1 Week Down!!! 1 room complete!

Today marks one week since I began my 60/300 challenge, and today I completed my first room. I absolutely love it and at the moment its the only non-chaotic room in the house so I just want to hide out in it and bask in the serenity of a clean, non cluttered room. I should say its ALMOST complete. I need to purchase a new toilet brush and after I clean out the linen closet/kids bathroom I will be switching the towels under the sink to the linen closet, and our master linens to our bathroom.

Here are my little helpers helping me sort items into my tumblers.

And the finished product!

I love bright colors, and this green and blue are very bright even though they look muted in the picture. We are buying a new camera soon, so no more cell phone pictures! I got the candle for $1, it's a Glade candle and it smells wonderful. Plus the colors match! I bought a new trashcan in Avocado green too.

Here is a mirror picture so you can see the curtain we hung to use as a closet door. It works really well. It's so bright and white it makes the colors we used really pop, and it makes the room feel really clean and fresh. And I LOVE that people using the toilet will no longer get a view of our Master Closet. (The Bar is Chris's pull up bar!)

Another shot of the corner of the sink. You can see one of the shelves we hung up that holds some of the tumblers.

The bathtub area. The reason there is no curtain is we only use this tub to take baths. In our main bathroom we have a shower stall that is wheelchair accessible (and therefore can only be used for showers) so we use that one to shower and this one to bathe. Makes the room seem bigger without a shower curtain. The green Submarine is a kids shower caddy that holds their toys and shampoo/body wash. I also purchased a regular shower caddy to replace the basket I had full of our shampoos. Makes the room so much less cluttered.

The toilet. The green basket holds toilet paper rolls so there is no more running out with guests, and what have you. I don't like it peeping over the top but I didn't want to put one roll back in the stockpile area. The blue container is for "reading material" and really helps tie in the blues with the greens. The shelf is the second shelf hung and contains more tumblers!

A close up of both of the shelves. These tumblers are so bright and contain so many colors that it's really easy to play off of them for accents! I think I may purchase a red bath rug to tie in the reds in these tumblers. I LOVE this idea to house bathroom supplies. I know I can't be the only one who does this but I did not get the inspiration for this from anyone else. If I do get inspiration somewhere I promise to always link it so the proper person can get credit. In these tumblers are things such as cough drops (so I don't have shapeless bags hanging around), tweezers and nail clippers since we are always losing them, headbands (until I can find a better spot for them, dang headbands!), medicine droppers/cups/thermometers since we can never find them when we need them, q-tips, chapstick, combs and brushes, band-aids ect. Basically the little odds and ends that can clutter up a bathroom.

I pretty much kept this unchanged. I took it apart and scrubbed it down, but other than that it is very functional and I can't figure out a better way to have this. It holds my cloth pads (yes, I use cloth pads), my cloth nursing pads (Cloth is my religion), and my hair products like gel and de-frizzer.

And an updated picture of the hair drawer. I removed the headbands (pesky things) and took the lids off and it works so much better.

A reader commented that hanging the head bands on a hanger might work! Great idea! And it's totally inspired a whole slew of ways to hang the headbands in my room. I don't want them in the closet and I'm already annoyed that the hair stuff is in multiple locations already (The drawer, the white drawers, and a tumbler) and I want to keep them in one room - but it's a great suggestion and may work for someone else. Keep the suggestions for home organization coming!

Another project I did today took only a few moments, and although it needs to be modified in some ways - for now this works. I purchased the little pails from the dollar section of Target, and the tray from the seasonal dishes area. The tray actually matches some of the tumblers! I've seen this idea across the internet and on a lot of my homeschooling blogs I follow. I originally planned to use a Lazy Susan or turn this into a Lazy Susan but Chris said that he could envision items going flying so we left ours alone. But, if your kids aren't crazy like mine that may be a great idea.

I used hot glue on the bottoms of the pails and then around the edges after gluing them

I may end up putting a screw through the bottom of the pail to keep it on the tray permanently.

I will take a picture tomorrow of it in use, I simply forgot to take one today. I love this idea, and I hope it encourages the kids to keep their art supplies neat.

And finally - a possible blog giveaway! I came across about 100 ovulation tests while purging my bathroom area. Well they were neatly in a bag in one of my containers anyway. I am so awful with taking these. So my laziness may be one readers gain! Once I hit 50 followers I will be posting a giveaway with a chance for two readers to win a sizable amount of these (as for how many I'm not sure yet). I'm expecting it to be a while but if you are interested follow my blog!

Day 6 of 60/300

Another day where not much on the house got done - but today was far from productive! In fact, this entry is so late because we just literally got home!

