Updates

More of the "60 days."

Made some serious headway in my kitchen yesterday. Purged and organized:

junk drawer

bread/water bottle cabinet

coffee/bottles/travel coffee mug cabinet

utensil drawer

big utensil drawer

cup/dish cabinet

2 pots and pans drawers

I had one smaller bag of trash and one very large box of stuff to donate.

I am finding that the key to organizing and then staying that way is to truly have a place for everything and put everything back in it's place. Now, I think I'll be able to handle this given how much time I've taken to organize it, but the hubs is going to need some serious training! (especially when he empties the dishwasher)

I also tackled another rather large project yesterday that's carried over to today...MY BAGS!

I pulled all of them out of the closet and put laid them out on the bed and floor. I will never tell how many I pulled out! NEVER! If I did, I'm afraid I'd come home one day with my family and a therapist in the room ready to stage an intervention.

So far, I've purged 20% of them, either for the sale or donation. I plan to go through them again once before they go back into the closet.

I found I need to organize them better so I can get to them easier in hopes of using them...and so I don't forget what I have. And, now I'll shop at home first...AND I'm going to stick to the "one in, one out" rule.

I have all the my totes in one large clear bin like files. I have backpacks grouped together and easily seen as well as diaper bags gathered in one designated spot. I need to go to Walmart later and find just the right size clear bin for my purses.

Once I get them back in the closet I'll snap a pic of it :)

*I have discovered that I do layers of purging. I go through something once and get rid of things I don't have to think about, then I can start going to the stuff that's a little harder to part with. Another thing I found I need to do is gather it all together in one spot for me to see it. I'm a very visual person. This is how I find duplicates to thin out.

"Thankfuls" from yesteday:

Mommy-that Daddy will be home for good from Chicago soon

Emma-clocks...(?!)

Soph-ice cream

Things we were thankful for Sunday:

Mommy-that the basement wasn't ruined

Daddy-that he was home for the weekend

Emma-the whole world

Soph-for the sky

Nana-her church, St. Lukes UMC

Uncle Adam-that it's been a little warmer outside

The basement

Lily and I went down to the basement Wednesday to get something out of the freezer and I thought, "man that carpet looks dark." And then "squish" as I stepped on it. AHHHH! 3 inches of water on the sump pump side and had backed up through 3/4 of the basement.

Thankfully, Mom came over to watch the girls and Dad came up that evening to help me. We moved things around, steam cleaned the carpet to pull the water out and got fans and the furnace going to move air around. I've had the fans going non stop since then and I think the carpet may get dry enough to be ok. One part of the carpet never got soaked so everything is piled up there until the rest dries enough to move it back.

Our friend Chad was nice enough to come over and replace our sump pump for us. (Something had caused the float or the switch to stick and not kick on) All in all, it could have been SO much worse! I'm thankful I had most of the stuff on the wetter side in plastic totes and neither of the couches down there got wet except for the legs. Plus, I was home. It would have been awful for this to have happened while we were out of town! A huge thanks to mom, dad & Chad for helping me out!

This was Soph singing at Grandparents Day.
Lily helping me organize the straws...again.

Sunday

What a week! It was a pretty busy one. Tim was in Chicago, our basement flooded (only a few inches). I was glad to get to the weekend.

Here is what the girls have been up to today. I think the movie, Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2 spurred their creativity to do this:
I can't believe I got them to hold still for me to get this one! I was holding treats in my other hand.
Emma with her show dog, Princess Tiana.
Tank was Princess Giselle from Enchanted. He kept the crown on pretty well, too.
Tank could care less what he is dressed up as long as the treats keep coming.
He's such a good boy.

(very) Belated Birthday Thanks!

Blah...Well, I'm not going to get thank you notes out for the girls birthdays. They have been sitting here on my "desk" (aka the kitchen bar) for a while now. I figure that by the time I would get them written, addressed and sent, it would be time to send Christmas cards. I figure most of you who were gift givers are the same folks who check the blog so I'm sending you a big thank you blog post! I apologize for the informality of it as well as the HUGE delay on it. Emily Post would not be happy with me.

Plus, I figured if I posted the gifts in the blog, it will be fun to look at way down the road when I have it printed in the blog book. :)

A big thank you to...

