the first stop

A couple months ago, when I heard my Mom was able to come up for Gabrielle's adoption day, I immediately thought of a project we could do together while she was here.  You see, my mom organizes for a job!  Yay for me!  So I asked her ahead of time if we could tackle the new and so unorganized school closet.  Last fall, we turned our school room into the bigger girl's room to make room for their new baby sis.  And the things we didn't toss from old school room now had to fit in this closet in Gabrielle's room.  That was no small task. 

Bookshelves were moved to different parts of the house, along with board games and puzzles.  But all of our everyday school stuff needed an organized home.  I thought back in August, that I'd done a really good job organizing it all.  But it turns out there was just WAY too much junk I thought I needed to keep. 

I really wish I would have taken a before picture, but I forgot.  You couldn't even see the white of the closet wall, it was so stuffed.  And you couldn't see the floor either.  It was baby and school all thrown together in one big jumble. 

I'll show you all the junk that came out of it in a minute.. but first I think I need to have a moment of silence for my new favorite organizing tool: 

these simple clear boxes

They were just over a buck at Lowe's and I bought 8 of them, sure that I'd use them all up.  And that I did!  They house:

crayons

colored pencils

glue (all sorts)

post-it notes

dot paints

markers

and... and...

I can't remember the other two, but trust me, these little bad boys are worth their weight in gold!

I love how they are clear, so the kiddos can see what they're grabbing.  Plus, they're small enough to stack 3 in each cube.  We had so many crayons in this house, that I threw out all the broken ones and only kept what I could fit in one clear box. 

Mason jars were my other best friend in this organizing job.  I have one each for pencils, pens, scissors, paint brushes, chalk, etc..  I just love clear containers, it makes me so happy to see our supplies looking cute and ready to be used.  Can art supplies look cute?  Well, ours do. 

There was one other organizing box with layers and compartments I found that I got two of.  It's the one with the teal lid with the handle sticking up (in the photo below) and one holds all our office supples (stapler/staples/rubber bands/tape/paper clips/brads) and the other one holds beads, beads, and more beads. 

The baby's side took a major gutting too... Why in the world did I have like 20 blankets in her closet?  When we only use one in her carseat?  And she sleeps in a swaddle blanket?  Well, they're either stored or donated now. 

Gavin was so excited to help Jeremy put together the shelving... cute guy. 

Okay, so here's the dirt.  Some of the stuff that was filling the closet to the brink!  I thought I was so organized having it all in labeled drawers...  they should have been labeled:

just junk

stuff I'll never use, but saved anyways

toilet paper rolls that have been here 3 years

paper towel rolls that will be here 3 years

those tiny beads that get spilled all over the floor

dried out markers

dried out pens from 1996

Seriously, why didn't I trash that stuff when I "cleaned" it all out last fall? 

Well, I view stuff much differently now.  "Things" in our house have been drowning us for too long.  We have been slaves to it!  Picking it up, dusting it, yada yada.. Enough.  This was the first stop of a major overhaul we've done on the house these past two weeks, and I wanted to share our first project. 

It's more of a spiritual thing than anything.  Stuff was getting in the way of our relationship with God. 

We just don't want that.  We don't want to be selfish hoarders, we want to be free to give our things and not be attached to our things. 

Wow, I got on a bandwagon... back to the junk that was in the closet!

More...

and more...

and more...

There was one more huge plastic 3-drawer dresser that was in there too... I had already moved it out to the hall and forgot to snap a picture.  Craziness I tell ya. 

It's been about 3 weeks since the closet was finished and it hasn't gotten messy yet.  It's so easy and simple now to put things back in their places.  Ahhhhhhh. 

More on other house projects later ~ night!