New Bath Cabinet

I have been relunctant to show you our new bright and white tiled tub and shower surround because, well, the whole bathroom isn't "done."

Now that we've implemented new austerity measures around here, it will take some time before it's all done, too.

Since I saw this picture in January, I've wanted to replace those shelves with a bath cabinet.

I'll just let you experience the full impact of these shelves before I go on.

Bath cabinets, or "over johns" as they are called here are horribly expensive for what you get: melamine clad particle board, mostly. Awful stuff--$60 on sale was about the cheapest I could find--but it wasn't white and too big for the width of my space.

So, I resolved to live with the shelves and paint them white when we had money for paint.

But, in an effort to generate a few dollars to throw at our debt, I have been listing things to sell. And it occured to me one night that I could look for things to buy, too, like an over john.

So, yesterday I drove to the extreme north end of our city and purchased a small "cape cod" style overjohn.

For those following our journey on Dave Ramsey's financial plan, know that I purchased it with my "blow" money--for $25.00.



Last night, my husband and my son hung it and I scrounged different knobs.



I think it looks very odd hung up there, though. Should it be lower? Sort of where the old shelves were? It is physically possible.

Let me know what you think.
(Hubby will not want to move it though, so if it sort of looks OK, let me know that, too!)

Linking to the 131st Met Monday.

Week 2 Progress Report: The Basement.

If you've come from Org Junkie's link up--Welcome!

After updating my progress for Week One, I headed back down to the basement and got more done last weekend. Today, I headed downstairs just so I could have something new to post!

I am actually having a really hard time "getting" what I've done. All I can see are the pile and piles of things waiting for me to deal with:

The memorabilia which is supposed to find it's way into scrapbooks someday.

The kids' artwork which I plan to tackle this afternoon while listening to Dave Ramsey:


The itty bitty pile of things which needs to be put away:


The pile of things to be sorted into donate and sell:


So, here goes:

Before:


As of today:


Before:


As of today:
It's actually kind of nice down here when it's warm enough to leave the door open and let the sun shine in!

Here's how I'm tracking according to my plan:
Week 2:
Purge.
1. Look through the shelves and get rid of anything obvious. --done
2. Start collecting items for homeschool conference sale. --done
3. Go through Emma's things with her--goal: to consolidate and clean out two storage boxes. Yet to be done. She has Monday and Tuesday off from school next week, so that's when we'll be doing that, I think!
4. Go through the scrapbooking supplies and discard little used tools and items. --in progress
5. Go through the drawers in the pine dresser. --done!

First (Successful) Loaf!

We ran out of bread on the weekend.

The children were away at camp, so I decided to figure out how to bake my own.

I tried making a "no knead" bread from Mark Bittman--all I got as a bitter brick.

For my second attempt, I spent some time on the internet reading about yeast and so on. I found this lovely article in the Guardian and decided to try the recipe at the end.

(I didn't have a Vitamin C tablet, so I left that out.)

It makes the most delicious toast.

I made another loaf yesterday--and it was even bigger. I'm not sure how long I'll keep this up, but it is nice to know that I don't have to worry about running out of bread ever again.

Sold!

I am so pleased.

We have sold the punching bag.

It was here:



Now it is gone!


It was really in my way when I was clearing out the old Ikea pine units.
Now that it is gone, I can see my way to re-organizing the space.

I also sold a few scrapbooking punches: that was actually fun. A woman and her daughter came to pick up a few Sunday afternoon. I gave the money to my Mom as they had been her punches!

I went through the drawers in the pine dresser: most of them were empty! (It just wasn't accessible behind the punching bag, I guess.) There were a few toys, but not many.



Then, I started filling the drawers up with scrapbook supplies I've decided to keep.

I emptied out these two plastic drawer units. I was all gung ho to sell the one with the big drawers --the one on the left-- (they sell in the stores for around $40) but then I noticed that the bottom is cracked and broken.



I sorted things into piles:
1) trash, (or recycle)
2) keep, and
3) sell or donate. This third category is the toughest. Will people pay for gently used vintage baby themed wrapping paper? I think it wrapped my baby gifts!


(There's something weird about those big disembodied heads, don't you think?)

If you know of anyone who could use it and/or love it, please let me know!

So, it feels like what's left is the tough stuff.

1) List and sell the "Home Gym."

2) Go through the boxes of kids' artwork. I'm not even sure I want to fill up even one binder for each of them. But I know that the minute I see it, I will want to keep all of it.

Yes, two carboard boxes, two plastic boxes and a suitcase. There's more upstairs, too.

3)Deal with piles of memorabilia and papers and stuff I've been collecting as I go.

4) Decide whether to sell my XXL Crop-in-Style.

**15 minutes a day for the rest of the week is the plan.**

Week 1 Progress Report: 29 Day Organization Challenge

Right after I decided to join the challenge to transform the Area of Utter Chaos in my basement into a functional crafting area, I spent some time down there looking after the low hanging fruit.

Then, of course, I didn't do anything at all again until yesterday.

I decided to tackle this area.

These old IKEA pine units (between the filing cabinet and the dresser) have been in my life since they held record albums in my Mom's house when I was in High School. They're great for old scrapbook binders and photo albums.

I unloaded the entire thing, one shelf at a time, and sorted and piled on the bench.