• Cindy and Mark et al for the Lalaloopsy Land and the tshirt and shorts for Emma & Soph and the IU dress and baby for Lily.
• Auntie Brandi et al for the didj game for Emma and the Pet Shop stuff for Soph
• Gabe & Shantel for the boat from Tangled and the princess Dress Shop
• Nana for the Rapunzel tower (to share) and "Mouse" books for Lily.
• Uncle Gary for the Melissa and Doug birthday cake set for the girls.
• Uncle Adam and Renee for the Princess game for Emma and the princess Walkie Talkies for Soph and the gift money for Lily (Mommy bought her some new shoes and some snuggly bird pjs and a boho carters outfit with it)
• Grandma and Papa for the pearl necklaces with each year of age for the girls as well as the Lalaloopsy dolls and ballet outfits for Em & Soph's American Girl dolls. And the fun dinosaur ball popper and leopard jacket and pants for Lily. She plays with that ball popper everyday!
• Grandma Lois for the gift cards to the Disney Store for Emma & Soph. Those were spent at lightning speed! Soph bought a bedazzled princess outfit with all the princesses on it, which became her one of her favorite outfits. Emma bought a Marie cat and Perry the Platypus (and something else I can't remember). And thank you for Lily's sugar plum outfit. It's adorable. (Thanks for my Olive Garden gift card, too for my birthday. I'm still trying to get a date with this cute guy that I keep running in to. He's tall, dark and handsome. I hear he's an attorney!)
• Uncle Andrew and Auntie Kate for the mermaid Dora for Soph, the barbie for Emma and the Violet pal for Lily. She loves that pal, especially because it says her name. Thanks for setting it up beforehand for her!
• Luke and Kristin for the gift cards for Target. They got...something princess I know, but the specific items escape me at the moment. Those two LOVE gift cards.
• The Bennetts for the color wonder sets. We are getting close to burning all of the metallic paper up creating masterpieces. Those are pretty cool. And thank you for the fleece dress and button bracelet for Lily. Adorable!
• Souk for the wall decals. They were immediately all placed on their walls either the night of the party or the day after and they look fabulous. Princesses everywhere!...and the puzzle, too.
• Aunt Jan and Uncle Dan for Lily's dress. She wore it on her party day. Emma & Soph picked it out for her. She did look pretty darn cute in it!
• Poppy for gift money. Emma & Soph took an hour at Toys R Us deciding on something. Emma bought her big Ariel doll and Soph bought a Belle doll. I'm still thinking about something Lily might use her gift on. I'm sure something will come up later.
• Joni et al for the dresses and bunny from England. We love it all. We so appreciate you taking the time and effort to get gifts all the way here to us! Miss you!

I'm sure there are some things I've missed and for that I'm sorry. I'm going from a quick list that was jotted from Em and Soph's party and the rest is from memory. Thank you to those who came to the parties to share these milestones with us. They were pretty fun.

We love you all!

Thankful for...

Mommy-This morning I was so thankful for a nice hot cup of coffee and warm cinnamon rolls for breakfast. The best part was all of us eating breakfast together...after we ALL slept in! WooHoo!

Emma-Her Barbies to play with. I'm pretty sure this has something to do with new dresses they got at a craft show yesterday.

Soph-She is thankful that we have a table to eat on :)

On another note...

On a much less serious note, I got this crazy idea to go ahead and pull down the girls clothes stored in the attic and organize them...and get rid of as much as I can. I have it listed on my 60 day list as maybe 2-3 areas... BUT I had a rude awakening when I finally pulled all the totes down and stacked them up in the playroom. I had...no, no, I'm too ashamed to say it...let's just say there was a ridiculous amount of totes up there! I'm too embarrassed to even post a photo of it! It's been 6+ years of boxing things up with no thought of organizing it or purging and then just tossing them up in the corner of the attic.

Maybe when I'm done going through the totes I'll feel good enough to admit how many were up there :) Maybe...

Veterans Day

I know I've mentioned this blog I love, Clover Lane. If you have time today, click on her blog and read what she posted about thoughts about today from a mother's perspective. I had tears in my coffee this morning reading it.

Happy Thursday

I got ahead of myself yesterday and cleaned out Lily's dresser and closet. The dresser was driving me nuts because the drawers were stuffed full. She's into the next size now and I needed to box up the outgrown clothes as well as the summer stuff.

Since she is more than likely our last baby, it's time to start getting rid of clothes once she is done with them unlike before when they were just boxed up and thrown in the attic. So going through her clothes took me a little longer as I looked at something and really had to decided if I was ready to part with it or not.

I feel like I did a pretty good job with it. The clear box on the bottom right are clothes I kept. My plan is to someday make a quilt out of the girls baby clothes, so I've now dedicated that box to add things I think I may use to make that one day. It's sleepers and play clothes that maybe all three of them wore that will make for good memories for me later.

