The Life Cycle of a Minimalist

I ran across this post in my reading and love it...apparently I'm moving between #4, #5 and #6....and haven't moved past those yet.

I've been trying to simplify and declutter for over a year now.  I'm not 'there' yet...where ever 'there' actually is.

But again, as far as I'm concerned, it is more about the intentionality of the process than the end product.  So I'm ok with that.

And I'm trying desperately not to be so hard on myself and the unattainable goals that I tend to set for myself.

Clutter control (March 25 - 31)

25 - We reorganized the clothes in Kellen's room and got rid of a few items in there (outgrown sleep outfits that he's held on to for way too long), t-shirts he's outgrown, etc) - 12
30 - After Jacey wore one of her pair of jeans-turned-into-almost-capris, I realized they were, in fact, too short for her. *sigh* - 1
31 - Hubby had warned me that the toaster was broken, but we hadn't gotten around to throwing it away. It is now in the trash (shhh...I did it before he got home and I wonder how long it will take before he notices). - 1

Weekly total - 14 items
March total - 67 items

Clutter control (March 18 - 24)

20 - 1 shirt that we realized Jacey has outgrown (I could have sworn I just went through that girls clothes!!)
21 - 3 items (including a random, non-insulated drink container that sweats horribly that I've had sitting on the kitchen counter for some unknown number of weeks....have I just been oblivious to this??? cleaning around it???  who knows, but it's gone now.)
24 - 2 pairs of shoes (1 each from Kellen & Jacey)

Weekly total = 6 items
March total = 53 items

Batch cooking

I'm hosting a meal swap for some of my fabulous co-workers this week, so in preparation for that event, I did some batch cooking last night.

Pizza pasta is my 'go-to' dish for meal swaps. It just is. It's easy to make, most people love it, and I always end up making extra because my family seems to love it (especially Jacey, which is a real treat).

I got the ingredients (buying in bulk for a recipe is way easier than getting a bunch of different ingredients for different recipes!)

Then turn all of those things into a LOAD of food!!

Boil the pasta and separate it into the lasagna pans.

While the water for the pasta is boiling and the pasta is cooking, brown the meat and heat the sauce.  Then mix the meat and sauce with the pasta in the pan (I use 1 lb of hamburger meat and 1 can of spaghetti sauce per pan, along with 1 bag of tri-colored twirly pasta or 1 12 oz box of pasta).  Then layer with approximately 2 cups of mozarella cheese.

Take your pepperoni and layer over the shredded cheese for the final topping.

If you have an assembly line going while you're making quite a few of these, it can look something like this on your table.....

And you end up with something that looks like this....

I made seven of these last night while we simultaneously made dinner to eat, the kids ate, my hubby ate, then I took a quick break to bathe and put to bed the littlest.  And I was completely finished (as in wrapped with saran swap and aluminum foil, labeled and in the freezer) by 9 PM or so. I started with all of this at about 6:30....so not too bad!!

I kept one out for us to eat later this week and also browned some of the 'extra' hamburger meat that I had bought as a started for another dinner for this week.  When you actually cook it, do so on 350 for 25-35 minutes, or until all of your cheese is melted (I leave on the foil until the last 10 or so minutes).

I felt very productive. *grin* The added bonus is that my dear sweet hubby cleaned up the kitchen afterwards. Love that man!!

I think it's time for another t-shirt purge...

3/13 Update: after doing some additional laundry, I came across a few more t-shirts...so I've adjusted the numbers accordingly below.

Remember my old post about purging t-shirts to a more manageable number?  Well, I think it's time again.

My t-shirt count is 21 23 shirts (at least that are currently clean, folded and in my drawer - and I'm pretty caught up on my laundry as of *right.now*), and this is true t-shirts, not the girl-cut t-shirts (I know, I know...I actually differentiate between the two).

They actually (mostly) fit when they're all clean and folded in my drawer, but still....how many t-shirts do I need? I wear them on the weekends and occasionally on a Friday to work...occasionally.

In going through them, it's obvious I end up still wearing the same ones over and over again....maybe it's the way they feel?  Maybe the way I feel like I look in them?

I honestly have no idea. But I'm thinking it's too many t-shirts. Especially when I'm not wearing them all.

So, there seems to be some that I have a twinge about getting rid of....race shirts, etc.  Apparently I need to make some sort of keepsake item with those (a shadow box for my race shirts and medals? suggestions from other runners would be greatly appreciated!!). Others I will officially move to the 'sleep shirt' ranks. Yeah, they're that bad. Still others I'll move to the 'craft' pile for wreaths and possibly some flip flops for the girls and I.

So, the end count is....17 19 t-shirts.

Clutter control (March 1 - 10)

So this post will cover about a week and a half for the month of March...

Saturday the 10th was a fairly relaxing day...the weather was drizzly, and we had NOTHING on the agenda.  Let me repeat that.

We had nothing on the agenda.  [It's so rare it was worth repeating]

So I decided to pull Tatum's shorts, skirts, pants, capris and dresses out and she did a fashion show.  It was really just a fun way for her to try on all of these things so I could see what needed to come OUT of her section of the closet and go into storage for Jacey or get purged because it was a little too loved. Then later on in the day we did her tops.

