Editing

 Have you watched "The Home Edit" on Netflix? In case you missed it, it is a show about professional organizers who own the company "The Home Edit" where they will come in and help you edit and organize different spaces in your home. They also have books to help you do this on your own but the real treat is watching them do it for other people. I'm convinced the show would make even the least organized person want to tackle their closet or pantry. I wanted to give it a go, but wasn't quite prepared to get all the various bins and organizational tools recommended so I decided to start small. 

My junk drawer. 

We all have one, and actually we probably have like 3 but this is our main junk drawer that sits at the edge of our kitchen counter. The home edit process is as follows: 

1. Take everything out of the space.

2. Edit- purge what you don't need, use, want, is out of date etc.

3. Sort/categorize items remaining.

4. Contain- put the categories into containers to help set up a lasting system.

So I took everything out...

Yikes...this picture literally hurts my eyes to look at.

Edited and categorized it...I don't have a picture of this part but I did cull several unwanted/unneeded items.

Put it into these handy containers from Target...

and Voila! 

My categories from front to back ended up being...notepads/stickies, writing utensils, health products (hand sanitizer, lotion, chapstick), tools (hubby keeps several small tools in this drawer for little things that pop up).  And if I'm being totally honest, I did have to extend to the drawer next door to make my categories fit- so next door has a mailing category and an electronics category. 

I'm really pleased with the result and so is hubby! We've kept it looking like this for about 2 weeks so now I just need to venture on to something bigger. The nursery dresser or my pantry perhaps? 

Back in the Groove

Things have been a bit chaotic around here so blogging just didn't feel like it was in my realm of possibility. But the weekend gave us some time to regroup and get settled and I'm feeling good on this Monday morning! 

Thursday, two of my aunts and my grandma drove over from Knoxville to take me to lunch! What a fun part of living close to family! One of those aunts lives pretty far and was down visiting grandma. Since I don't get a lot of opportunity to see her, she decided a lunch date was in order. It was a lovely start to the weekend!

A few posts back I shared that we had a plumbing situation in our kitchen that we were having repaired. The repair went well but then began the much too long process of dealing with the leftover water damage.  We are so grateful we were able to have it fixed and it wasn't more expansive but nevertheless, we spent a full 7 days with fans and dehumidifiers running in the kitchen and plastic sheets blocking it off. This meant a few things. One- the kitchen wasn't really usable- let's be real, if I can't get to the sink I'm not going to be cooking/using dishes. Two- the noise of those fans was so much louder than I anticipated when they said they'd be placing them in there. But after a week of eating out and spending as much time outside as possible, they were able to take the fans away on Friday.

Here is where I am extra thankful for having a super handy husband that knows how to do all the things. He was able to get started right away putting up new drywall on the area we'd cut, getting it sanded down, repainted and then rehanging the kitchen cabinet. Now that did not all happen Friday, but I'm just so glad we didn't have to wait around till Monday for someone to come in and do it for us, since he's so capable himself. Saturday, while the drywall was busy drying we ventured out on a double date which was so fun! We got to try somewhere new and my friend and I introduced the hubby's and we all had a blast. 

Sunday morning, hubby finished sanding and painting the drywall and while the paint dried we went out for a delicious lunch that was capped off with this ginormous milkshake. This cute little restaurant by our house has the most impressive milkshake menu. While they do have some straightforward milkshakes- just a milkshake with whipped cream on top- they are known for their more impressive creations that have basically a full sugary meal on top. So we shared the chocolate cheesecake and were not disappointed at all. 

Afterwards we headed home with very full bellies and got the cabinet rehung which meant I could finally clean up the kitchen! Everything that had been in that cabinet and under the sink etc had been spread out over the other counters for the last week and it was making me crazy. Plus with all of the work being done, everything was covered with a layer of drywall dust. It felt so good to clean and put away after a week of mess. 