I've mentioned the Dave Ramsey method and how we follow it. Recently we paid our Trailblazer off 2 years early, which saves us nearly $400 a month (our car payments were ridiculous!) to snowball on other debt. Chris is leaving in September for at least 5 months and the Trailblazer isn't a family car as it only sits 5. The original plan was to sell it around September and throw that money on debt, however we decided to sell it early to save on interest and insurance. So we sold it today and Chris bought himself a very old, ugly, cheap BMW. The car is only one year younger than me. But it runs, and it's cheap, and we bought it outright. The rest of the money is going on debt and a family vacation - our first real family vacation. We've gone to visit family in the past but we all know that isn't a real vacation. So at the end of next month we'll be going to Mount Rushmore and surrounding areas and camping! So today was spent selling the car, and shopping. A family friend is quite the bachelor and doesn't enjoy shopping for himself. So in trade he pays me to shop for him and watches the kids (minus Charlie) while I do so. So after selling the car I had to do his grocery shopping and Chris and I went on a date together!

I did make a trip to my favorite store, Target, and bought some stuff to finish up my bathroom. I bought some tumblers, two shelves, and a basket for toilet paper. I also bought 5 plastic shoe boxes for $6! All in all I spent $50 (and purchased 4 mens body washes for only .04!).

Only two pictures tonight! Last night I organized my hair drawer. I used tupperware I had on hand, but a reader suggested this to use to organize pony tails.

Such a neat idea! I may switch to that if the tupperware doesn't pan out. For now this is what my drawer looks like

It's not as neat as I'd like but it works. My main issue is the stinking headbands! I have them in a bag for now, but I hate the way it looks.

And just because I rarely get dressed up - here is me modeling our van (not the car we sold)

Day 5 of 60/300 - a day of little productivity.

Do you ever have one of those days where you want to get into your car and drive as far away as possible? Today was one of those days. From the moment I woke up until 9 pm tonight the longest stretch of time I had today without one of the kids crying or whining about something was 3 minutes. I was watching the clock. Of course Chris was flying, so there wasn't any other adult to give me a break. This is just a glimpse of what life will be like this fall when Chris leaves.

Soooo... there wasn't a lot of progress made today. I did make the decision to hold a Yard Sale next weekend. I hate yard sales with a passion - so this is major for me. I figure if I sell even one item it's worth it though. Whatever doesn't sell will go straight to Goodwill. Two of my homeschool curriculum books sold on Ebay today too. I'm thinking its not cheating if I add that money into my $300 fund, right? I mean - I sold what I'm cleaning out, so it's like using a coupon! So thats an additional $71 minus shipping!

Here is what I accomplished today

I didn't want to throw away my babies first bathtubs - you know the one they bathe the baby in right after birth? I still have all four of my kids bathtubs. Some even have their name still taped on it, as the hospital I delivered my last three at makes a sign with their name on it for their bassinet, so we took the sign and taped it to the tub instead. They were holding some of the baby items that hadn't been placed in their baby boxes yet, but as we are turning the boxes into shadow boxes I needed to do something with the tubs. I'm not sure I like this idea, I hate clutter with a passion, but for now this works. If anyone has a better idea, let me know! I cleaned out my stockpile cabinet and they are now hiding out in these containers - including the tubs.

My stockpile is quite large - especially my body washes. I need to donate about 2/3rds of this to the food shelter. We go through a lot of body wash in this house, though, since all 6 of us use it.

More of my stockpile. I have about 30 bars of soap.

My bathroom is normally quite clean - it's the room I'm most anal about. However, at the moment it's catching part of the closet clean up and I'm currently purging a lot of stuff in the bathroom so it's quite messy right now.

The shoe organizer is a decent idea but it looks way too cluttered for me. I HATE clutter with a passion. So, the shoe organizer is getting sold in the yard sale. The three containers on the bottom shelf in the closet will hold the rest of our meds and such. Until I can think of a better solution. Tomorrow I'm going to Target to purchase a few shelves and some tumblers. One shelf will go in this room and inside the tumblers will go some knick knacks such as q-tips, nailclippers/tweezers, ect. If someone knows a nice way to organize the millions of headbands, pony tails, barrettes, ect please let me know! I'm at a loss!

My husband swears that he is going to help me out this weekend, so hopefully I'll be able to make a lot more progress!

A bowl full of lemons.: Silhouette GIVEAWAY!!!!

A bowl full of lemons.: Silhouette GIVEAWAY!!!!: "A SILHOUETTE GIVEAWAY!! I was sent a Silhouette Rhinestone Starter kit this month, to try out and giveaway along with a Silhouette SD Mac..."

Head on over to "A Bowl Full of Lemons" for a chance at winning a Silhouette!! I think this machine will help me in my 60/300 challenge!

Day 4 of 60/300

The past few days have been spent furiously decluttering and massively cleaning and the rest of my home has gone quite neglected. Today I played catch up and folded the 15 loads of laundry (a slight exaggeration but not by much) that had piled up, and cleaned the kitchen. I also had to create a cake for the Cub Scout Cake Auction tonight. I decided to do these cupcakes as I thought they looked cute and I I figured the kids would love them. I was originally going to make 2 boxes but one box yielded two dozen cupcakes and I didn't need to do the second box.

