In mid-August, I gave myself two weeks to fill my empty baskets and containers with existing stuff that needed storing, or give them away. I had a donation pickup on September 1, but since that was a sizable pickup, I held onto the containers and baskets for a future Goodwill run. I haven’t had a chance to get over to Goodwill, so once again, my lack of ability to adhere to a timetable has worked in my favor.

This was a really productive weekend. I focused on this month’s Big Project, the playroom, and last month’s space, the kitchen. There’s still more to do but I made a lot of progress. I don’t think I’ve gotten so much done in two days in quite a while.

Top shelf- purses, jewelry supplies and misc items

Most of Saturday was devoted to my closet. It was a huge jumble of sewing and craft supplies and books and miscellaneous fluff. I filled a bag with trash and a small box with donations and found uses for two of the empty lidded containers. One of them now has paints and brushes and the other has cards, letters and other smaller keepsake items. I’m limiting myself to one container of keepsakes, and many actually belong to Emma. When she’s older she can decide what she wants to do with them. My jewelry tools and books have their own cubby, and the fabric bins are holding sewing supplies, extra Brownie supplies and my old journals.

The sewing machine is top, left and partly covered by clothes.

Getting the sewing machine off the floor made me happiest, because when it was on the floor it blocked access to the shelves.  I parted with two handbags, which was difficult but necessary.

Sunday was spent working on my kitchen issues. Even though I donated everything I wasn’t using, I still found storage a challenge. Last month I was supposed to organize the room and be done with it, but I kept avoiding it, then the month was over. While I was working on my closet, I thought of a solution: to reorganize the laundry room and use space in there for lesser-used kitchen items and food. Back in the spring I reorganized the laundry room and got rid of a lot, including cans of spray starch the former owners purchased during the first Bush presidency. But like many spaces in the house, it needed a second purge. We have wire shelves over the washer and dryer with a lot of space. I don’t know why I thought we needed three grounding outlets, so I gave those away, along with a few other odds and ends. Tools were relocated to the garage, and my reorganized closet had room for surplus Brownie supplies. It left me with space for items I use but not that often, along with some food.

Totally un-Pinterest-worthy, but functional.

I’m tempted to call this room the Granary since I moved all the pasta, rice, quinoa, etc, down there, because those are things we don’t use as often as snack food. And I’m using empty containers and baskets. There is still more to be done in the kitchen but it feels much more manageable now!

On Wednesday I’ll have an update on my menu-planning-palooza.