Operation Organize!

My story started as the typical romance fairy tale.

I met my soul mate, we fell in love. Got married, bought a house. Everything was clean and shiny. Everything had a place. We had a miscarriage, but shortly after along came our first child. I delighted in washing, folding and neatly organizing all of her tiny pink clothes. Then somewhere in between losing a second child, having a very uncomfortable 4th pregnancy, giving birth to our other wonderful daughter, the onset of chronic pain and homeschooling, I lost control. Oh every now and then I would tackle an area that I could no longer function in. And we clean. But it's often the "company's coming" type of cleaning. You know, where you clean the  main areas, then stash and dash all of the rest into a room and close the door. I'm not saying we live in filth. It's just clutter. And now that my girls are big enough to help me with the maintenance, it is the perfect time to change that.

The first step I made was to create and inventory of my house. You see, I need to feel a real return on my investment, and what better than to be able to make a check mark. Well, actually several check marks would be better.

I have literally broken down every room in the house into areas that I will be able to clean and organize, a bit at a time. The task doesn't seem overwhelming because I'm not trying to organize the whole house all at once. We have a few days off for Easter break, so I am tackling my most frustrating areas in fairly large chunks. After that, one item a day will be my goal. And I think that's very do-able.

Today: The dreaded Tupperware cupboard, and the kitchen counters. See Exhibits A & B below.

And the cup cupboard. Wait, that's like a duplicate. The cup boards? Aw, heck. The cabinet that contains the cups.

I swapped out these two cupboards to give better flow, but it also seems to add a further sense of newness.  After 10 years of going to the same cabinet to get my cups, it has made for an interesting afternoon.

All of my kitchen counters are now clear, clean and make me smile. In fact I think I'll go back to the kitchen to admire them again right now.

Much better!

And best of all, apart from a few papers that I need to work on, everything else on the counters was addressed, cleaned and found a home for. Check, check, check.

Really, I am smiling at my kitchen counters. And I think they may be smiling back.