I used colored ice cream cones to make them look cuter.

And then I had to have my product testing team taste them for me. They were well received.

They were outside playing in the mud. Oh joy. Don't worry, they washed their hands prior to eating and then it was bath time!

My "cake" at the auction. I melted the frosting a little to make it look like melted icecream.

It sold for the max bid allowed - $20! All the money is going back to the troop to help with the costs for the remaining of the year and next year. This is the cake we purchased, also for $20.

obviously some people are better at decorating than me!

I volunteered to help out as much as I can next year. I'd love to be a Den Leader but with us PCSing in January/February I don't want to leave a Den hanging. I've been volunteered to help with the Blue and Gold ceremony as well as I'll be a Council Member and in charge of organizing the Camping events. I'll be quite busy next year with Soccer, Cub Scouts, and Girl Scouts all while Chris is gone. Which is why I need to get back to organizing my home tomorrow!!

Day 3 of 60/300

When we first moved into this home Chris took the door off the Master Closet as it wasn't designed very well. With the door on it would hit the shelves and make it very difficult to get things into and out of the closet. I HATE this as I hate people sitting on the toilet looking into my closet! The Closet was also given over to Chris for the most part, as his military gear takes up most of it. This was one part of the house I have never really touched and therefore was one of the messiest rooms. I'm trying to take care of the messiest areas first while my drive is still pretty up there.

This is the view people get while using our bathroom

This is supposed to be my side of the closet

And Chris's military uniforms

And his military....stuff

And the other corner with more stuff.

And after a few hours of taking every single item out of our closet it looked something like this:

My side

The view from the toilet

And Chris's side

LOVELY!!! However, my room is now trashed while we sort through everything and figure out whats going back in the closet and what is finding a new home. There are a few boxes of pictures that need to be sorted into albums, and the kids baby boxes are being turned into shadow boxes.

Quite a lot of stuff will be sold or donated

Even more stuff is going in the trash. So far my closet looks like this. The clothes on the shelf are maternity clothes that need to be placed in a nice basket when I purchase one.

We are also going to hang a curtain rod and a nice white/sheer curtain to act as our door so people are no longer viewing our closet.

I went to Target today and spent $32 on a curtain rod, a sheer curtain, a trash can (to hold my wrapping paper rolls), and a decorative basket that didn't quite work for what I wanted so now I need to find a new use for it.

57 days to go $215 dollars left!

Day 2 of 60/300!

A few years ago Chris and I switched to the Dave Ramsey method of budgeting. We don't follow it as well as we should but I still swear by it. When we first switched we did actual, literal Envelope for our Envelope Budgeting. After a while our Envelopes began to look sad, so we switched to one of those little coupon accordion folders. We went through a few of them and then Chris said he wanted to switch to virtual envelopes. I was skeptical but gave them a try. However, months later we've concluded they just aren't working so back to actual Envelopes. I saw a few people make their Envelopes on a few blogs so I thought I'd give it a try.

I need to preface this by saying that I wish I were a crafty person. I LOVE to create crafts, and make stuff - I am just not very good. My friends Kristina, and Amy have more craftiness in their little pinkie than I have in my entire body. I do try though. Sometimes it works and other times I fail miserably. This time I came somewhere in between.

I started out making a template of an office envelope I had. My intention was to use two pieces of scrapbook paper so my Envelopes would be pretty inside and out. I also planned to laminate it to make it more durable.

My template for my first Envelope.

This is the traced template on scrap book paper.

I printed off labels using the Avery Template Program. We actually have 10 Envelopes - Chris Gas, Gas, Beth Fun, Chris Fun, Pets, Food, Fun (family), Clothes, Gifts, and Misc.

My first template didn't work well. The Envelope didn't close very well. Using two pieces of scrap book paper made it very bulky and difficult to manage. So I made another template which worked a little better. Next time, though, I will get double sided scrapbook paper and make myself happier.

These are the Envelopes prior to lamination. This project took entirely too long. To make it easier next time I will use only ONE sheet of paper and just buy double sided scrapbook paper. i will also create ANOTHER template with longer "wings"

And the final product. I used Velcro dots to close the Envelopes. Each Envelope has a different inside and it makes them super cute! They are more like plastic little pouches after all the lamination though.

These will go inside my Mizzell Family Binder once complete!

This project, unfortunately, took up a big chunk of my day. I did work on the garage more though. It is nearly complete and the pile of donate, trash, and sell is quite huge. I'm stuck, at the moment, until Chris can help me complete it. Only two more boxes to go through, a very good sweeping, and all the remaining boxes to be neatly stored and that room will be complete. Hopefully this weekend we will complete it and I can cross that room off my list. Tomorrow I begin the Master Bedroom Closet - a very scary place!