Turning to New Ways Day 2 of 64

This is the living room that we call the playroom. It has many boxes that were never dealt with after moving. No one gets to use this room because it is full of stuff.

Today was one of my days to working on tidying...day 2 of 64 to be exact. I did not want to do this today, but I know doing what I don't want to do is what it is going to take to reach freedom. It was really hard to get started.

I got to work doing what I thought was best, but when my husband came home, we had a huge discussion. After listening to him and being willing to let go of my own ways, I think he's right. I'm going about this all wrong.

I'm going to take a completely different course over these next weeks. Here's what I have planned:

-four boxes...trash, giveaway, keep, relocate
-start with my stuff and have Sarah help me as I go through the process of weeding through my last boxes and the pantry
-then we'll work on her stuff together...and then I'll be done

My friend Christi suggested I have her participate with me first and watch how I work through the challenges. She loves to sort! I think she'll do just fine once we start her stuff.

I need to accept the inconvenience of being "in the process of tidying". I need to let go of some of my own ideas about how things should be because they are self-centered. An hour ago I was very discouraged, but I can see how I can move forward with new vision. Thank you Lord!

Final Tidy Countdown Day 1 of 64

I'm ready to be done. I mean, I'm ready to take action to be done. By December 31st. Done-done.

I mapped out all of November and December, identifying which days I'll be able to devote to the final tidying tasks. There are 64 days until Dec 31st and many of those days, I can tell, I won't probably get to tidying for various reasons. I sense the Lord has a deadline on my final tidying and the end of the year is it. So I need to make this happen.

I made a list of a few spots that I think will be the most difficult and I'm going to do those first. I remember moving and doing the garage first, what a huge relief it was when that was actually finished! It motivated and propelled me because all the other tasks were small compared to the garage.

I quickly made a notebook with the lists and calendar. I'll be focusing (and taking ACTION) over the next two months so I can finish by December 31st.

Reviewing "Freedom Is":
-knowing what I have and where it is...(see below)
-maintaining with quick daily pick-up and tidy (we are already implementing this on our daily chores, each day is assigned one room and we tidy that one room to the best we can right now, we've come SO FAR, most of the rooms are actually quite tidy on a daily basis)
-embracing "what's next" for my self-education (as I enter this "final phase", the Lord is speaking to me about laziness and being willing to take action and discipline, it is really good! I'll look forward to some in-depth word study at the first of the year)
-being unencumbered to help my kids' education (what a delight that will be!)
-completing long term dangling projects (the list is down to:
help Sarah with room
go through cubbies
get rid more stuff
go through plushy boxes
clean playroom/other final tidy)
ALL THE OTHER PROJECTS are completed! Of course, I've started a list of "new projects", but those are new and I haven't procrastinated any of these. I think it is reasonable to have an ongoing project list. In the next couple days, I need to make the Thankgiving pillowcases which we decided to do a couple weeks ago and bought fabric (the kids LOVE their pillowcases)!

It is quite exciting to see that my "Freedom Is" list is really coming along and not too far from completion!

SO

the most difficult:
-playroom
-Sarah's room
-cubbies
-legos

Playroom:
This room is going to be awesome. Need to go through the bags of stuff. Be brave.

Sarah's room:
I need to help Sarah let go of some things. She needs me to do what's going to be best for her, not just what she WANTS.

Cubbies:
Actually, things are looking quite good. Just need to make a list of the cubbies which need attention and finish the job.

Legos:
Hmmm. I bought special boxes for the Legos for the other house. They just don't work here. I need to brainstorm some ideas.
-boxes to slip into attic, easy to retrieve
-maybe wheeled carts to fit in Dan's closet, easy to roll out when want to use
-could stack some smaller boxes behind Titan table in flop room
-what to do with large plates/storage for completed sets?

Out of these four, I think Sarah's room is the most difficult, then playroom, then cubbies and Legos. I'll start tomorrow on Sarah's room.