We also did some baby things over the weekend too! And by we I mostly mean hubby. We installed the carseat bases in both cars. While its still several weeks until we'll be needing them, we both agreed having them in was better than scrambling if baby boy surprises us early. He finished sanding down an old dresser we're repurposing for the nursery and got the first coat of paint on it as well. He also set up the pack n' play which is going to be a sort of downstairs baby hub so we're not trekking up and down to the nursery all the time. 

It's so fun to start to see things settle into place and imagine the baby being here in those spaces in what I'm sure will be no time at all. I'm 30 weeks so we're really on the homestretch to meeting baby boy! I've got a running 3rd trimester to-do list that I made this weekend and I'm ready to start getting things marked off the list!

Am I the only one who puts things on a to-do list that I've already done just so I can give myself a head start with checking things off? I hope your weekend was filled with things that make you happy like a clean kitchen and yummy milkshakes. Happy Monday everyone!

The Darker Side of Hardwoods

This past November we moved into a new house with some beautiful hardwood floors. They are the exact color I would have picked if I had been designing the house myself. They're a darker wood with some lighter patches mixed in- some coffee colors combined with cocoa if you will. Those are probably not terms professionals use to describe floors but hopefully you get the gist. 

In our previous home, I always felt like the color of our floors, combined with a few other factors, made it feel very dated and while they were great floors in terms of their condition they weren't my favorite. But fast forward to me seeing the new floors in the house hubby found once we knew we were moving and I was thrilled. 

I love watching design and renovation shows on HGTV. I don't consider design to be a skill of my own but I sure do love to watch other people do it. So as we moved into our new home, I found that the aesthetics reminded me so much of many of the homes I'd fallen in love with on HGTV and thought "Perfect! It's just what I wanted!"

But do you know what they don't mention on those shows when they show the clients their new beautiful dark hardwoods? That every single crumb, piece of dry grass, hair, dust particle etc is visible against that dark background. I mean seriously, I have never swept floors so often in my life and I am positive we are not making any more mess than we were at our old house. It's just now my eyes are forced to look at the mess until I can get a broom across the floor. 

I hadn't paid much attention to this fact upon our initial move in. Sure there was dust and debris but I thought surely that's just from moving and boxes and unpacking and so on. And then we had family in town the week after we moved in..because we're crazy like that. And my mom being the kind, thoughtful person she is was sweeping my floors for me. She commented how awesome it felt to sweep my floors because it was so satisfying to see all the things you were actually sweeping up. This peaked my attention and she continued on..."You'll want to sweep these pretty regularly because everything is going to show, but just look how satisfying it is to sweep up!".

She was very right and very wrong at the same time. Yes, you can see everything and yes I do need to sweep often but the satisfaction of how obvious the cleaning is as you go? That part fades when you're sweeping for the 3rd time in one day...

I still love my hardwoods, they are still exactly what I would have picked. They've just made me much more thankful that I registered for such a nice broom for our wedding! 

This month I am linking up every day with "Two Writing Teachers" as part of their Slice of Life Writing Challenge. Thanks for stopping by!

Normal Routine? Is That You?

 Nope, not yet. But we're trying! I had anticipated that since the move south meant I wouldn't be working right away I would have so much more time to blog. Hah! As it turns out, there is so much to do when you're moving that any extra time you do have, you are too exhausted to do anything else. But I do finally feel like this week, we're moving towards a semblance of normal over here. We officially moved into our home on the 17th- woohoo!! But let me back up just a couple of days. And yes, I know it's December 1st and I'm talking to you about mid November but that's where we are. 

In the few days before we closed on our home, I headed to my sister's home to visit with her family to give myself a break from hotel living and have something to do while hubby was traveling for work. It was so wonderful to eat some home cooked food after a week of nothing but restaurants and sister and I had some much overdue sister time. It's so exciting to only be a short drive away from her now. Now short is a relative term in my book because she was living on the other side of the world and then upon their return  I was still 11 hours of driving north of her. So it's not like they live down the street, but a quick 3 hours seems like a breeze! 

