Blitz-It Friday

I did one of my typical housework blitzes today. In 20 minutes, I:

-started the laundry
-emptied the dishwasher and put away clean pots/pans
-loaded the dishwasher
-washed pots and pans
-409'd the kitchen counter

Now to blitz this 3-day (woohoo!) weekend:

-The theme is family time and relaxation. But...
-I am inspired by upcoming houseguests (my parents coming on the 12th), to try to get some things done.
-Tasks: my hubby wants to buy and hang curtains in the kids' rooms; I want to hang photos and art in various places; and hang the "Cars" shelves in the living room. Any progress on these projects would be awesome.
-Food: honestly I've drawn a blank, we're in such a rut. Tonight (Friday) was teriyaki chicken on the grill. Tomorrow will probably be fish/pizza night (hubby makes himself some fish, I make a frozen pizza for myself). Sunday and Labor Day remain a mystery. How does one celebrate Labor Day?!
-Treats: another mystery. Maybe the library, I need something new to read. Maybe rent a movie.

For more blitzes, head to Organized Everyday. This weekend she's having a giveaway, so don't miss out! Thanks for stopping by!

Command Central

Today I am joining Organizing Junkie's Monthly Round-Up--this month's challenge is the command central area. I love orgjunkie.com, but this is my first time participating in a Round-Up. Yes, my command center needed a cleanup, but mostly I just wanna win the goodies. This is, after all, my "year to get organized" (though, at the rate I'm going, it's more likely to take a decade), so I need all the tools I can get. ;-) So here goes....

I set up this area a couple of years ago and it still works very nicely, but as you can see, it got a bit overgrown and needed a good de-cluttering. BEFORE:
AFTER:

Ah, that's better! I sorted through everything and purged a ton, I even ended up with an empty slot. So here's more about how my command center works....

First, the two organizers are from Pottery Barn. I never buy from PB because it's so expensive (instead I just drool over the catalogs), but when my generous sister gave us a gift card a few years ago, these are what we chose. Organizer on the left: top drawer has stamps and a variety of note cards, bottom drawer has several lists, addresses, computer passwords. On top are my envelopes and that box is full of broken Christmas ornaments, not really a part of my command center, but whatever.

Organizer on the right: the three front cubbies hold (1) notepads and checkbook, (2) pens, pencils, highlighter, sharpie, and (3) return address labels and church tithing envelopes. Behind that, the middle slot holds coupons on the left and bills-to-be-paid on the right. The back slot ended up empty(!), so I'll leave it for papers from preschool that need action.

The stuff that had been piled by the phone included things I didn't want to lose track of, but I didn't like having a pile there--it was ugly and also made it difficult to open the bottom drawer of the organizer. So I threw the stuff I was keeping into a picnic silverware sorter behind the pretty organizer--the stuff is easy to find, but hard to see.

Also, you may notice in the before picture that there were folders along the left side of this area. I have folders for bills/budget/tax docs, moms club, "refrigerator stuff" (these are notes, recipes etc, that I would've posted on my fridge, but it's stainless steel so not magnetic) and extra return address labels. I moved those into a magazine file, further reducing my command center clutter.

To see more of the command central Round-Up, go here. Or you can stay here and click around, I have an "organizing" tab on the sidebar, or you can learn more about me and my kids with the "about" label. Thanks for stopping by!

Blitz It Friday

I had a really great blitz today I feel like sharing. It has been a super-busy week of running around, so it was nice to just be domestic today and get stuff done. I initially set my timer for 30 minutes, but in the end I worked an hour. Yea! Here's what I did:

-started laundry
-changed into comfy clothes
-prayer time (I know it's pathetic that I have to put this on my chore list, otherwise I don't do it)
-put clean dishes away
-changed a poopy diaper
-loaded dishwasher
-scrubbed pots and pans
-browned ground beef
-folded towels out of the dryer and put them away
-moved laundry from washer to dryer

As long as I'm here, I'll do a quick rundown on our weekend plans. The theme, as always, is family time and relaxation. I scheduled L a haircut for Sunday morning. We might go to Chuck E. Cheese tomorrow (we're in Phoenix so it's too hot for the park; the mouse house is an inexpensive indoor stand-in). I really need to clean the upstairs bathroom and I'd love to inventory L's clothes. For my "me" time, I'll probably hit Walmart on Sunday for 15-cent notebooks (one can never have too many notebooks!). And we rented a movie. For food: enchiladas friday night, leftovers Saturday, and either pork tenderloin or steak on Sunday (I better get something defrosting).

