Necklace Organizer

I'm so excited to show you my new necklace holder!

It's been on my "to do" list for FAR too long.

No longer is there a tangled mess at the bottom of my bathroom drawer (where little hands can reach). NOW almost all of my pretties hang nicely right next to my sink. I love it! Did I mention that might kids can't reach them? LOVE it!

Here's how I made it.

I picked up an old shutter at Round Top.

I spray painted it black.

And distressed some of the edges.

I used 2 picture hangers to hang the shutter to the wall & S hooks to hang the necklaces on the shutter.

And "Viola!" Problem solved!

I was worried that it would look cluttered or messy, but I actually think it adds some personality to the bathroom. And for pete's sake, shouldn't your bathroom be functional? :)

monday madness

It's Monday again & I'm trying my best to get organized.

I've noticed that if I start my week intentionally (rather than just falling into it), I'm less stressed and all-around a happier me!

These weekly planners have been helping. Check these & more out here.

They're free to download and print!

And this is my favorite printable grocery list that I've found.

It helps organize your groceries by the area/aisle of the store & makes shopping (even with three kids) so much faster.

Man, I love Mondays!

Because I love my man...

Tiffany & I have been busy the last few days and over the weekend as we were getting ready for our first ever joint "Village House" garage sale. Since my family recently moved I'd set aside a bunch of things that I didn't need anymore. We had another friend who brought some stuff over too and the three of us (plus my mom) worked the sale this past Saturday. See the sampling of some of what we sold...

I had great visions of what my profits would buy me...
1. Headboard and bedding for guest room
2. Great long sofa table for behind our couch
3. Window treatments for any of our bare windows
4. Kitchen rug
5. Entry rug
Ok, so obviously the money wasn't going to buy EVERYTHING on my list...but a girl can dream, can't she?

Saturday after the sale I came home to find my man cleaning out our garage that had been filled with boxes after our move and a bunch of things that needed to go out to the curb. He's been talking about getting some shelves for the garage to help with some much needed organization. We just talked about it the other night and decided we should wait a few months since we've been spending money like crazy (as you do after a move to an old foreclosure!). As I was talking to my mom that afternoon it hit me... "my" money earned from the garage sale wasn't really mine. It was his -- he deserved it for all he does to support me and my crazy ideas, wants, desires and hopes for our family. So, although the garage sale was 100% my idea & my work... I was happy to buy these nice shelves for him....

Let's be real honest... his hard earned money goes towards purchasing a whole lot for me, (the house) & the kids and rarely does he get something for himself.

So, all you married ladies with a hubby who supports you 100% give him a HUGE thank you today. Thank God for that. You, my friend, are blessed.

Bloglovin

**Disclaimer**Blogger won't let me fix my HUGE gaps between pictures and paragraphs... arg! So, I hope you'll excuse the mess.

If you're like me you follow a ton of inspiring blogs or have a zillion on your blog readers. Since really getting into the blog world about a year ago I found myself overwhelmed at how to keep up with them all without missing one amazing thing. I tried adding them all to my internet favorites and would go up and down the list seeing if anyone had a new posting. Then I started 'following' them through my google account. Then I ventured into the Google reader. None of those come close to the greatness that is

Seriously I LOVE this site.

I have no connection whatsoever to this site so this is a completely random plug for a really great way to keep up with all your favorite bloggers.
Here's how it all works. Go to their site and create an account. Then the fun part begins... start adding every one of those blogs you just can't get enough of. Once you have your list the bloglovin' site tells you when there's something new to be seen.

Once you've checked out all the updates ... or the ones you cared to click on. You can choose "mark all as read" and it clears out your queue so that when you log in next time it's only going to show you what you've not yet seen!! Another feature I love is that you can sort by blog. So if I don't have time to sort through all 66 (or 214 like after last week after my vacation!) you can choose one at a time to catch up on and mark those as read to clear them from your list.

Something else you can do is "like" a post. How great is that? So if I see a super cute birthday party or cloche idea that I don't to forget all I have to do is "like" it and bloglovin' will keep track of it for me! That would have been helpful last year when I came across a blog that had some super cute Valentine decor in her kitchen. In the world of blogging if you come across something you like you MUST MUST MUST follow it. If not, you may be like me and never come across it again. So, if you are the gal who uses a cloche dome at Valentines in your kitchen with an ornament hanger and a cute ornament... I used you as inspiration and I wish I could find you again! :)
By the way... if you don't see your name on my list that either means you didn't have anything new or your blog name is alphabetically after "K"... OR it means I don't know about it yet. So, go ahead and comment and leave your link so I can find you and add you to my bloglovin' list!
Have fun setting up your bloglovin' account!!! You'll be so happy you did.