Status:
IN PROCESS-go through cubbies (I'm REALLY close to being done!)
IN PROCESS-help my daughter purge and organize her room
-go through several bags and boxes of plushie accessories and organize (in Fred and in playroom)


DONE-finish taxes
DONE-finish quilt (gift)
DONE-finish handmade napkins (gift) 
DONE-finish a huge crochet project (gift)
DONE-finish handmade pillowcases
DONE-another afghan (waiting for yarn to arrive) {the yarn arrived, afghan 80% finished!}

FINAL TIDY COUNTDOWN:
Laundry
Flop Room/Desk
Pantry
Master
Master Bath
Master Closet
Kitchen
Dining Room
Playroom
Fred
Dan's Room
Sarah's Room
Office
Attic/Shed/Barn
Main Bath
TV Room

Video Game Shelf

When we moved, we put a chair in this corner and a box and bins...it was a jumbled mess. I thought Daniel would enjoy organizing his video games, consoles and controllers and I knew I would enjoy having this area organized.

We assembled the shelf together and he immediately got to work putting things where he liked them. He apparently likes Oreo on the lower left shelf, ha! No one tells that cat what to do!

The TV room is officially tidy! I'd like to put a lamp behind John's chair (IKEA floor lamp is in its box in the office waiting to be assembled) and some art/photos/kids' projects on the walls...oh, and I want to apply some Fray Check to the edge of the carpet, but that's on my "new to-do list" and I can do that after the final tidy. Nice work, Dan!

Playroom Boxes

I want to get through all this stuff in the living room (we call it the playroom). This has become the dumping area...contains mostly stuff I don't know what to do with and Sarah's plushy stuff.

I didn't take a photo, just dove into the boxes. Wow, I actually accomplished something! The room isn't done, but I feel terrific that about half of the stuff is dealt with...I have a looming sense of dread about what to do with Sarah's stuff. But...I'm going to put off that feeling until after we go through it together. Maybe she'll let go of more than I expect.

TV Room update...I purchased a shelf to house the video games and controllers, tucked the Rock Band drums up in the attic, easy access but out of the way. Once I put together the shelves, that room will be d.o.n.e.!

Status:
IN PROCESS-go through cubbies (I'm REALLY close to being done!)
IN PROCESS-help my daughter purge and organize her room
-go through several bags and boxes of plushie accessories and organize (in Fred and in playroom)
-another afghan (waiting for yarn to arrive) {the yarn arrived, afghan 80% finished!}

DONE-finish taxes
DONE-finish quilt (gift)
DONE-finish handmade napkins (gift) 
DONE-finish a huge crochet project (gift)
DONE-finish handmade pillowcases

FINAL TIDY COUNTDOWN:
TV Room
Laundry
Flop Room/Desk
Pantry
Master
Master Bath
Master Closet
Kitchen
Dining Room
Playroom
Fred
Dan's Room
Sarah's Room
Office
Attic/Shed/Barn
Main Bath

Locator Notebook and Attic FINAL TIDY

This seems a little fussy and perfectionistic for me to be posting, but I'm totally excited about it. Enter...The Locator Notebook. Each and every room will have a little map showing what's in the room and where it is located within the room. {In a really sick way, this reminds me of the 5S program my husband used at a previous job, and I remember how much we joked about how they were expected to diagram and inventory their desk drawers}. This is precisely what I'm doing-funny! The notebook concept sends me over the moon and I have to pinch myself that I can actually DO this! Less stuff means I know what I have! I remember reading about a home organization idea using bankers boxes and having a card index system to tell what's in each box. I never could do that...until now! (Maybe I could index the cubbies when I get there...naw, better yet, get rid of what I don't use!)

Now that the office is tidied and several additional items are stowed in the attic, I'd like to NOT forget about what is in deep storage. Better yet, I'd like it to take under two minutes to retrieve the cat carrier or suitcase or...where did I put the box which holds last year's taxes?

