Getting Organized 15 Minutes at a Time

Though most of my clutter is carefully hidden away, lately I've been feeling a bit squished in my little house because there's TOO MUCH STUFF! As is my typical way, I first blamed the boyfriend. Afterall, I didn't feel so squished before he got here. But then he reminded me that 99% of his stuff is contained in one single room, manland. He's got me there. It's my crap that's out of control.

I couldn't find the time to fit in a massive organizing session, so I've been finally taking some of great organizing advice to start small and keep at it. In just four short sessions of around 15 minutes I've already tackled my over-flowing coffee table drawer (shown below after being attacked), bathroom storage cabinets and closet. I forgot to take a before of the coffee table drawer, but trust me, you couldn't fit another thing in there when I started.

If I don't love it and use it, it's out of here! And if you need to declutter, try just working on it a few minutes at a time, you might be surprised how much you can accomplish.

What's No Longer Black, White and Purple All Over?

Well, it took almost the entire day and caused more than a few fights, but we can strike another project off the summer to-do list: painting the front door and shutters. I've wanted to tackle painting the black shutters and hideous purple door since I first saw the house, and thanks to the Boy, it's finally done. Now min hus stands out from the other neighboring white houses with black shutters.

I'm happy with how it turned out, but oh so tired. I really hope I never have to strip that much paint off of anything ever again. I'll post more details (probably) when I have more energy.

Who's Afraid of the Big, Bad Door? A Scary DIY Tale

Grab a pillow, boys and girls, and make yourself comfortable, today I'm going to tell you a scary story about a boy, a girl and a DIY project.*

It all started, as most scary stories do, with a simple, but flawed plan. The boy and the girl planned to go shopping and buy supplies, strip and paint their front door, and clean and paint their shutters. All in ONE day. They foolishly forgot the DIY golden rule: all projects will take four times as long and cost three times as much as planned.

"We'll easily be able to finish this in one day," the silly boy exclaimed.

The girl was not convinced, so they did some preliminary window-shopping the night before. All was well until suddenly the girl sprouted a second head! And not just any head mind you, but a grouchy, snarling, hungry witch's head! The witch put a spell over the girl, so that to anyone else it looked like she was still her usual self, but she wasn't. Suddenly the girl started snarling and snapping at the boy when he didn't find the paint stripper fast enough. The boy snapped back about her painting choices and a fight ensued. Finally, the girl was able to overpower the witch and cut off her head. The boy and the girl managed to make up and go to sleep dreaming happy dreams of a successful project. (the fools!)

The next morning the girl got up, made coffee, and tried not to dread the work ahead. Later, the boy and girl went to a discount home improvement store. They found door hardware at half the price of what was at the nasty box store. This made them happy, but they still had to go to the big, nasty box store. The paint section proved tricky again, as the girl had a minor panic attack over picking a paint sheen and annoyed the paint guy. But eventually the couple got their purchases and headed home.

This, boys and girls, is where the real trouble began. First, they discovered that someone evil had painted over the same hinges and screws they needed to remove to begin their project. Eventually, they unhinged the door and removed the old hardware. Then, they soon realized that if they installed the new hardware where the old mortise lock had been, they'd be left with a huge, gaping hole in the door. This worried the girl terribly. She started stripping the paint off the door and it wasn't going well. Morning had faded into afternoon.

Suddenly the evil witch gathered all her magical powers and regrew a head on the girl's body, and all hell broke loose. The girl began hyperventilating as she realized they'd never finish the door that day, let alone the shutters. She also panicked about the right way to fix the hardware problem quickly. The boy wanted to ride off into the sunset to slay the evil lock problem, but the girl knew she'd never finish the door alone. She began yelling and pacing and came quite close to crying. The boy thought she was having a nervous breakdown. They fought and swore they'd never do DIY together again. It began to look like the evil door and witch had won.

Eventually, the girl slayed the evil witch and the boy and the girl calmed down. The girl apologized, and the boy made her repeat it several more times as they spent the next SIX HOURS scraping that stupid door and removing all the old paint. Both of them feared they had fallen into a time warp, because how could it possibly take SIX FRIGGIN' HOURS to strip a door? But by that time, it was dark, and they were dirty, hungry, sore and tired. So the boy and the girl went into their cottage and slept. Without a front door. Oh don't worry boys and girls, they had a great security system in place of the door consisting of a locked storm door, a $1 alarm that would sound at the first sign of trouble, a bunch of newspapers (to block evil, prying eyes) and a vacuum (to booby trap any wannabe criminals).

