Laundry Room.... finally

I wish I was a decorator with lots and lots of time and money.  Then I would have the house that is on my Pinterest boards.  And then you would come over and we would drink wine and talk about my amazing house.  You would pin my house to your pinterest board with captions like LOVE IT!, Have to have,  Check out this lady and her amazing house, Want!....

For now, I have this blank and cluttered slate with stains on my carpet, crayon on my walls, flat paint, and serenity.  OH and my laundry room.  I've got my little laundry room.

Most of the accessories in the room are recycled (red and yellow spray paint baby).  Over the course of several months I purchased a few pieces using my regular household budget.  The painting is from Home Goods ($29.99) and I wasn't planning on spending that much on any single piece in the room but I couldn't pass it up.  SO adorable.

I  painted the door navy blue to cover up the scuff marks and finger prints.  The red rug was from Kohl's ($10 with a coupon).  It is not washable and it gets super dirty from the lint and laundry room stuff.  Read the care tags folks!

The red hooks were once white hooks from Lowe's that I bought for another project and forgot about.  (Look at sweet baby Liam)

And then there is the light.  My second favorite piece after the art but the piece that I am most proud of because it caused so much consternation in my life.

 

Here is the Before, a fancy contractor grade boob light.  I have lots of these in my house.  I really want to make a drum shade in my eating area so I thought I would start with a DIY trial in the laundry room.  Some of the tutorials include embroidery hoops (which I probably have if I wasn't too lazy to look) but I found this lamp shade at Lowe's for $5 and some red fabric for $3.  

 That's where the idea came to a screeching halt.  I was challenged by that ugly space between the existing light fixture and the shade.  I was challenged by the dimness of the light.  I was challenged by the task of securing the new fabric. I was challenged,  PINTEREST FAIL (again).

I spent months trying to figure it out.  I would get the ladder out, try to reconfigure, Kevin would come home, bump into the ladder (as unimpressed with my handiwork as I was), and I would put everything away.

Right before Christmas, Kevin gifted me with an afternoon to run around by myself.  I spent most of my afternoon on Junior League business but in between I stopped by Lamps Plus on a whim.  First time!  And I found the light.  It was more than I wanted to spend ($60) and I didn't believe the saleswoman when she told me that the light was a special order that usually goes for almost $400.  I was so incredulous she finally pulled it up on the inventory and showed it to me. 

 

I bought it thinking that I would bring it back the following week.   Once I saw the same fixture on Joss and Main for $325, I was sold.  It took several tries but I finally got the new light wired and installed.  I have never been so surprised to see a light turn on when I flipped the switch.  I love it.

The total cost for the project (including the Pinterest FAIL products) was just under $200.  

One room down, 12 to go.  At this rate, I will be done decorating this house by the time Patrick is in college.
 

Funny things my kids do

 The transition back to school was a little rough on the boys.   After two weeks of playing together hour after hour, four days of separation was hard.  When they did have a few minutes together they alternated between enemies and BFFs.  Case in point, a few minutes to play before homework time and they start constructing Legos.... on the same chair, even though we have six, they share a chair. 

 Lauren rarely gets juice and if she does it's prune juice (no further explanation needed.).  This morning the baby also needs her prune juice.

All three kids are currently having a wild rumpus in Patrick's room.  At some point I need to break it up and get the day going.  For now I'm laughing at their interactions and happy that they all love being in the same place at the same time.

It's gonna be a long month

"Mom, it smells like Halloween!"
This was Patrick's declaration after we dragged the Halloween bins out of storage last weekend. And with that scent of potpourri (which has been in my Fall rotation for YEARS but hasn't made it out of the Ziploc since we lived in Sacramento but penetrates everything Fall nonetheless) firmly under his nose, Halloween was on in our house. I didn't actually unload the treasures until this weekend. Owning this much Fall stuff is a tad overwhelming, I have to work up to it. And then there is the problem of TOO MUCH HELP.
Pumpkin Snatcher (I was taking a break from decorating to practice with my camera and the only subject that will stay still, until said subject was kidnapped)



Fall Vomits in My Dining Room

and Leaves it There Until the Next Day or two.

I Love Fall. And it looks like we might finally be getting a taste of Fall weather this week! Feeling optimistic, I put the duvet back on our bed and ordered the boys new sweatshirts (and sweaters and fake Uggs).