Pantry Redo

When I saw this pantry makeover that Decor Chick did a few months ago I was totally inspired and motivated to get mine done. When we moved in a year ago we did a total rehaul on a lot of the spaces in our home. One of those was the pantry. Five college guys had lived here before us and lets just say the shelves in the pantry were nasty and in our opinion, not worth saving. So my hubby and a handy college student from our church built the new shelves themselves. We'd always planned on painting them and making them nice...but time and money (and energy) ran out and we just lived with the raw wood shelves for over a year. Finally it was time!!!

This is how I was living! (sorry for the poor photo quality but you get the picture, right!)

Oh I am so embarrased to show this to you! It was awful and I didn't mess it up to make it look worse... this is truly how our pantry functioned. Wow... that's humbling. :)

After a coat of paint on the wall and shelves and the addition of the canisters and other organization stuff I'd been collecting over a few months... here it is today!!!

And these awesome lazy susans built by my handsome helper. Seriously... these are awesome and he worked VERY hard on them!

My pantry now functions and looks 100x better!

I got these shelves from Wallyworld to store some of the "what do I do with these?" items.

And these canisters keep our snacky foods

And this basket stolen from the playroom keeps the paper goods that just were cluttered up on top of the shelves before.

I'd had these baskets for a while to hold our bread and chips.

And remember when I showed you the kitchen cabinet makeover? I told you I'd moved the kids crafty stuff to the pantry. Here's their corner. I got these drawers to hold coloring books, stickers, markers, paints, etc. SO much better than the cluttered cabinet.

I am loving the new pantry. My husband has even given me major props! He was once skeptical about all the canisters instead of boxes...but now I'm pretty sure he's a believer. And I couldn't have done it without him... all the painting, wood shelves and trim and Amazing lazy susans are credited to him! He's pretty much the greatest.

Linked here:
Making the World Cuter
Between Naps on the Porch
Keeping it Simple

kid's closet

I'm following in Lindsay's footsteps today... cleaning up & cleaning out! I began to organize my daughter's closet this weekend while I was already in her room painting. Might as well kill 2 birds with 1 stone! My biggest hurdle...combining her closet (and everything in it) with my younger daughter's stuff.

Closet #1

Closet #2

I began with organizing all of their bows.

I realize they have a ridiculous amount!! My mom makes and sells them, so they're the lucky beneficiary of every color you can imagine. I simply tacked up 3 rows of ribbon. And I found these unused storage racks in the garage, which worked well for shoes and books.

2 hours and 1 goodwill box later, I ended up with this...

Much better! Now back to decorating...

De-Cluttering my cabinets

Don't you just love seeing how fellow bloggers "really" live? Well I do... I want to know that these lovely ladies aren't perfect and they live real (and sometimes cluttered) lives! If you enjoy knowing and seeing that then you stopped by That Village House on the right day.

This was our junk cabinet in the kitchen. As you can see... it is a total disaster. It houses the kids craft stuff, candles, cookbooks, medicines, lotions, etc. Finally I had had enough. Things weren't fitting like they used to. I am sure it's got nothing at all to do with the fact that there's no organizational tools whatsover, right? :)



And here's the AFTER! I spent an afternoon clearing out everything and figured out what I wanted the cabinet to house (and what it shouldn't!).

Ahhh... Glorious! I moved all the kids arts & crafts supplies to some neat organizational bins that are in our pantry (which is also getting a makeover that will be featured soon). I love that I can see all my cookbooks and that all my Scentsy bars are no longer falling out of the cabinet when I open the doors and I have a place for my camera bag so it doesn't have to live on the counter anymore. So... get after it... clear out your junk and don't live with clutter anymore! It's the little things that sometimes bring me silly happiness!

Decoupaged Clothespins

If you have 5 seconds (literally, 5 seconds), grab some scrapbook paper and make your chip clips a little bit cuter. If you have another 5 seconds, add a button or an initial!

This card holder, which I picked up from Canton, & which happens to fit PERFECTLY between my desk & hutch, looks even better with my new clothespins. Can you tell I'm excited?? The quickest project EVER!

I was overzealous & decoupaged too many (an easy mistake), so the girls' art shutter got and upgrade too!

Even my chips in the panty are now adorned with colorful clothespins. But I'll save you the picture of my pantry!