Playroom Organisation.

If you saw my playroom at the moment you wouldn't call it organised but it's something I'm working on, it's a pity my children aren't working on it with me. So what am I going to tell you that you haven't already seen on Pinterest or other blogs. NOTHING. Today I just wanted to share with you what I'm planning on doing in our multi-functional playroom. What I've achieved since I started this project sixteen months ago and how I'm hoping to have it finished before school finishes in December of this year.

Our playroom needs to be multi-functional. At the moment it's nothing more than a dumping ground and an area that the children haven't used since we moved in two years ago. This room needs to work as a play area, homework area, reading area and a chill out zone for all the kids, especially if they want their friends over for a play. Sixteen months ago I had a desk installed to create a homework area that eventually they'll all use once everyone starts school and that's were it I stopped. This year with three children at school the desk isn't being used as it's filled with things from their bedrooms that I uncovered when I decluttered their bedrooms. I've needed to get in there and get the area organised otherwise the kids will be graduating and it'll still look terrible. We're half way through Term 2 and I'd like to have it up and running before Term 3 starts, otherwise it'll be another sixteen months and I'll have four children searching for places to do their homework.

The first thing I decided to work on was creating a storage system and a reading area that would work for our toys and an area for the kids to sit and read. Our playroom is a good size, making it idea for various areas within the zone. The storage system I set up was fairly easy to create, however if I was buying everything new it was have cost us $310.00 and for many families that could be too much money. I was lucky that I already owned two of the Ikea Billy bookcases from our previous house so there were only a few additional items I to buy (minus chalkboard paint) to create our toy storage area.

Our curtains and rug have a heap of different colours in them, the kids love the rug's brightness so I decided to use some of the colours to help make the area fun, playful and timeless. I got rid of the toys that the kids no longer played with, those that were broken and any others that didn't fit within the criteria. I found some MDF coasters and fabric storage boxes at my local hardware store so that I could create labels for each cube.

The labels were a simple process of drilling a hole into each coaster, painting each side of the coaster with my chalk paint. Each coaster got one coat of paint and this took a while as I had to wait for one side to dry completely so that I could paint the other side. Once the paint was completely dry (I let them cure for 2 days) I then used my chalk to write on each label. I then cut lengths of black sheer ribbon and narrow white ribbon and threaded them through the holes I'd drilled earlier. To attach each label to the storage box I just tired the ribbon around the handle a few times and then I tied a bow or knot depending on the ribbons colour.

So the entire make over of this area cost me $130 which wasn't too bad but if I wanted to reduce the cost a bit I could have used less boxes or waited for them to go on sale. I paid $5 for each box but later found out that when the hardware store has too much stock they go on sale for $3.60 each so I could have saved myself a bit of money. 

Overall, for a minimal amount of effort I'm really happy how things came together in this section of the room. The kids can now find toys they want and they we know which books are there for reading which saves Daddy from reading the same story every night. I'm now hoping that within the next 6 months I can find a chair for the kids to sit and read on, some art for the wall and a few cushions to make it comfortable when reading. 

Megan

Decluttering Success

When I started decluttering this house there was one goal I needed to achieve and that was to clear out the kids bedrooms. I'd noticed over time I'd allowed the kids to bring things into their bedrooms that just didn't belong and this was adding clutter to an already disorganised room. Luckily there was no food hidden away but the amount of clothing, toys, paper and pencils in each child's room was unbelievable. 

Both my daughters are really bad at bringing things into their rooms and hiding them away for later. My youngest daughter had pieces of clothing in her room that belonged to her sister, her little brother as well as having baby clothing in various sizes. She didn't even realise that these pieces didn't belong in her room. Her room was the first area I tackled as I needed to see how much clothing she actually had, whether or not the clothing she owned actually fitted her and what damage had been done to the room with her colouring pencils.

I followed a simple plan with each room as it forced me to stay on track and it also helped reduced the amount of time I spent in each room.

• pull everything out of the room

• sort like items into piles
• clarify what needs to be kept, donated or thrown out from each pile

• place kept items back into the room, put donated items into a bag, throw out items that aren't been kept
• MOST IMPORTANTLY rehouse items that don't belong in the room
• vacuum the bedroom
• dust furniture and skirting boards
• vacuum bedroom again
• dress the room
• vacuum the room again

Following these few simple steps allowed me to get some areas finished quicker than others. However, I did decide to take my time with a few rooms as I knew that I could accidentally throw out important items that the children wanted to keep.