Patrick had a special prayer tonight: "Thank you Jesus for the gift of Halloween, Amen."

And the fake spider trick never gets old. And we have Martha back in rotation. We love Fall!

Like I said, he rocks

Is it Fall yet? Not pretend Fresno Fall, I mean full-blown Autumn. MMMM...... Autumn. The air conditioner broke in one of the 4 zones in our house. It just happened to be the boys zone (wing).

Usually, our air conditioner is very Johnny-on-the-Spot with the cold air. The boys and I are known to cuddle under blankets while the air conditioner is working to get the temperature from 83 degrees to 81 degrees. Anything cooler than 81 and you have to put a sweater on (and a beanie and mittens). So when the boys' zone was holding steady at 84 even though I had the air set at 81 I knew we had a problem. Kevin didn't (want to) believe me. For some reason the air conditioner would work when he was there and as soon as he went back to work it would stop working (just like the mechanic).

The point of the story is I finally convinced him that the combination of the non-functioning air conditioner and the (close to) triple digit forecast for the weekend meant we had to call the air conditioner guy.

He came, he saw, he charge a hundred bucks. A hundred bucks to guess that the problem was a faulty flapper (how very 1922). A hundred bucks for a guess, I'm definitely in the wrong business. How about another $420 to actually fix the (hypothesized) problem? Sure. I know the economy is bad because 4 years ago we would have just bought another house. Instead my man climbed up into the attic and started banging around (with the help of one of his buddies via iPhone).

I was his Tool Girl, running up and down the stairs (luckily I can use the climb), bringing tools and switching from one zone to another. And I discovered this real estate right above my closet. Just what I need, more storage.



Anyway, after seventeen trips up the stairs. A number of adjustments. He fixed it!!!!! for now

Kevin really is amazing. He will still have to replace a part but he just saved us hundreds of dollars in labor at the very least.

How about this for music to my ears:
"Is there anything else you want me to take care of?"
"I'll do some laundry."
"I already took care of it."
"It is all put away."
"I made you coffee and packed you a snack."

Trying to wrestle the beast.

The junk/paper/chaos beast that slowly takes over the corners and crevices of our house. The beast fills up drawers with junk, covers counter space with odds and ends and drapes itself across any open area. FlyLady says these are Hot Spots. With the amount of paper we receive for Kindergarten and our general life of chaos, our laundry room is a HUGE Hot Spot for the beast.

It is not strange for this room to look like this.
BOYS LOCKER

I think the problem is about TOO much storage. Too much counter space, too many drawers (two junk drawers in this room, another one right outside and 4 more in the kitchen), and too much counter space.

I wish this was all laundry on the floor. It is some combination of dirty clothes and random things that need to be taken care of. And you can see the top of our locker....
We needed help. With all of this storage we were still struggling to keep track of everything coming in and out of the house during the week.
So after a lot of thought and shopping, I bought this.....
The point of this is to sort, organize and plan. Papers, uniforms, borrowed/forgotten toys to return to friends, out-going mail, coupons, etc. is organized into the day that it needs to be handled. It is also a good way to keep track of homework, not to mention a quick way to know what to grab in the morning. If I am traveling early in the morning, everything Kevin needs for the day is right there. On Sundays I write checks, sign forms, prepare mail, and coordinate the weeks activities with this thing. No question, a good use of $20.

The other problem is the lingering mail situation. So I bought this.....

This came from Lillian Vernon and is a tool to keep the other Hot Spot (that drives me crazy because there is not a door to shut out the chaos), the kitchen counter. Mail and school papers and toys and phones and keys love chilling on the counter. When Kevin is working I pile stuff up there for him until it makes me so crazy I move it to the laundry room (productive, I know). Kevin leaves behind bits and pieces for me when I am working. This is a place to not only leave incoming mail but also put magazines and kindergarten newsletters and other propaganda that needs to be considered. So I added this...



This is not a storage facility. Everything in this thing has to be dealt with on a regular (if not daily) basis. Read it, deal with it and move it along. Things with a longer shelf life (BILLS) go right into the bill organizer to be handled at the end of the month. Receipts go into the receipt organizer to be dealt with or tossed.

More than these new fixtures, I am trying really hard to get us to just deal with things right away. Otherwise the beast is going to move back in and I am going to leave for the loony bin.