There is also one box of warm weather clothes (it's not even half full) if we need them.

The large gray box if full of clothes that I could part with and plan to donate to Outreach.

The clothes on the top and on hangers are items I plan to sell at the Whale of Sale in the spring...they're all hung up and ready to go.
As you can see, if it were up to Lily she would prefer to not have clothes anyway. This is right after a bath. She likes a little clothing-free time afterwards. She crawls around all excited kind of the same way the dogs run around the backyard right after their baths. :)
As I was getting a container out of the pantry, I spied this little stowaway. Not sure who she is hiding from.
Lily loves lasagna.
Tank loves that Lily loves lasagna. This is his hang out spot during meals. He's nice enough to keep the floors cleaned up for me.

Thankful for:

Mommy-whoever invented the Magic Bullet...and Costco for carrying it so I would finally buy one! I use it most mornings to make a breakfast smoothie (carnation packet, fz strawberries, milk and ice) I love these cups bc they came with a travel lid so I can take it with me on our busy mornings.

Emma-mommy's cozy bed. (Geesh!)

Sophie-our oven because it's makes our food warm

Lily (per Sophie)-our playset. She does love the swing.

Now a 60 day challenge

So here's where I stand so far on the challenge. Highlighted areas are done. It is SO hard for me to not move on to another area. Like this morning, I went through my bathroom vanity and went ahead and started to go though Tim's. I did clean out the part under the sink, but after looking at his two drawers, decided that's all him.

I've also come to terms that this may be more like a 60 day challenge. I find it's better for me to do things in 20-30 min chunks of time. I can sneak it in a little easier than trying to commit a few hours to it. Some of the bigger jobs will probably need to be broken down. This will make me feel less overwhelmed by them, too.

So here it is and edited version:

1. Steph bathroom vanity
2. Steph bathroom closet
3. Tim hanging clothes
4. Tim socks, t-shirts
5. Tim casual shirts and sweatshirt
6. Steph pants,
7. Steph hanging shirts
8. Steph socks, undies,
9. Steph t shirts on chrome shelf
10. Steph shirts on wooden shelf
11. Steph pjs
12. Tim vanity
13. Toy shelf in living room
14. Pantry
15. bookshelf, buffet, tea cabinet
16. our dresser, desk in bedroom
17. night stands
18. cabinet with coffee cups, bottles
19. cabinet with coffee, teas
20. cabinet with spices (make room for cable box in the future)
21. bread cabinet
22. junk, utensil
23. under the kitchen sink
24. hall coat closet top
25. hall coat closet bottom
26. kitchen cups & dishes
27. above fridge cabinet
28. towels/bibs drawer
29. Girls nightstand and dresser: DONE!!
30. Emma closet: DONE!!
31. Soph closet: DONE!!
32. Girls bathroom (E&S side)
33. Lily dresser, bookshelf and toys
34. Lily closet
35. Playroom books
36. Playroom bin and baskets
37. Dress up clothes
38. basement toy bins
39. basement right shelf
40. basement left shelf
41. garage closet
42. garage shelf
43. christmas stuff
44. basement storage area
45. baby totes in attic
46. stuffed animals
47. barbie stuff
48. American Girl stuff
49. dollhouse stuff
50. playroom, my crafts on table
51. file drawer upstairs
52. my bags
53. my wallets
54. my shoes
55. 3t stuff in attic
56. 5t stuff in attic
57. Halloween decor
58. girls shoes in attic

Thankful for...

Today we are thankful for:

Mommy: that this screw implant for my tooth looked okay on the xray today despite the fact that it's still achy

Emma: our play set in the backyard

Soph: the playroom

Lily (per Emma): baby food

I found this on the blog I love, Clover Lane, today and just really enjoyed reading it:

"As surprising and unsettling as the twists and turns of life may be, it is even more damaging to simply take life itself for granted.
If we do that, we are fast on our way to becoming inured to the pulse of life that beats through all our days, however taxing, however difficult.

If we miss the little things, we will soon begin to take love and friendship and blessing for granted.

Perhaps even miss them entirely.
When we do not cultivate a sense of surprise,

we give in to the emotional dysfunction that suffocates the breath of life in us.
Our hearts go sour and our souls go blind.
We lack the open-armed exuberance for life that make the human."