Overall, I was really impressed with how the bedrooms come together so quickly and I'm proud to say that both my girls have managed to keep their bedrooms clean for three weeks now. I'm in the process of drawing up a routine for them so that they know what my expectations for their bedrooms are. I'll hopefully get them printed, laminated and placed within their rooms so that its easy to read and follow.

I would say that I'm really delighted with the way their rooms have come together BUT it's obvious that I need to pull my finger out and get started on adding some style and personality to these bedrooms. I've spoken to my Star Wars mad, Lego obsessed son and we've come up with a few ideas of how to decorate his room. So I'm hoping that come the end of the year I may have created a kid friendly space that will carry him through to his teenage years. I'd love any suggestions or helpful advice.

Megan

14 days, 56 bags

Life in the One Plus One Equals Six house has been difficult in recent months, this has impacted on our day to day life. Recently I lost my grandmother which came as a shock, I'd always thought she'd be around and because of this I hadn't talked with her for a number of years. I had the opportunity to travel back home to New Zealand with my sister to say goodbye to her and to pay my respects. I'm so glad I did because she was a remarkable woman and during my time there I got to hear family and friends talk about her with such love.

When I returned home I decided it was time to get my life in order and to turn this house into a home. During the last eighteen months I've participated half heartedly in various decluttering tasks so that I could clear out all the excess items that we no longer needed to be carrying around with us. On 6th January I signed up with my sister to participate in a 52 week declutter challenge. Lets be honest I only did one of the challenges, every week I read what my sister had done while sitting down looking at all the stuff that was building up around me. It wasn't until I read a post by Corrie from Retro Mummy about how she was collecting 40 bags in 40 days to prepare for her families upcoming move that I got the motivation that I needed.

When we sold our house three years ago I was pregnant and not in the mood to pack up the house let alone declutter. So I packed everything we owned into boxes and we stored them away. Fast forward three years and we still have all the things from the previous house PLUS the things we've accumulated since moving in two years ago. When I started my 14 day challenge I knew that I'd need to create three different piles as the bags were going to different places. Pile 1 was rubbish which went to the dump, Pile 2 was for the local thrift shop and Pile 3 was for the 'reuse shop' at our local dump.

After 14 days 24 bags went to the dump, 26 bags were given to the 'Save the Children' thrift store and a total of 6 bags went to the Reuse Shop at the dump. The house is lighter and less cluttered but I still have a few more areas to finish off so I'm sure I could add to these numbers.

I'm pleased to say that with removing all these bags out of the house we've been able to create more space within the house. In the coming weeks I'm going to share with you some before and after pictures of the kids rooms and hopefully I'll be able to start decorating the kids bedrooms rooms.

So far I'm pleased with the effort that we put into decluttering the house. The children are also pleased with their rooms and they're putting in the effort of keeping it clean. So far the children have made their beds each day and the girls are putting all their clothes away each night. I'd call this a success and I wish I'd pulled my finger out and decluttered the house earlier.

Megan

Pantry Organisation

When we decided to build our home I was really excited that I'd be able to make changes throughout the original house plan thus making it OUR design and our family home. One of the areas I spent a lot time on was the kitchen and the adjoining butlers pantry. Our previous house had a five shelf pantry that was about the same height as a refrigerator and I was forever getting frustrated as I never seemed to have enough room to store things other than food. So I really wanted a pantry space in this house that would allow me to store food, containers, special items and things that I don't want my nearly two year old to get to.

 

During one of our many visits to the house during construction my brother's girlfriend asked me what the small room at the other end of the kitchen was. I told her that it was a linen cupboard that I could use to store things that didn't fit in other area's of the house, she suggested that I use it as another pantry as that would allow me to store more food and possibly reduce the number of times I had to shop during the year. The reason for having this space was because I've always believed Australian homes don't have enough storage within the house for families. Nowadays builders seem to be providing us with even less storage options than what they provided twenty-five years ago when my parents were building their home.

 

After listening to her idea, Mr Opoes and I went back to our rental house and spoke about what she had suggested. Having decided to use it as a linen cupboard was OK but technically it was in the wrong position and as we already have a large area in the laundry to store our linen it just made sense. If I'd been honest with her I would have told her that I'd always had a problem with the cupboard been off the kitchen and it wasn't possible to change the position of door due to the nearby rooms. So with a few months left of the build I got to thinking which space would be to store my food and which would be used to store my Tupperware, special items, containers etc.