We talked and shopped and got lunch at the cutest cafe with an attached warehouse style store full of different booths of items to peruse. And I can't forget that sister time also equals nephew time! We snuggled and read 1,000 books and built towers so that we could knock them down and I soaked up every minute. 

It was a quick trip but just the refresh I needed to push me into the rest of my busy week. I left her house and headed straight to our house closing. After all the million papers were signed (seriously, why is it so many?) we started trekking around to get all of the utilities set up. I do not understand why things like the water and electric company are not smack dab in a central location. In theory, everyone needs to go there at some point, so why are they out in the boondocks? And not near one another? Electricity and water secured, we ran a bunch more errands to be ready for move in before grabbing dinner to celebrate our new home and prepare for one last night of hotel living before finally getting to move in.

The movers came the next day, oh and the internet company, and we had a bed delivered. So it was basically chaos but those movers really moved! Things were unloaded and out of boxes in about 6 hours. But let me not mislead you, when I say they were out of boxes, I did not say they were neatly put away. Merely out of a box and on a flat surface. Or in a big pile... 

So Thursday night was spent getting the kitchen counters cleared before ordering takeout pizza. You don't realize how much stuff you actually own until is all sitting on every surface in your home. Hubby and I both determined after this, we may need to pare down a bit. But while we are wanting to pare down, we also bought some new things - whoops! But we needed a new rug for our living room and found this beauty that I just love! 

We have since rearranged some of the furniture here, but the rug is still my favorite :) 

We spent the weekend putting things away, getting a few more things delivered, and trying to make our house look more like home. We had to be prepared for turkey day obviously! Wait, you didn't think that because we moved in the week before Thanksgiving that meant we wouldn't be hosting people at our house all the following week did you? On Tuesday my aunt and uncle brought my grandmother over to spend the week with us and Wednesday brought my in-laws for a few days, followed by my own parents arrival on Friday. Why have a new home if you can't fill it with people? 

It sounds like a lot and well it also kind of felt like a lot but mostly it felt joyful and warm and made me extra thankful we have so many people who love us. There was some seriously puzzling being done, games played, and of course too much food consumed! Hubby smoked two turkey breasts... one of which was wrapped in bacon! Plus we had all the fixings, my favorite is always the stuffing. It's really dressing I guess because I don't stuff it in the turkey but I always call it stuffing anyways. 

The last of our company pulled away on Sunday morning. And as one holiday ends, a new one gets going. We got a tree on Monday and I sure do love a lit tree in the evenings. I don't have a picture of it with ornaments on it but you get the idea. We had to get on top of things and at least get the tree up because boy our new neighborhood is full of Christmas spirit. They're going to think we're scrooges if I don't get my wreath on the door or some lights on the porch. Two weeks of my life, wrapped up in one post. But now that things are finally settling down...she says hopefully...I fully intend to be keeping you in the loop on a much more regular basis. 

And for those of you that weighed in on our zoo/aquarium decision...we went zoo! I took no pictures as proof but we made a good choice. The aquarium and about 100 other things are still on our list though! 

Moving South

Well we have moved! Or should I say we are on the move? While we have officially vacated our old home, we can't quite get into the new one yet. So it's been a lot of driving, bopping around to both sides of the family while we made our way south. Which meant we stayed in 5 different spots in 5 different days. It was so wonderful to see family and people we love but it is so nice to know that for the next 6 nights I don't have to load and unload a suitcase from the car. 

We said goodbye to our first home together and while I thought I would feel pretty sad leaving, the bitter cold temperatures we were driving away from made it a little easier. I do feel a sense of sadness that we've closed this chapter since it was our first one together. But the excitement of what's ahead and the whirlwind pace at which we spent the last few days in our house getting things ready meant that by the time we were preparing to get in the car and drive off, we felt ready. 