-Joan Chittister

From England

Our friends across the pond send Lily the cutest dress with tights and this adorable little bunny. Lily kissed it when she got it out of the box. It looks like she is biting it, but I know it's a kiss :)
Yes, she was drinking Fuze. (kidding)
Our "thankful chain"

I decided to start a thankful chain leading up to Thanksgiving. The girls love doing any type of chain. So even though we're starting off a few days late, I think it will be fun to hear what they are thankful for. Here's what we've got so far:

Mama: a warm house to sleep in at night

Emma: a warm house (hmm?) and a potty inside the house. Somewhere she must have seen a picture or has been told a story about outhouses.

Soph: her preschool. This was sweet because she really does enjoy going there.

Lily: Emma thought that she would be thankful for diapers. I say amen to that! Add this to my thankful list as well :)

Lily helping me with the "40 Day" challenge. "Um, Lil, I wasn't ready to do this area yet, but thanks for the help!"
This is the stool of choice for standing lately.
Emma did their hair. Lovely, isn't it? :)
This proves that they genuinely love each other, they choose to not show it most of the time.
My bins from Emma & Soph's closet clean out. The top empty bin is to start organizing the mess of shoes I have in the attic.

5 down, 35 to go

Cleaned out the toy bin in the living room today. As I dumped out the 4 baskets, Lily watched in amazement as the toys came pouring out. Again, didn't get rid of very much. A small bag of rattles that Lily is over using. But a larger basket of stuff was given to Emma and Soph to put away upstairs in the playroom. That's a huge problem around here...pieces to toys get separated and then that toys isn't played with again.

So far, Emma and Soph have frustrated Tim and me to the max today about cleaning up upstairs. You would think I'm asking them to renovate! Ridiculous and exhausting. When it comes time to go through the playroom, I'm doing it myself and purging about half. I'm sick of this madness.

great quote

"It is a Shame for a [Woman] to Grow Old,

Without Ever Seeing the

STRENGTH & BEAUTY

of which Her Body is Capable."

~Socrates

Fever for Emma, long night for us

Last night was kind of rough. Lily fussed out about 1am. Tim nicely agreed to go up and give her some motrin and dimetapp (she has a little cold). But, she was back to sleep by the time he got up to her room. 2 hrs later, Emma came down and said was shivering which is a quick sign that she has a fever. Yep, 101.6. So Motrin for her. She was complaining she was hot so she was fidgeting around like crazy and couldn't sleep. She tried the floor and then ended sitting on Tim's side of bed upright on the pillows. An hour goes by and Soph comes down crying because she's in her room by herself. 6am Tim's alarm goes off. 7am Lily is back awake just kind of fussing in her crib. I brought her down with me and we watched a little of the Today Show.

Just taking it easy this afternoon. Emma is watching Scooby Doo. I had a follow up appt with the oral surgeon who placed this implant today and Emma could barely manage though it. She walked in with her blanket wrapped around her and stayed that way the whole time. She's pretty pale and has that glassy-eyed look. I hope she feels better soon.

pantry and papers

My bills, files are so organized. I feel great, caught up. A month goes by...the stack of papers is back! I realized that every month or so I have a stack of stuff that I just have to take the time to go through. Pitch, file, pay, to-do, etc. That's what I did this morning and I'm back to feeling caught up...at least with that little part of my world. I cleaned out some of the pantry, too. Not a major clean out, but pared some things down and took stock of what I have for upcoming meals. My goal is to use up what I have in there as efficiently as I can. Lily is occupied with arranging the girls chore magnets. They're not fairing so well.

today

So today I actually tackled 3 days worth of areas listed on my "40 Days" challenge! It was one of those things that once I started, I didn't want to stop. I found that if I take the time and look and around the house and see all that I want to accomplish I get overwhelmed. I had to stop myself several times and say one day at at time. I'm eating an elephant here.

As for the girls closet, Clover Lane says she has her kids hang most of their clothes. I had made the mistake of starting out with neat piles of folded shirts, pants, shorts and after a few times of the girls helping me put clothes away, they were a mess! So i have it now where everything is hanging except for pants.

As for purging...I only filled up one shopping bag full of extras to give to my mom to take to a charity called Outreach. She was just telling me about it this weekend. It's a shelter for teens, a lot of young mothers there who would always be in need of clothing. As I was packing up the outgrown stuff, I would pick say 1 tshirt out of 6 to donate. I can post a pick of my bins later. I have 4 going up to the attic:

3t clothes for Lily later

4t summer clothes for Sophie next summer (or a warm winter vaca)

5t clothes for Sophie next year

5t & 6 summer clothes for Emma.

After putting Lily to bed tonight, I quickly went through Emma and Sophie's nightstand and bathroom vanity. Tossed out a hand full of trash, and removed stuff that didn't belong there. I had 20 or so wash cloths. Who needs that many?!