I've never had an attic before, though growing up we did have a storage room with a door which was very attic-y. Back then, I didn't realize it was attic-y, but now that I have my very own real life attic, I can indeed verify the likeness.

I don't like the idea of an index file, so I thought a visual map would be good to put up in the attic, so anyone venturing up there might be able to actually come back down with what they were looking for in the first place (before they froze or cooked to death or slumped over in pain from trying to keep from standing up straight).

So I got things moved around the way I like them and made a map. The map is going in my "Locator" notebook AND a copy is hanging in the attic in a page protector from a post. The Locator notebook has three pages already...the attic map, the office map of the lower cabinets and drawers, and the office map of the upper cupboards and shelves. This is the second iteration of this map, the first map got lost!

What makes me giddy (besides the cool new notebook) is that it was EASY to find a pin and a page protector and hang the map in the attic! No searching or stumbling to find these needed items! I think it is super geeky to post a photo of my "attic map" IN the attic, but there's a sense of completion that makes me really happy. I'm enjoying this FINAL PHASE of tidying and this certainly does give me a great sense of order and freedom. "Knowing what I have and where it is" constitutes "tidiness" and freedom with my stuff.

This is just a huge big deal for me...to know what I own and to be able to find it. And have it stored in a way that makes it accessible. This has been my heart's desire for YEARS. I remember cleaning the garage in our first house (1100 sq feet) and wanting so badly to "know what I had and where it was". I think that would have been about 1998!

I would say the attic partially correlates with the garage at the old house. And since we don't have a garage at our new house, this final tidy really does count as the garage (astounding)!!! This weekend, we're planning on tidying the outside shed and micro barn, too. Those count toward the garage as well, but they are extremely simple to tidy. The patio is tidy, but we want that stuff in the shed or barn, which will empty the patio, making IT very tidy! Last weekend's POURING DOWN RAIN prevented us from completing that task.

I have completed the attic and the office. They are officially TIDY. I know what is in them and where everything is (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yay !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) Fffffffffffffrrrrreeeeeeeeeedom. Thank you, Lord!

FINAL TIDY COUNTDOWN:
TV Room
Laundry
Flop Room/Desk
Pantry
Master
Master Bath
Master Closet
Kitchen
Dining Room
Playroom
Main Bath
Fred
Dan's Room
Sarah's Room
Office
Attic/Shed/Barn

Dining Room Floor Restored

Today, the wall got textured and painted and the floors restored. Ah. THAT feels so good. How long has it been? We discovered the leak on Tuesday, August 27th, so we've been a month in limbo with the dining room disassembled. I'm pretty excited to move the Expedit back into the dining room again!

I've been feeling so terrible about the water damage...just made a mess and made more work for our landlord.

The wall looks like new and we're ready to put our bookshelf back in place. I'll probably wait until Monday, just to let everything cure properly. The black plank wasn't as dark before the finish was applied, so I'm hoping it will lighten. So grateful to have it all fixed again...would never know there were holes cut out of the wall!

The bookshelf is damaged...I'm not quite sure what to do about it...maybe flip it upside down and put the blackened, water damaged part on the top. Only half of the base is damaged, I don't see any point in trashing the bookcase. But the black is pretty ugly and I'm really not sure about stability. Need to think on that...

I'm only going to put necessary things back into the cubbies, which will give us a FINAL TIDY on the dining room! Maybe next week I can post that!

Office FINAL TIDY

This might be one of my favorite posts so far...and unexpectedly so, because I wasn't planning on tidying the office today.

When we moved in, I surrendered the office to my husband and kids. The master plan was to use it for John's game collection and a place for a second computer. And storage.

Over the past six months, it has turned into a dumping ground catch-all, family IT department and film sound stage...but there was nowhere to move! (Sounds familiar!!!)

I had some inspiration to clean out the office today...oh how I wish I snapped a before shot! The room is transformed! I forgot how big it is. The inspiration to clean it out stemmed from the idea I would be moving my nail table into the office to make more room for my sewing machine in the flop room.

