a hat to replace son's favorite one that is misplaced.

Smelling the wonderful scent of a curry coming from the slow cooker.

Feeling my stomach growling.

Patting myself on the back for having all the meals planned and mostly prepped while the kitchen is out of service.

Thinking about Christmas preparations.

Putting the flag up on my mailbox.

Kicking myself that I am late getting several cards mailed.

Thinking about cleaning off my desk.

Family fun...

So I saw the above image on Pinterest.  It is from a post from thedatingdivas of creative Christmas card ideas.  I couldn't track down who the original image belonged to, so I want to apologize for using it without proper credit.  LOVE the idea!  I wanted to try it so bad, because a) we have plenty of people in the family, and b) Kasey's house has the perfect vantage point to get an overhead shot like it.

Tonight was the family Sunday dinner, so I managed to talk them into giving it a trial run.  Chandler wasn't home, so we will have to do another session when we can get them all together.  I wanted to see if it would work out with the dark background of their stained-concrete floors.  If it hadn't been in the least workable, we wouldn't have to try to schedule a time when everyone could be in the same place at the same time...call-out work schedules and shared parenting can make this a challenge.

I talked them into all throwing on white t-shirts, and most were in blue jeans already.  Now we can think about what clothing we want to use for a finish photo.  And I will take my good camera, as tonight's photos turned out a little blurry with the phone.  

Even if we don't do it again, it was a fun experiment...lots of laughs and general hilarity.  Bobby was very brave and a good sport to lie there, as he was the one who would have been hit by the camera if I had dropped it.  He brought it up, so I know he was thinking it.  :)

Oh, and Diego wanted to be the one from the inspiration photo with the 'B' over his face, so I Photoshopped it in especially for him.

Demolition men...

This is how it was left when Carey went back to work a week ago.

Carey and Jared back at it yesterday morning.

The last upper cabinet coming down.

Clean slate...or rather it will be when the horrid slate backsplash comes down...which is proving difficult.  The plumber was here yesterday and did some necessary work.  The electrician will be here tomorrow to give it a look, then will come back to do the work on another day soon.  THEN we can schedule the cabinet installation (they were delivered this week, and are waiting in the garage).

Now I have to choose a countertop material.  Today I narrowed it down to these two.  One of the above is laminate, and one is granite...can you guess which is which?  I really thought I wanted laminate, because: it can look very similar; we have never been hard on countertops as far as burns, scratches, etc.; it's less expensive; and just seems less...snobby?  But after looking at the edge options today, I didn't like any of the laminate edge choices.  Also, I would really like an undermount sink, and those are not really suited to be paired with laminate countertops.  So I'm going to think about it for a few days.  Any thoughts or advice?

The kitchen work begins...

This was the kitchen before we moved in.  Love the size.  Love the high ceilings.  Love the fireplace.  The color...not so much.

Shortly after we moved in we painted the whole house a sort of khaki color.  I'm not a fan of dark cabinets, but I was willing to live with their color.  

But for four years, what I continued to struggle with was the work layout.  The island was TOO big, and we removed it last year to re-purpose as cabinets in the garage apartment.

Lots of other things made this the most frustrating kitchen work space I've ever had.

This is the second house where I've had a built-in desk in the kitchen, and I've hated them both as space wasters.  I just pile things on them, and they always look awful and inefficient.

I like the luxury of the double oven, but do you want to know how often I needed to use them both at the same time?  Maybe once...twice?

 Now the desk and the ovens are gone.  

 Along with all the upper cabinets on the left side of the kitchen.  The rest of the deconstruction is going to have to wait till Carey gets back from working out of town.

 Here is my temporary kitchen space in the laundry room.  It worked very well for making most of tonight's dinner.  For now the stove top in the kitchen still works, so I used it to make rice...

...which we topped with Crockpot Creole Chicken and Sausage from Pinch of Yum.  It was easy and really, REALLY good!

I'll be showing more kitchen reno as we make progress.

Making it Monday...

It's been awhile since I have mentioned what a fabulous...FABulous...public library we have.  I spent the day there today.  Man, it is a spectacular facility, and our community is so fortunate to have it.

I arrived there at 10:30 a.m. with a jelly roll from Moda, plus a few solid squares, and my sewing machine.

And when I left at 4:00 p.m., I had a completed Jelly Roll Race II quilt top!  Well, except for the borders, which I will add soon hopefully.  (Wish I didn't have to work later this week.)  And I met some great quilters too!

This was such a kick, and just what I needed to make my sewing machine my favorite toy again.  

It's Sunday, so there must be dessert...

Today's dessert had to meet two criteria...I had to have all ingredients on hand...and it had to be easy.  I went to my Pinterest dessert board and found Sopapilla Cheesecake.  It doesn't much resemble a sopapilla or a cheesecake, but that's beside the point.  It met the criteria, and it turned out quite well.

My photo above is absolutely awful.  I just remembered to take one hours after dinner.  It's late.  There are only three two cold pieces left.  I'm tired, and I didn't want to fool with the lighting.  Check out Bakerlady's blog where I got the recipe...her photos are scrumptious.

Carey and I and the kids liked it.  Kasey thought it was too sweet.  (Really, sometimes I think she was switched in the hospital.)  I think I would describe it as more similar to a cheese danish...which means it will be great for breakfast!