I can say that their room is officially done! Yippee!

37 more areas to go!

40 Bags in 40 Days

1. Steph bathroom vanity
2. Steph bathroom closet
3. Tim closet clothes, socks, undies
4. Steph pants, hanging shirts
5. Steph socks, undies, t shirts
6. Tim vanity
7. Toy shelf in living room
8. Pantry
9. bookshelf, buffet, tea cabinet
10. my dresser, night stands, desk
11. kitchen, stove side,
12. Kitchen, coffee maker, bread, junk, utensil
13. Kitchen, dishes, above fridge, towels
14. Girls nightstand and dresser: DONE!!
15. Emma closet: DONE!!
16. Soph closet: DONE!!
17. Lily dresser, bookshelf and toys
18. Lily closet
19. Playroom books
20. Playroom bin and baskets
21. Dress up clothes
22. basement toy bins
23. basement right shelf
24. basement left shelf
25. garage closet
26. garage shelf
27. christmas stuff
28. basement storage area
29. baby totes in attic
30. stuffed animals
31. barbie stuff
32. American Girl stuff
33. dollhouse stuff
34. playroom, my crafts on table
35. file drawer upstairs
36. my bags and wallets
37. my shoes
38. 3t stuff
39. 5t stuff
40. (I'm sure something will come up :)

day 1

Girls closet is organized! We'll see how long it stays that way.
Soph had a monster of a meltdown for 45 minutes today from picking up shirts at the cleaners, during a (very quick) trip into Walmart for totes and then ALL the way home from there. It was ridiculous. The kind that really makes a mom want to just lose it! So... here she is asleep in her timeout. Geesh! I could have used a nap after that, too! ...and one stiff drink.

Game on!

I did actually start my 40 day challenge today. I have cleaned out Soph and Emma's closet and dresser. Soph had 3t and summer stuff that I took out. In the past I haven't wanted to separate clothes by season because I thought it would be a pain to have to dig through boxes if we took a winter trip to Florida. But, because they share a closet I just have to. I did my best to keep it organized well so should we take a trip it should be pretty easy to find. I'll try to post after pics later.

40 Bags in 40 Days Challenge

There is a blog I have fallen in love with...Clover Lane.

This blogger is a mother of 5 and is the queen of keeping it simple and organized. I have spent hours reading her posts and have been so inspired to follow her plan on parenting and keeping house. I have been so frustrated with things lately and I figured that most of it stems from me asking the girls to help pick up or keep things clean and them acting like it's the worst jobs in the world! I feel like I'm just chasing my tail and getting no where when it comes to organizing and keeping up with all the housework. I realized that a good part of it is there is just too much stuff to manage! So...I'm purging. I'm sick of wasting time picking up and constantly being frustrated with the girls. Our stuff is not worth it anymore!

My challenge to myself is to get rid of 40 bags in 40 days. Now these will more than likely not be consecutive days, but at least a total of 40 days worth of purging.

I have made a list of 40 areas in the house which is what this blogger did and thought this is so much easier for me to manage and not get overwhelmed if it's broken down into chunks like this.

I'll keep you posted. I think tomorrow is going to be day 1....I'm thinking stuffed animals.

Halloween

We stopped over to Grandma and Papa's.
With the cousins.
This is the only pic I got of Lily in her costume, which she had on for about 2 minutes. She was a little under the weather so she got to stay home and help pass out candy.
Rapunzel, secret Flynn Rider (notice the goatee), and Belle
Batgirl, Belle, Rapunzel, Wonder Woman

Chicago

Nana, Emma & Soph and I took a trip up to Chicago to get Sophie's American Girl doll. This is an early Christmas present for her. We had gone up last year to get Emma's in December and it was freezing!! So, we decided to go in October and make it an early gift.
We stayed at the Westin on Michigan Ave. and I don't think we could have been closer to the American Girl store! You can see it in the pic (it's across the plaza area with a big red sign on the corner of the building). The girls thought that was pretty cool.
The underground adventure at The Field Museum.
They took their first cab ride to the museum. Soph said, "I don't have to buckle in!" Here they are counting the steps to the front entrance.

Dinner at the Grand Luxe Cafe.



Soph's new doll with freshly pierced ears.

Lily's Birthday Pizza

We started a tradition with Emma to go out for pizza on their actual birthdays (because they usually fall within the work week).The girls thought Lil would like Chicago's. She did really enjoy the pizza.
As did Soph.

I wanted to throw in this pic of Lily's birthday cake.
Emma at Apple Day. They're using little bears to balance the apples.