Week 08 February 24, 2012

29 Day Challenge 3 Week Follow Up

This week has been about the details. I followed the advise of Peter Walsh from Clean Sweep and removed everything from the dressers, shelves, and most of the room. Then in a staging area I took 15 minutes a day going through the boxes of clutter to determine what will return to the room, trash, donate, OR belongs somewhere else. Most of the drawers have free space and one of the small drawers is EMPTY. I placed all hair adornments in one drawer, perfume in another, nail care items in one, then watches and misc items, and finally "valuables" (notes and cards from the kids, unused wallets, )

I also googled some ideas for make up and jewelry storage. As a former Avon Rep and Shop for Free crazy couponer I have a ton of these items. The wooden previously unused "end table" turned into a perfect shelf unit for my makeup. I spent another $25.00 on the Sterilite storage drawers from Walmart but everything else was prepurchased on week one or from around the house.

Organizing the jewelry was fun after finding some great ideas. I stopped at Goodwill and found 2 one inch deep picture frames and a cork board to use. I had the cup hooks, stain, and screen material already making this a functional, cheap $7.00 display. I still need to add the screen for the hanging earrings.

I would like to eventually get the white plastic shelving unit out of the room. It mainly holds crafting supplies, Old photos, and various other projects. When I get to the craft area I will move this shelf there after another round of purging. For now I just purged and categorized the items.

Next I tackled some of the various paper work in the room. I had a number of packets from our Disney trips with duplicate information, receipts (because I wanted to track price increases), and fun stuff for scrap booking some day. Purging and grouping these items helped form an organized system with only what I truly need for future trips.

REMINDER: Earth Day is Sunday, April 22. Check local listings to see if there are any Earth Day Fairs in your area. We have a big Fair in Forest Park in St. Louis, MO. They have a number of companies collecting old appliances, bikes, paint, computers, costume jewelry... I have a number of items that I just could not throw away but now I can get rid of them and keep them out of the land fill. I also received a call from American Kidney Services they will pick up from my home March 5. All the donate items are ready for pick up!