For more blitzing, go to Organized Everyday.

Blitz It Friday

I have two housework blitzes to report this week. First, on Friday (7/10), I did a 30 minute blitz. I set the timer for 25 minutes and accomplished the following:
-load and start the dishwasher
-409 the countertop
-scrub pots and pans
-fold and put away towels (the timer rang during the folding, I continued 5 more minutes till done)

On Monday, I set the timer for 30 minutes: started dinner (put chicken on to boil), loaded the dishwasher, and started organizing a dumping-ground area of my kitchen counter. I wasn't able to complete that project during this blitz, but I came back to it later and finished. To see more on that "tackle," see this post.

Sadly, I didn't work on my official project this week. However, that was because I've been working on a different task this week: packing up three boxes of hand-me-downs to send to friends/family. That too remains a work-in-progress, but the girl box is nearly ready to ship!

As of this writing, I can't see a Linky thing on Organized Everyday. I don't know if it's my technical difficulty or hers. Anyway, I wanted to report my progress. I'll keep checking and hopefully link up soon. Thanks!

Tackle It Tuesday--messy counter

I'm really excited about what I tackled yesterday. It's this area of my kitchen counter that has been a messy dumping ground for as long as I can remember. I was inspired by a 3-drawer organizer I saw in a Walmart mailer (I actually didn't buy the one in the ad but found another one that's a bigger size at an even better price) and got to work. Here's the area before:



A lot of the stuff was just trash! We had several bottles of expired prescription medicines that I tossed. I moved the silver bar set into the Cupboard of Randomness, it was just gathering dust. A few other things were relocated. Then, once I was down to what I was keeping, I cleared the area, 409'd the counter, and filled my containers. Here's the after:

Inside the 3-drawer organizer: top drawer is a package of straws, middle drawer is adult meds (cough drops, Airborne), bottom drawer is kid stuff (yeast cream, saline nose drops, thermometer, nail clipper). In the purple container: tall meds like Tylenol and Chloroseptic. I kept the bubble machine there for lack of a better place to put it--maybe when the rest of my house is organized it will find a new home. (The lap pad and A&D ointment remain in their old home in the front corner of the counter because they are used at every diaper change.)


In case you're wondering, the 3-drawer organizer was $6.50 at Walmart and the purple container was $1 at Dollar Tree. Gotta love cheap organizing! For more tackles, go to 5 Minutes For Mom. Thanks!

Blitz It Friday--Big Project cont...

Okay, after three weeks of not accomplishing my project goals, I realized the problem: I was putting it off till later in the week and then life happens and nothing gets done. So this week, I aimed to work on the project early in the week, to make sure it got done. I put it on the to-do-list for Monday, it didn't get done. I put it on the to-do-list for Tuesday, there wasn't an opportunity. I put it on the to-do-list for Wednesday and I succeeded! I set the timer for 30 minutes, dragged all my stuff to the living room, and filed. Here's a DURING photo (notice T's legs in the exersaucer, she was my "companion" during the blitz):
I was worried about starting up where I left off, but it was satisfying to come across things and think, I have a file for that! Here are my AFTER photos. See how little is left in the basket?! (Keep in mind though, I have another basket to sort, plus another box and basket to file.)

And here's what the box of files looks like now:

Once again, this coming week's goal is 30 more minutes of filing and sorting.

I had an unconventional blitz yesterday that I also wanted to share. It wasn't officially a blitz because I didn't set a timer, I briefly checked email, and I was constantly checking on T, but in 45 minutes I made brownies (from a mix), browned ground beef, and assembled enchiladas for dinner. By my standards, that was a lot of cooking time in a row. Of course the payoff was a delicious dinner and dessert. :-)

For more blitzing, check out Organized Everyday. Thanks!

Blitz It Friday

Well, I thought I wouldn't be posting this week (again) because I didn't manage to work on my project this week (again). In my defense, I got everything assembled in the living room on Wednesday around 5pm, but then T woke up and hubby came home. So no "big project edition" today.

I did however do an awesome (by my standards) blitz this morning. One hour and I cleared a cluttered corner in my master bedroom. Yea! First, I put things that had a place back where they belonged, like games into the closet. Then the piles of CDs went into the rack (tedious). That cleared space for me to move the plastic storage drawer thing against the wall to multitask as a nightstand. Moved books, clothes, trash, recycling etc. till I found a path to the bed and a place to sleep. Woohoo! In the final minutes, I folded the towels from the dryer and moved clothes from washer to dryer.

For more blitzing, head to Organized Everyday. Thanks!