During staycation, I finished a quilting project. I've pieced quilt tops, but have never made a quilt sandwich with binding from start to finish. I have aspired to do so, and completing this quilting project birthday gift, I felt inspired to do a real quilt. Sarah loves to use the sewing machine as she feels inspired for various projects. I think she'll do even more sewing with the sewing machine out (it's home has been the master bedroom, but no one likes to go all the way back there away from the family activity center that is the flop room, kitchen and office just to sew...and it is a major deal to get out the cutting mat and iron, it would be nice to centrally locate all of those things).

I had the sewing machine by the nail table and the cutting mat and ironing board on the bar in the kitchen. I've been debating learning longarm quilting by taking a class at my local quilt shop, but when I boiled it all down, it made so much more sense to somehow figure out how to do it on my own sewing machine. So I set to work to figure it out and figure it out I did! In order to make it comfortable and efficient, I need to add a small table to the left and back of my sewing machine to support the weight of the quilt or blanket and thus the need to move some things around. So I was thinking if I moved the nail table to the office (there's a perfect spot), then I could create a sewing corner that could be easily accessed anytime I could carve out some time for quilting. And it would be accessible to Sarah anytime she was inspired...and it might even inspire her just being out!

Since cleaning up from my quilt project, I've been wanting to find a place to keep the cutting mat (it has been living on the bar making it unusable for kitcheny things). Previously, it's been squished into a closet since we moved and really needs a good home. Once the office counters were cleaned off (I pushed through dealing with a big stack of frames and random stuff from moving) I noticed the second computer bay (which doesn't have a keyboard tray) would be ideal for the cutting mat. And then noticing a nice space for the ironing board to live (I fetched it from behind the master bedroom door) I realized I had a nice permanent cutting and ironing area (how EXCITING is THAT!?). So the idea to move the sewing machine (instead of the nail table) into the office made me realize how convenient it would be to have everything "sew" close!

I actually feel like I have my own sewing room now! I love that the tile floor is easy to keep clean and is a perfect spot for basting my quilts! I can do it all in this room! There's plenty of light and plenty of room to store upcoming projects and the placement makes it super easy to cut and iron and sew all in a close space!

So that was unexpected, to turn the office into a sewing room (without really impacting the kids' activities which are using the second computer and making movies). I tucked the card table along the drawers used for long term storage so it can be set up anytime...and put away when not in use. The sewing area can be expanded for larger quilt projects by setting up some soon to be purchased 3' or 4' folding tables. My son has more space for using the small tv and album ripping turntable now that many old cords and various things have been stowed in drawers and cabinets. The room is USABLE! And my husband can still see and get to his beloved board games. Daniel wanted to put up some posters to liven up the wall-looks awesome! I love looking at the vintage Star Wars poster that's been rolled up for years. After going through the stack of frames, I remembered the birthday gift from my dear friend...and I found the perfect spot for it!

I love that Sarah will have a good five feet of counter space with a few drawers underneath for her crafting. I'm hoping she'll decide stash her glue gun in one of the drawers and use this space instead of the kitchen and dining room table...it would make our lives a bit more tidy if she would do that. If not, that's fine. But she could have a designated space if she wanted. And here we agonized over getting rid of the eight foot counters when we moved...this is so WAY MUCH BETTER! I know what is in every drawer and cupboard. And did I mention there's a few EMPTY cupboards and drawers!?

Even though we're in a new house, this space would probably translate as the sunroom in the old house. It's like having a FINAL TIDY in the sunroom! Fantastic!

What a fabulous feeling! I think I can say that "I know what I have and where it is" in the office! THAT really is freeing! Just thinking about this actually gives me butterflies and a tear in my eye...a tear of JOY!

FINAL TIDY COUNTDOWN:
Attic/Shed/Barn
TV Room
Laundry
Flop Room/Desk
Pantry
Master
Master Bath
Master Closet
Kitchen
Dining Room
Playroom
Main Bath
Fred
Dan's Room
Sarah's Room
Office