I emptied quite a few binders=--and found a few in categories I've seen before:



"Home Management" --This was chock full of print outs from Fly Lady's site and a few handritten sheets detailing my "ideal" morning and evening routines. Everything went into recycling. I'm pretty sure I may have another just like it (only different) upstairs in my bedroom.

"Garden Inspiration" --full of clippings from magazines and a few notes on various plants. I have another upstairs 3x as big. I tossed 90% of it.

"Scrapbook Idea Book" --sketched layouts, lots and lots of notes about how to assemble albums, etc. I went through it page by page and kept only my own page layout schematics. I'll put the sheets into the binder I have for this upstairs.

To my utter horror, (I have spent a lot of money on page protectors) I found not one, not two, but three binders full of 8 1/2 x 11 page protectors. I knew I had them, too. But I wasn't entirely sure. I'm not sure whether to keep them--not because I'm afraid I'll buy more--but because the thought of filling them up with stuff makes me shudder.

Here's how the cabinet looks now:


I'm not done with it.

I want to go through all that stuff on the top and figure out how to store it better and I have a bunch of punches and some craft paint to go through, today.



The punches will be hard. They were expensive and some were never even used.

But, most importantly, how am I tracking on the plan for week 1?

1. List the punching bag for sale. done.

2. Clear out the area by the lat pull-down machine for a picture and list it for sale. cleared out. Not listed, yet.

3. Decide whether the Rocking chair is repairable.
According to my husband, it is. When I asked him if he could do it in the next few weeks, he didn't anser me. It broke just a few days before Christmas.

4. Decide whether to keep the upholstered platform rocker.
This is it:



I dragged it out of the basement, washed the vinyl and vaccuumed the upholstery. Then I threw a blanket over it. I think I will add recovering it to my long list of things to do.



5. Decide wehther to insulate the wall over by the lat pull down machine this month (my husband has another vacation week coming up)
We talked about this. I can't remember what we decided. My husband did say it will be nice to have a week off "without a big house project." I don't think it will be getting done any time soon.

6. Put up hardware for curtains in the laundry room. done!

7. Talk to my husband about what needs to be done to finish the laundry area. done!

8. Put away items which really do have a home, like these on the bench. done! But of course, it is full of stuff again!



Decisions, decisions!

Check out more fabulous and challenging projects at Org.junkie.

The William Morris Broom Cupboard

Jules, at Pancakes and French Fries hosts the William Morris Project every Thursday. She's been doing this since the new year--and I finally have something to post for it!

I took on a very small project: but one I've been meaning to get to for ages.

My linen cupboard upstairs also has to hold the various odds and bits I use for cleaning the two bedrooms and the powder room up here.

I'd put the back of the door to use:


However, as you can see, it wasn't very convenient. Or beautiful. But it did work. Sort of. Everything was stacked, one on top of the other. Like a pile. A hanging pile. Yuck.

As I was cleaning up the basement (as part of the 29 day challenge) I came across a small towel rod and some hooks. I can't quite remember what I thought I'd do with them--maybe even this very project!

The first task was to remove the old sticky plastic hook.



Have you heard of Goo Gone?



It's amazing stuff.



Just a bit on a tissue and rubbing away at it for several minnutes was enough to get rid of all the residue.


(That's old growth forest from British Columbia you're looking at. Douglas Fir. At first I wanted to paint it, but it has grown on me.)

Nothing left to do but put up the towel bar, the hooks and hang everything up idividually, instead of all together. In a pile.



Ta Da!

(Yes, I did sneak in the water bottle. It occurred to me when I emptied it that it can hang.)

If you'd like some great inspiration to get something done, check out the other participants at Pancakes and French Fries.

The February Budget: done!

Like making the menu plan, it seems that I will now spend the last weekend of every month making up the budget for the following month.
.

The budget is only one aspect of Dave Ramsey's financial program. His take on it is a bit different. It's not based on averages, or projections, or anything about what you should do. Instead, you look at your take home pay and spend it on paper before you touch a penny of it.
.

The budget, then, is simply a spending plan for that month.

.
It is a scarey thing to do because, now that I've done it, I can clearly see there is no money for painting the bathroom, for example. (Not unless I take it from my personal "blow" money allocation). I can live with that this month. But next month? This could get oppressive fairly quickly. But the goal is to avoid the credit cards --no matter what.
.

That's why it's really important to have set up what Ramsey calls the "baby" emergency fund of $1,000.00. We will actually have to use ours this month to help pay for some dental work. In the past, I wouldn't have touched that fund--but simply used the credit card. We have a dental plan which will reemburse most of the cost: so our Emergency fund won't be depleted for long. My husband says he likes the idea of being his own lending institution. The rates are certainly better!
.

The best part of the budget, for me at least, is the Allocated Spending Plan. Each expense is listed down the side as before: but the sheet is divided into four columns, each representing a pay period. It's perfect for us as my husband is paid weekly and one of my biggest challenges was keeping track of what to pay when.
.

Here's an example from the book:




I don't know how well you can see it, but basically, when the first expense is deducted from the pay cheque the amount remaining is written beside the expense--separated by a slash. Keep doing that down the column and you have a running total of how much money is left from that pay cheque after paying each expense.

From doing ours, for example, I realised that I have even less money available for groceries in week two than I thought I'd have.

Good to know.

If you are interested in these forms, there's a collection of them here in both word and pdf format at the Byrd's Nest.