 

Recently I watch Quinlan playing with all my plastic containers and that's when I got to thinking that I needed to create a storage solution to look after the growing collection of plastics and Tupperware that I've accumulated over the years. So with this in mind I got to thinking about what I could create and where I'd like to position my plastic and Tupperware collection. I purchased a few weaved baskets from my local Kmart store and a can of PlastiKote spray paint from the hardware store.

I wanted a hot pink colour and I fell in love with the colour of the lid so I was really surprised to find out that the colour I'd chosen was called Heather Violet but I must admit it's a really nice colour if done in moderation.

So this is what I came up with. I undercoated a small section of each basket, left it to dry for the required time and then I sprayed it pink. I had to spray it twice with the pink so that I could get into all the uneven spaces that each basket has. I then left it to dry for 48 hours just to make sure it was really, really dry. Lastly I stuck four one inch felt pads on the bottom of the basket so that it wouldn't mark the bottom of my pantry shelves. I haven't completely finished the baskets yet as I'm still waiting for Mr Opoes to drill holes into my chalkboard labels so that I can use the large tin of chalkboard paint I have.
 

I'm going to say that these new storage containers will save my plastics from disappearing, I'll be able to match them up when I use them and they'll be up high enough that my four lovely children won't be reaching up to steal them time and time again. It'll also help heaps next year when I have three children attending various educational locations so that means I should have more room for lunch boxes and drink bottles. So do you have a special storage trick that you use to keep all your plastic container under control. I'd love to hear about it as I'm desperate to get our house de-cluttered and organised before the year's finished.

 

Megan

Pantry Organisation

Last week while visiting one of my favourite link parties I discovered Mary Organizes and her 91 day De-Clutter Challenge. I always love a good de-clutter series, I've participated in three different series so far this year and with each series I seem to take a few steps forward but they are never long lasting. Back in February I participated in an intense seven day organisation program that saw me putting up to five hours each day so that I could officially say we'd unpacked after moving into our house eight months earlier. During this process I was happy to have moved the car into the garage.

 

Unfortunately, my time management skills need an overhaul as I find myself never finishing jobs that need doing. One of my blog friends shared this on her Facebook page and although I had a good laugh I'd have to say that I'm one of these Twelve Procrastination Types. Can you guess which one??



Source

Sunday night saw me feeling down as I realised another weekend had passed and my to-do list hadn't changed if anything it had gotten bigger. It was then that Mr Opoes and I started a conversation about what we needed to do in order to achieve our DREAM of living in a clutter free home. One thing Mr Opoes said he needed was a short break especially as he's been working hard since the beginning of the new financial year. The children have also been asking when they could have another small trip away since the one we had last month. So Mr Opoes suggested the he take the kids on a short break next month, while they're gone I'm going to spend the time organising the kitchen and dining room as we tend to spend most of our time in this area.

 

I've always known that my husband is a good father but to volunteer to look after four children, over the weekend on his own is just brilliant. I'm hoping that he likes what I've done when he returns and that the children will see the change because over the Christmas holiday's I've got plans.. My plan is to create a chore chart, install a routine especially as Mackenna will be starting school next year and to work on keeping their bedrooms clean ha ha. I want to use the eight weeks productively instead of the house filling up with school supplies, Christmas presents and rubbish that they don't want to get rid of.

 

As you can imagine I've made plans to add colour, style and some organisation into the kitchen so that it functions better in the coming months. I'm planning on ticking off these little project in the coming weeks so that when it's time to de-clutter I'll be organised enough that the task gets completed within the time allowed. I'm working on a storage area for my collection of Retro Tupperware which my mother in law gave me when we moved in. I've managed to cut it down from two large boxes to one cardboard box however I'm going to need a number of cane baskets as I can't find anything big enough that fits in the space. I'm hoping that the colour works well with the kitchen, especially as Mr Opoes choose the colour back in May when we talked about the direction we wanted to follow in the kitchen.



So what do you think of the pink? The baskets will be sitting in the pantry so you won't see them the moment you walk into the kitchen but depending on the angle you're standing you'll see some of the colour showing through. I'm also going to add blackboard labels so that the kids can put things away especially if they're on dishwasher duty. I've also got a plan for a small amount of pink to go on the bench near the oven so that it all ties in together.

 

I'd love the hear your thoughts on the pink storage baskets, what type of 'procrastinator' you are and what type of 'procrastinator' you think I am.

 

Megan





Gardening Mis-Adventure...

