Guest Room

My guest room had become a catch-all for my treasures found at DI.

Tyler had also begun using it to store his computer parts. (he rebuilds broken computers)

Tyler and I had started calling it our "Hoarding Room".

Well, enough was enough, so a couple of weeks ago I completely cleaned, organized and re-arranged to make it a pretty space for any guests we might have.

Over the years this room has been a place of healing for several members of our family

Tony remembers staying there during the week after he broke his ankle while snowboarding.

Josh recovered from two surgeries there and lived with us for a few months while saving to buy his first Condo.

My brother Terry stayed with us for a year while making some changes in his life.

So now the room is ready in case it is needed again. I hope the room continues to be a place of healing for our family.

Hoarders

The TV show Hoarders has done crazy things to me...
I have spent the first two weeks of 2011 going through everything in my home. I have definite Hoarder proclivities. (big word, I know)

So the next few posts will chronicle my adventures in organizing and purging my house.

So today I share with you the adventures of cleaning out my kitchen pantry.

First, I need to see if all of this:




Can fit into this:




My new philosophy in cleaning and organizing has become: Do I love it? Do I use it? So I guess that can work with food too. When my son Josh lived with us for a while we ended up with a lot of organic and whole wheat based food items in the pantry. So there they have remained since he left over a year ago. Do I love it? No. Do I use it? No. So away they went into the trash.

Also, I have been trying to organize using containers. So I separated items into baskets based on their uses. Baking items in one, breakfast items in another, pastas, well you get the drift...

So here is the finished product:




This feels so good.


Tune in again next week to see what I have done in the guest room. My son Tyler and I have renamed the guest room "The Hoarder Room".

Closet Re-Do

I'm not known for my organizational skills...But have recently been inspired by the gift of some hand-me-down shoe shelves from my great friend Emily. Her husband built her some custom shelves for her 60 plus pair of rockin' high heels.

So with the shelves in hand, I spent the next few hours re-organizing my own shoes and closet.

Not too shabby...I think. What do you think?

Here's the before:




And after:

The Color Red

Yes, I love the color red...growing up as a Pleasant Grove Viking our colors were Blue and White. I remember in high school I wouldn't even consider wearing red. (Our arch rival American Fork Cavemen wore red, Boo!). I had strong school pride and that poured over to my choice of clothing, and just about everything else.

Now, the last few years, I have developed a serious obsession with the color red. My latest room re-arranging project included adding red into my decor. You can go back a couple of posts to see the before photos.

Enjoy...









Even a cute little toaster!



Here is what started my latest obsession with red:

Master Bedroom Re-Do

Yes, I love change. I've tried to come up with the deep reasons I love re-arranging furniture so much. I think a lot of it stems from my memories as a child. I grew up living in the same house my entire childhood until marriage at 20. I had a favorite cousin that would move a lot. It seemed like every year or so, her family would move into a different house or apartment. I have to admit, I remember being jealous of her because it always seemed so exciting to me to see her new bedroom and their new house. As I grew up, I realized that their moving was actually based on job changes and sometimes difficult financial circumstances. I admired her parents for trying to make the difficult transitions into new apartments and homes seem like an exciting adventure.

Fast forward to my own adventures in moving. I love moving, (remember, I love change) each time I was pregnant, I had this incredible urge to move. So, my patient husband let me find new places to live. I loved the fun of setting up the new apartment or home, unpacking the boxes, arranging the furniture in new ways. The last time we moved was 3 weeks after the birth of my now 14 year old son.

So, every time I feel that familiar urge to move, I re-arrange furniture or re-decorate a room. All of my re-decorating involves very little cost. I buy most of my decor at yard sales or thrift stores.

Saturday night, I re-decorated the master bedroom. The inspiration piece for the room was a picture I found at Ikea of a beach. The picture reminded me of Rob and my cruise to the Caribbean for or 25th anniversary last year. We spent some time on a private beach and the picture at Ikea looked a lot like the beach. So I decided to decorate the bedroom as a reminder of our fantastic trip to the Caribbean.

Thanks Rob, for being patient with my re-arranging and re-decorating. This one is for you...enjoy.

Before










After



See the pillow? Notice the Est. Date? 1983, our anniversary!

Halloween Decor 2009

I have had a lot of fun this year decorating for Halloween. I try to put something spooky in surprising places. Check out the photos.

Redecorating the dining room

As a yard sale and thrift store treasure hunter, it becomes necessary to host a yard sale every year. I have friends and family that look forward to my yard sale every year, because they know they will always find something fun and cheap to beautify their homes.

Each year I have something in mind on which to spend the money from the yard sale. This year I wanted a dining room table. Not just any dining room table, I wanted something "vintage" that was either black, white or a combination of the two. I wanted to continue with the "Shabby Chic" look that I have been incorporating into the living room and dining room.

So after the yard sale, I went on the hunt for the perfect table. In American Fork on Main Street is a fabulous shop called "Finder's Keeper's". I love this shop. The owner finds second hand furniture and then carefully refinishes, repaints, and gives each piece a wonderful "vintage" flair. The minute I walked in the door, my eye rested upon the dining room table and four chairs. Voila! The perfect table. She had it marked for $450 and because I paid cash, I received another 10% off. I took the perfect dining room table home!

So over the past several weeks, I have been tweaking the dining room decor and have finally been satisfied to a point to post some pics.

The room needs a coat of paint, and I need new drapes, but this is a good start!

Enjoy!