As for the evil door? And the shutters? Stay tuned kids, stay tuned.

* I'm sure it goes without saying, but this tale is purely fictional. It has nothing to do with reality. Any similarities to real people, real huses and real DIY projects are purely coincidental. And anyone who says otherwise is LYING.

Tired, But Satisfied: Getting Back in the Thick of It

window before

I rarely feel like a "real Houseblogger," those renovation enthusiasts at Houseblogs.net who tackle major project after major DIY project, without pause. You know, the people who totally renovate their entire house, room by room, in a year or so. While I love reading those blogs, sometimes they make me feel extremely inadequate, not to mention jealous.

It's not just bloggers either, my stepdad has been spending almost every free moment he has for OVER A YEAR renovating a house. They took that place to the studs and brought it back. Yeah, that's not me.

I'll go all out on larger projects until they are done, because unfinished project chaos drives me NUTS (though there are some things I manage to ignore for weeks or years), but after they're done I need a nice, long break before I can even contemplate another project. I'm just one of those people who needs major doses of R&R every week. Min hus is on the "never going to be totally finished and will look its best before I sell it" plan.

Case in point, the reason I felt so satisfied this weekend, despite my aching body, is that I finally got back to restoring the windows after a two year break. This summer my goal is to restore four windows, though that may be optimistic. Last Saturday, I finally got started, and managed to scrape (using a heat gun) the paint off the trim of one window, and repaint it. It took about four hours and the project is only half done, if that, as I still need to reglaze the window, paint the window, and repaint the storms.

window during

While the caulk and wood filler was drying, I managed to clean the back stormdoor, light and deck; and do some gardening. Meanwhile, the Boy spent the day working on his own projects in manland. By the end of the day I was exhausted, and even though I had to pop some ibuprophen the next day, I felt great, almost like a real houseblogger.

window after

Our faithful companions were as helpful as usual during the day's work. Here's Piggy, being his usual supportive self. (check out that belly. His fur never grew back after he was neutered, it cracks me up.)

The Garden is Exploding

wintersown pink poppy

I'm so pleased with my garden this year. After three years of adding a few plants at a time, plants bought on sale (often for 33 cents each!) or wintersowed, the garden is starting to fill in the way I'd like. Of course there are always improvements I'd like to make, new flowers to try, but that's the fun of gardening. Here's a peak into my garden today.

wintersown Cerinthe

coneflower

crazy floppin' daisies

The veggies garden has exploded as well, in addition to the zucchini I've already harvested, I''m waiting in mouth-watering anticipation for:

peppers

tomatoes, lots of tomatoes

Also in bloom:

• Coreopsis
• Lavender
• Petunias
  
• Roses
  
• Sweet peas
• Sweet William
  
• Zinnia
  

A FAB Kitchen Makeover

You may have noticed that I'm obsessed with all things kitchen lately as I dream about transforming my kitchen to something fabulous on a tiny budget. That's why makeovers like this fabulous and creative one by Meredith Ladik are so inspiring to me. I love the bright pops of turquoise, the rich-looking bottom cabinets and the pretty wallpaper.

Get the scoop and see more pics at Do It Yourself (originally spotted on Casasugar). And come back for pics of my kitchen makeover, hopefully coming sometime before 2012 at this rate (I hope!).

How My Veggie Garden Grows

My little container vegetable garden is really flourishing. You can see what it looked like at planting time to really see how much it's grown.

This is my monster zucchini, which I planted because I thought the easy-grow factor would be good for my gardener's ego. Plus, what's not to love about a plant known for producing more veggies than you can use? I'll take that challenge! This monster zucchini is even more impressive in person (at least to me and the neighbor). As you can see, it's almost taller than the fence! Actually there are two zucchini plants in this Earthbox, along with the two poor peppers that have been completely overtaken. Note to self, in the future plant two zucchini plants per earthbox, max.

I have lots of baby tomatoes growing on my six tomato plants that are also in Earthboxes, although according to past experience I probably have another month to wait before I'll be tasting any of them.

I even had my first harvest today! I hadn't been watching my zucchini closely enough, and when I looked today I was delighted to see four zucchinis ripe for the pickin'. Yep, so far I'm pretty pleased with my zucchini growing experience.