 

Last weekend I had an extremely long to-do list that I wanted to complete, unfortunately we'd already planned to meet up with some friends Mr Opoes hadn't seen for a few years and all my plans went off the rails. I've always known that I'm a very unorganised person, which is somewhat of a problem. OK it's a huge issue in this house. You'd think marrying a man who's organised, has a routine and can tick things off a to-do list quickly would make us a winning combination. RIGHT. NO. We seem to have vastly different ideas of what needs to be done and communicating the next step isn't something either one of us do well.

One of the most important jobs I wanted to tick off my list was constructing two garden beds and plant them out. We started this task on Saturday at about 11am, now you would think a quick visit to the hardware store and home again would see this completed in four to five hours. Wrong. It took us two and a half hours at the hardware store, then we rushed home unpack everything we'd just purchased for ONE garden bed and not TWO like we planned before we rushed off to meet up with Mr Opoes friends. Now the plan was to spend three hours socialising before coming home to finish off anything that needed to be done with the garden.

In reality everything got started on the Sunday afternoon which only left us enough time to build one raised garden bed and to fill it with the supplies we'd spent over two hours buying. I then went off to another Kmart to purchase some pool noodles as I'd only managed to pick one up. I had thought with the warmer temperatures the noodles would readily be available however they are proving difficult to find. So after a total of four hours work over two days we had built, filled one raised garden bed and I'd made it a little more safe for the children.

Next up I need to plant my seedlings and packet seeds, add some supports so that my three tomatoes can climb and make some labels so that I know what I'm growing. At the moment it looks like I'll be busily planting this little veggie patch out on Saturday afternoon after the Family Fun Day that Mackenna's kindergarten are having this weekend. In the meantime I need to get working on all the labels so that Mr Opoes and I can spend a few hours constructing the second garden bed so that we are all ready to go.

So I'm hoping that when the children start their September/October holidays I'll have the garden beds all planted out and that I'll be able to have to children help with the watering and weeding of the veggie patch. Unfortunately, I don't have any photography's due to losing the camera outside. I'd placed it on the water tanks pump while we were filling the garden bed with all the soil and as the water tank is used to flash the toilets the vibration from the pump the camera has fallen off onto the grass. So after searching inside the house top to bottom for four days I went outside and I retraced my movements and guess what I found it laying on the grass. So now I'm waiting for the camera to dry out a bit before I use it again.

I've also been working on a little organisation project for the pantry which I'm hoping to finalised in the next few days so that I can share it with you. I'm trying a new type of spray paint so it's drying time is a bit longer than I'm use to so I'm hoping I've done it right. When I've finished this project I'm hoping that the colour I've chosen will work well with the kitchen finger's crossed.

Megan

When Clutter Own's You Part 2

During the last six months I've shared a few posts about my issues with clutter, (find them here, here and here) how I've tried to declutter our house and how I've signed on to various 'organising your houses' programs that other bloggers host in an attempt to make an impact on the mess clutter that we having been living with. So I've taken some time away from blogging and I've been working on finally unpacking all those boxes that I'd dumped all over the house.

In Queensland, we have been inundated with rain during the last two months so it was an easy decision as to were I was going to start. The first area that I needed to address was getting the our KIA Carnival into our double garage especially with the heavier rain falls happening during school drop-off and school pick-up times. Having to time it so that I could run each child out to the car with an umbrella means that by the time I get to the car I am very wet and as the return trip home is done with twenty minutes I usually have to take my clothes off and try to dry them over the clothes horse. So with this in mind I set about clearing the garage out so I could get the car into the garage and the kids in and out without having to deal with the rain.

Before.

Before.

As you can see there is a heap of things in the garage that just shouldn't be there and these pictures were taken after I'd previously spent six hours clearing out things. The majority of the work I'd already done was to remove all the clothing out and install a storage box that I'd purchased from Ikea months and months earlier. One of the reason why I only spent six hours in there was because we had so many large and small items that there wasn't really anywhere to put them.

I started off by removing all the boxes, containers, toys etc and I worked through these sorting them into various piles so that I could put them in there correct position later. I knew that we had a few heavy items like a refrigerator, unused tiles, an old wardrobe and a metal shelving unit that stored poisons, petrol and other items that need to be stored in a shed (which we don't own). With the amount of heavy items I had Mr Opoes work with me so that I could focus my time on going through the stuff I'd moved into the house. It wasn't an easy job, with all the things we had in there it's often difficult to find places for them in other rooms without first looking through a box and only keeping the things we need.

