"Master" Bedroom

When we moved in, the first room I unpacked was our bedroom. It quickly became one of the messiest rooms in the house, though. It also went through a couple rearrangements, which made even more of a mess. I got sick of the mess, and finally went to work. It's taken me several days because I've been pretty sick for nearly two weeks. I like how nice it is, and it seems like everyone else does, too, because the kids are always finding excuses to be in there.

It would really feel like a college bachelor's bedroom if it weren't for the girly touches of color and pattern throughout. Oh, and the kids... We just have a serious lack of furniture right now, and an even more serious lack of money, so it's going to look pretty humble for awhile.

The sleeping area. We got rid of our beautiful, storage-friendly bed frame back in September because it was falling apart from the moves it's been through. IKEA furniture really isn't meant to be taken apart... 

What used to be the kids' toy storage has become Mitchell's dresser. And we also use it as our entertainment center.

This door leads to the driveway and our car, so we use it frequently. That makes our bedroom a landing space for everything we bring in the house, which can lead to a lot of clutter. I'm trying to keep my purse orderly, and not allow stuff to be stacked on my dresser, except, of corse, the toiletries and jewelry that are supposed to be there.

I also organized our closet, but it's really mostly mine...

And this this the completion of the circle around my room. The door to the hallway, and Mitchell's work uniform.

This isn't the most exciting post, but I'm excited to have a clean and orderly room to spend my time in.

 

Charlie's Invitations

Charlie's 2nd birthday is in one month!! It's going to be quite simple compared to Annabelle's last 3 parties. I still decided to have a theme, Curious George, which is his favorite show to watch. I couldn't resist making these adorable invitations because I already had the stuff.

The Inspiration

The Result

Party Invitations

Annabelle asked for a Snow White party this year. I browsed on Pinterest for invitation ideas until I found something I could do with limited help and no cost. I ended up picking these simple apple invitations.

Mitchell drew the apple template for me and I scanned it in to Photoshop. I figured out how to duplicate it and put all the text in. I had 2 sheets of red paper left, and I was just able to get all the apples cut from Mitchell's template. And I had some green and brown scrapbook paper hanging around that I used for the stems and leaves. 

I think they turned out pretty cute!

House and Holiday Plan

Last year, I tried following along with the Christmas Countdown at Christmas.organizedhome.com. I really enjoyed doing what I could, even though I started late, had my appendix out, then had family in town for Mitchell's BFA show. This year, I'm still late staring, but that's because I'm going to try the House and Holidays Plan. I'm 3 weeks behind, and moving very slowly, but I am just excited to use it as a guide to get my home in order and prepare myself for a fun Christmas-time. 

Week 1 is all about organizing and planning. The first step is de-cluttering and organizing your home office/personal work space. I've been working on mine like crazy for almost a week now. So far, we've started rearranging the rooms so that my stuff and the dining room are all in the large area that we were using for our living room, I've sorted through my file boxes and thrown away over a foot of papers, and I started reorganizing my "craft closet."

This is a picture of the current state of my area:

I'm working in the open closet to the left. Once it's organized, most of the stuff on the floor will be inside it. I'm hoping I can make quick progress on it, even if I only work 15 minutes a day.

Chore Charts

I've finally gotten around to making chore charts for the kids. This is part one.

Some Progress

I'm mostly blogging because I made a goal to blog everyday, and I'm trying really hard to keep it.

I got a bunch of Ensigns, so hopefully things can move forward with that part of my scripture journal. I have been studying and learning a lot, though. I came up with a really cute idea today for one of the pages, but I don't have the right supplies. Maybe I can figure out how to get them.

My house is also getting cleaner and more organized. I did crazy amounts of laundry yesterday.

And I might be getting a job tomorrow.

Prehistoric Art

Sometime last week, I decided to start studying Art History on my own. I wanted to see if it was something I really enjoyed. I haven't been able to study every day, but I find a way to fit it in most days. I started with Prehistoric Art, since that's the beginning. In addition to studying art, I'm also including some others things. While cooking dinner and doing dishes, I've been watching documentaries on Netflix. I found three that cover the period I'm studying, so I've been cycling through them to retain as much information as possible. The three documentaries are "Caveman Coldcase," "Decoding Neanderthals," and "Cave of Forgotten Dreams." I figured that I rush through this period because it would be boring, but I've been fascinated by everything I've been learning. I'll try to go into more detail in further posts.