The Mini House Makeover

I can't tell you how in love I am with the new minor changes I made last week around the house. Ever since putting away the Christmas decorations, I have been looking around the house and pondering how I can make things more functional. I did not know I was going to end up blogging about this, so I have no before pictures, but I can explain a little of the former clutter :) You excited?!?! haha

This corner was awful before. The tray was laying down, and had all of Owen's vitamins on it along with a ton of other junk. Like a thing of bug spray and tube of sunscreen, random ingredients for my homemade basic moisturizer cream, two spray bottles, a flask, the sugar bowl and creamer pitcher...I'll stop there. Needless to say, it's 1000 times better.

My new work space!! I LOVE it! It's not weird that it's by the laundry room door. I live in my kitchen, truly, I do. I never leave it. And it makes the most sense for my little command center to be here. My calendar is on the side of the fridge, this is where I make appointments, look up recipes, do emails, read blogs, meal plan, shop Amazon....all of it. This corner space used to house the butcher block which held the Kitchenaid mixer, boxed wine and other junk. The vacuum stood here too before, and the little children's coat rack had a mountain of zip up hoodies and coats. The whole thing was an eye sore.

This is on the other side of the fridge and I cleaned this shelving area up too and just moved things around. Put away all the extra cookbooks I don't use anymore because....allergy free diets and all. New home to the boxed wine. I think they like it better here :)

What a novel idea, the butcher block in the middle of the kitchen!! Shocker!! And somehow it makes the kitchen seem bigger, even smack dab in the middle of it. It's fascinating. And we love actually using it! It's the only thing we own from Ikea. We should change that.

This little table had been here before and the kids were having fun moving it all over the house so I put it away. But it's handy when we have dinner company so I put it back.

Welcome to our "playroom". My desk had been where the play kitchen is. I hated it because it was a total catch all zone. It always looked terrible and was covered with books, papers, mail, dvds, scissors, etc, etc. I never wanted to sit there, and if I did, felt like I was just surrounded by chaos. I wanted to kids to have a more designated place, toys mainly in ONE area of the house. Mission accomplished. (The play kitchen had been on the wall where all the toys are now)

Ahh, the living room. Ignore the funny white chord. Luke is trying to do something with a printer connected to the internet and isn't done yet.....anyway, the kids black wire shelving thing that all their toys are on in the picture above, used to be set up under the tv. It was awkward. They were playing too close to the stone fireplace ledge....it didn't feel like the most inviting space. The table under the tv is a temporary solution, I don't love it, but it works. It is just an end table that used to be in the corner by the couch. I put a tiny tv table there instead and put a box in that corner with all the newspaper for the fireplace. (When the kids get bunkbeds this spring/summer, Luke is going to put legs on the train table and it's going in their room.)

Luke is going to move the book shelf on the wall for me that my desk used to be under, over to the wall above my desk in the kitchen now. He is so good to put up with my rearranging :)

He likes the new butcher block placement too :)

And that's that! I get a lot of enjoyment out of decorating and organizing. A lot. I love organizing things. I just hate filing. Hate it. I think because somehow it stills feels sloppy to me. Putting papers in hanging folders in a drawer, that still end up being hard to find.....I sometimes don't know where to put things, even though I'm the one to label all the files!!!! So I have to wait and ask Luke...I don't know what's ok to throw away sometimes.....it's the chore I might dislike the most. But it is the next big thing on my to do list. Maybe if I can come up with a cleaner system I'd love it. Hmmm, time for more brainstorming!