I still have a number of boxes to go through and I know that the majority of the boxes are filled with toys so one of the next jobs I have to accomplish is to organise the storage area in the kid's room which is next on my ever growing to-do list. Clearing the garage in order to get the people mover in took nearly six hours, at least half that time was spent re-positioning things like tiles, an old wardrobe and household items e.g. wooden ladders, art canvas and wooden dolls items. So in total we have probably spent twelve hours so far and there's probably another four to five hours just finalising things once we get a shed organised. It will also mean that I can move the four kid's bikes out of the living room and into the shed.

So if you're still reading you probably want to see same after pictures. Unfortunately I wasn't able to get the same angles as the before pictures but I was able to capture a more detailed photograph so that you could see how we went about fitting everything in.

The Garage (80% completed)

After.

Done:

▪ moved all the tiles into an area so that it would be easy to sell them.

▪ stored wooden ladders out of the way.

▪ placed items needing to go into the shed in one area.

▪ put shoes in pink box in the shoe storage area.

▪ swept floor so that the area was clean before the car came in.

To Do:
▪ remove all the shed related items into the shed.

▪ sell the tiles, wardrobe and any baby related stuff that I don't want.

▪ move the refrigerator, clean it and plug it in. 

▪ work on setting up an organisation station.

▪ set up zones so that the room is more functional.

As you can see there are still items that need to be rehoused but for now we are all very happy to have the car in the garage. The other thing that we've noticed is that the garage might not be a true double garage size especially when you take the brick work into account, we would struggle to fit a small car into the space that's left. The fun now is learning how to get down the driveway without damaging the new garden beds. Hope you have some fun de-cluttering just like we did!!

Megan

Can I Ask

 

  

Does This Clutter Make My Butt Look Fat?

 

I talked late last year about my clutter and unfortunately I never reduced the amount of stuff we had enough that you'd notice. Honestly, do you think clutter and been disorganised weighs you down? I think we've reached breaking point in most areas of our house and I'm tired of spending so much of my time looking for things. I know I'm not alone in feeling tied by the state of my house, many blogs have developed special series in order to help us start organising and decluttering our homes during January so that we can get on top of thing. I know that when I become overwhelmed with the clutter in my home I'll eat more often especially if I'm procrastinating about what to do and where to start.

So, as part of my goals for 2013, I'm going to be taking charge of the clutter and I'm going to win the battle. Starting on Valentine's Day I'm going to be joined by the lovely Donna from 'Organize It' who is going to help me clean up my entire house. We are going to be focusing getting rid of the stuff we don't need, reducing the amount of clothing that we have, putting away all the stuff that's still sitting in moving boxes and setting things up so that they run more efficiently. This is going to be a really

 BIG JOB

in that Donna and I will be working a minimum of four hours a day over the course of four days. This means that I'll be spending a minimum of sixteen hours working on this house in the hope that we'll be able to drive the car into the garage, that I'll know were to look for the notices that come home from school, the kid's will know were to put their toy's and that the kitchen will finally be organised so that the pots and pans are away in the correct space instead of sitting in a moving box waiting to be placed in there correct spot.

 

Media room that is housing some
 of our clothes.

 



Our Kitchen Bench.



The garage were I hope to FINALLY PUT THE CAR.

 

Donna has said that some area's may require more time and the beauty of working with Donna is that she's able to tack more time on so that you can finish off the spaces your working with. I'm going to be giving this task my full attention because it's affecting me in more ways than one.

 

I have come to the realisation that the clutter doesn't make me happy and because of this I don't make friends easily as I tend to be a negative person. The clutter has lead to feeling depressed and this in turn has helped me gain weight over the years. However, I believe that the number one problem all the clutter and un-organisation has achieved is that it's ruined my relationships. My family have been very judgemental about the clutter, I can become annoyed really easily at the children because of the clutter and it's also played a role in ruining my marriage.

 

At the end of the day though this is my fault, I'm the one person who allowed all these things to be bought into our house. I'm the person who made it impossible for the children to invite people over and I'm the one who didn't say 'NO THANK-YOU' when things were given to us. I've spent so much time watching the clutter grow that I never got around to putting the clutter on a diet.

 

So the house is going on a diet and a major one at that. At the end of these four days I'm hoping that I can give things to charity, get rid of all the boxes, broken toys etc at the rubbish dump and that maybe I'll even be able to have a garage sale to sell all the clothing that the children have out grown.  Most of all I just want to walk into any room and see that everything is clean, tidy and put away. The next job will be to teach the children to put things away after they have finished using them. I hope that I will be able to have the kid's join in on learning how to keep our house clutter free.

 

Well I'm off now to get ready for a very special day tomorrow.

 

Megan