We're now temporary residents of a hotel near our new house and there are definitely some things about hotel living that I could get used to. For example, no laundry, no dishes, no house chores. However, the other side of that coin is...living out of a suitcase, a lot of eating out, feeling a little stir crazy while my husband is at work and everything else that needs to be done is sort of at a standstill until we're official residents. So what is the first stop to make in a new town? Barnes and Noble of course! 

I found myself accidentally at the mall while on my quest for the nearest Barnes and Noble. An excellent place to kill time, while also finding some new reads to keep me occupied when I eventually make my way back to the hotel. The town we're in has pretty much everything but I am definitely still in the phase of feeling lost every time I get in the car. I wasn't able to come down when my husband went house hunting so yesterday was my first time seeing the new streets, highways, shopping centers etc. And while I  do not consider myself directionally challenged, I am very ready to feel more confident in knowing where I am and where everything else around me is also. 

One thing you will not catch me complaining about here is the weather though...high of 70 today! As I mentioned above it was freezing when we left our PA home. And I don't say freezing in an exaggerating sort of way. It was literally below 32 degrees. Our neighbor let us know there were snow flurries shortly after we left. SNOW! So the sunshine and warm temps were a lovely welcome to our new state. 

Now to decide which book I should start first...

Quilon

Continuing along today with the April A-Z Blog Challenge. Our family moved to England when I was just shy of 13 and spent the next 6 years across the pond. This month, I am reflecting on the time I spent overseas during my teens.

 Q is for Quilon    

I'm not sure I'll really be able to put all the words I want in this post but I'll try.

Our home.

Quilon. 

I love that homes have names in England. When our family moved overseas it was a very quick timeline. I believe from the time we listed our house in the U.S. to us being wheels up on an airplane across the pond was 29 days. So when our parents went over to look for homes sister and I didn't accompany them. We saw pictures but the first time we stepped foot in that space was the day we moved. 

A car had picked us up from the airport and driven us to this new home, where we groggily got out of the car, looked at our new home and promptly realized we didn't have keys and the realtor was nowhere in sight. So back into the car we went to a local hotel while we waited for the realtor, who was quite a ways away. We napped, sister and I both thoroughly unaccustomed to jet lag and the emotional turmoil that comes from being young teens moving across an ocean. And then a little while later finally got to see what would become by favorite home I've ever lived in. 

I loved my room. My cozy little room, with a twin sized bed and a tiny little window nook. A nook where I'd sit and read or write in my journal over the years. A room that had 2 major slants in the ceiling that I hit my head on pretty regularly despite knowing exactly where they were and how much I would need to duck. Everything in the home felt "old" in the most charming way. It had radiators that I would put my coat on before heading out the door so they'd be nice and toasty. There was a "secret" door from our front room the hall that blended into the wood paneled walls. It had the tiniest bathrooms with pedestal sinks. And the world's most spectacular backyard, complete with small pond, greenhouse and "tea house". 

We once had a dead hedgehog end up in that pond and that story has woven itself so deeply into our family that my mom, sister and I all have a collection of hedgehog related knick knacks that we keep buying one another. A friend of mine also fell in that pond. And a tiny cousin. So maybe not the safest of ponds? But it was also for catching tadpoles and frogs with my friend. And for relaxing out back listening to the bubbling water. 

So much life was lived in this house. Homework done at the kitchen table. Birthday sleepovers in the living room. Waiting in the front room for the bus to stop out front. Croquet in the yard...because that's what you do with that kind of yard right? Young Life bible study every Thursday for years, piano practice in the dining room, picnics in the backyard. A thousand visitors from our old home to our new home to take around and explore. 

Well my initial thoughts were right. It just can't all go in this post. I wanted this to be all things London. But there is so much, just in this house that my brain can't wrap it all up with the other London things. So that will have to be saved for another day. I'll leave it with this picture. 

This is the last time I was at this house. Taken the morning we headed for the airport to fly back to university after spending my freshman spring break at home. My last time at home. This picture tugs at my heart for a time that has now LONG passed (this picture is 12 years old). But the picture also makes me smile. The 4 of us together in our favorite place.

Quilon.