Since my last post up until today, I've been cleaning and decluttering our house. It feels amazing. Adam will attest that I may have gotten a little obsessed with it over the last few days, but I'm also confident that he enjoys the results. It all started with two things: 1). My parents bought us a new dining room lamp and 2). Adam wanted to paint his office. For whatever reason, these two events set me into a mission to clean and declutter. My first mission was the baker's rack that I successfully removed from the dining room with only an $8 Ikea purchase. That led to some kitchen and dining room re-organization, but I was satisfied with that much until Adam told me his plans for the office. He was going to clean it out except for his desk, bookshelf and the clothes rack. I asked why he even needed a clothes rack to begin with and he responded that with the beer and records in his closet he didn't have anymore room.
Beer and records? Did I marry a teenager?
Needless to say, I saw that as a challenge and I wasn't going to be wrong. While Adam was sleeping, I organized all of his clothes and as I suspected, they did in fact fit in the closet and dresser- with some adjustments and donations of course. Now is probably a good time to mention the fact that we home brew, so we tend to have a lot of beer on hand. I actually didn't know where it was until Friday when Adam told me it was in his closet. After another round of kitchen organization, we have a place to store the beer and the empty bottles without it being an eye-sore.
On Wednesday of last week, I really wanted to get a new bookshelf, but after the donation of around 30 books, I don't need it. Instead, I bought storage containers for the basement and some picture frames. The baker's rack had become a default poster storage space, so without it, I needed to find a new place for the posters. Guess where they landed? The wall. Shocking, I know. After years of talking about getting frames, I went out and got some and hung them on the wall. I put 5 small photos in the kitchen and then 9 bigger posters in the office and bedroom. It feels so nice to display some more artwork around the house!! It's also nice to know that I can do it myself. With just a hammer, a level and some nails, I can hang up pictures, it's great to remind myself of what I'm capable of. Adam probably would have helped, but he was in the midst of computer surgery...
The end result of my few crazy days of cleaning, I finally feel like our house is a home. It's only been 6.5 years, but it feels like us. A couple of Adam's guitars are hung on the wall along with posters of our favorite bands and few pictures I've taken. It's organized and everything has a place. (Well, almost... we still need to finish organizing the office...). I hated cleaning our house because it always took so long to pick everything up just to clean, where now, I should be able to just clean and not have to pick up nearly as much. We also donated 12 bags and 5 boxes to Arc's Value Village (on 66th and Penn if you want to purchase any of our donations), so our small house doesn't feel so cramped. Our dining room is actually started to feel big. With just two of us, I knew we should have enough room in our house, even though it is small, but it finally feels like we have enough room. It's such a great feeling to finally feel organized and calm at home. I love it.
Now that I'm back at work, let's see just see if we can maintain it. I hope we can.
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