I then pulled ALL of the socks out from Jacey and Tatum and we played the match game.  I am sick and tired of having mismatched socks....so am bound and determined to put an end to that. I went through the clean socks, matched them up, and them put the mismatched ones on the dryer so as I finish laundry, I can continue making sets.  Once that's finished, I'm know which of them truly are lonely. Of course, of the socks that are matched, it seems that over half of them are too small for Jacey's seemingly huge feet.  So out they went.

We matched socks, and now have a pile of socks currently mismatched.  After I get through doing laundry..(and figure out which ones are truly lonely, like I mentioned)...we might make some puppets (that Tatum has been asking to make) out of the lonely socks.

After all of the clothes purging (with just a bit more to go, I might add...but Jacey is in no mood to try on her shirts or dresses)....Matt decided to clean out the garage. And the purge total climbed. We started a 'mission box' and went to town.

And in our random purging, I ran across a pair of shoes that Jacey has outgrown that I really haven't wanted to admit she's outgrown.  And I put them in the bag to donate to our friends.  I showed them to Matt as I was doing it and we both got our sad faces on for a few minutes and were saddened that she was outgrowing those shoes.  Maybe we can find them in a bigger size and pretend she really isn't growing up after all.

Weekly total = ~40 items
March total = 40 items

Clutter Control (Week of Feb 26-29)

Here is the recap of the home stretch of the February goal of clutter control.  I was getting ready this week to host Tatum's birthday party (scheduled for at the house...yikes!!), so was gearing up to be a REALLY good excuse to go some last minute purging and cleaning up, right??

Right.

Well...it didn't really work out that way.

My back ended up going out and then Jacey ended up getting an eye infection....so the house ended up getting a quick spruce...but not the deep purge that I wanted right before her party....and then we moved the party to the park anyway, but that's a different story.

But this is life...and I live in the real world.  And I do the best that I can.  And I'm trying to do better about not beating myself up about things.

My goals are lofty...and I'll try to reach them...really I will.  But if I don't....I still tried, and it's the effort along the way that's really important.

Because all told, I ended up purging over 200 items from the house in the month of February (granted, lots of it was candy....but still - I got it out of the house!).

That's over 200 things that my house didn't need anymore.

Even though I wasn't as consistent about it as I wanted to be or had intended to be, that total is WAY better than averaging 5 items a week for the month, huh? *grin*

Total Weekly Count = zilch, zip, nada, goose egg
Total February Count =228

February recap of this project
Week 1, Feb 1-4
Week 2, Feb 5-11
Week 3, Feb 12-18
Week 4, Feb 19-25

Clutter Control (Week of Feb 19-25)

We're drawing near the end of the Clutter control month here....and I haven't maintained consistency like I had originally hoped.  My purges are coming in spurts.

I already mentioned and Kellen and Daddy did a great job of cleaning Kellen's room....and in doing so, they came across a cute outfit that Kellen had outgrown...It was his Easter suit, complete with tie. So on Sunday, we took it to church and passed it on to another couple whose kiddos can use it for their boys. (We'll count that as one item.)

Sunday was also the donation day for the Princess Project, so three dresses that had been bridesmaids dresses in their former life were donated to this project. Hopefully in this phase of the dresses life, they'll be utilized by a high school girl so that she can wear a dress to her prom. I was still able to wear them, but every time I tried to, Matt simply saw them as bridesmaid dresses and couldn't get past that mental mindset.

So off they went.  Better to be used and worn again than for me to wonder, 'What if I could wear it to.....'

Then on Saturday, I went through ALL of the shorts, skirts and pants in Jacey's drawer to see what fit/didn't fit her.  And I ended up purging some items from that drawer. (The girl is just a skinny-minny and some of things she inherited from her sister were for a completely different body type....'nuff said, right?) That totaled 18 items plus one pair of shoes she's managed to outgrow.


Total weekly count =23
Total February count = 228

Clutter control (week of Feb 12-18)

Continuing on with February's clutter control theme.....I will say that this week was a little better (from my perspective at least).

A group that I work with was having a yard sale on Saturday, so we were able to donate our old BBQ grill for them to sell, and I played 'middle man' for another friend as she went through a her boys toys in her own purge mode (her toys don't play into my count)....Another friend had given me two large garbage bags full of clothes for Jacey not too long ago, so I (finally) went through those, pulled out the stuff I wanted to keep for her, and donated the rest for this particular sale.  I have NO IDEA how many items were left in that bag, and they weren't in my posession all that long, but still....let's just say ~75 items left the house in those bags.

I actually had to work an event on Saturday, but when I got home, I discovered that Kellen and Daddy were deep cleaning Kellen's room.  Deep cleaning.  As in, there was an ENTIRE garbage bag of STUFF ready to be dumped out.  Trash, broken toys, papers, wrappers, and I even think there was a banana peel.  Don't ask.  I didn't begin to even count, but let's say that was an easy 50 items.

Total weekly count - 126 items
Total count for February = 205 items

Clutter Control (Week of Feb 5-11)

To continue with my February goal of clutter bustin', I took some additional items to Kellen's Kids Klub (newspapers...no real count on those...we'll say a weeks worth).

I also re-purposed some existing candy into Valentine's Day treats for each of the kids to give away for next week at their respective parties (the candies will be out of the house, so that counts, right?? ;) ) [See posts here and here for Valentine's Day ideas]

It wasn't the best of weeks for managing our clutter.....

If I count the individual candies, then we're at 63 items....add in a few days of newspaper and we're at 70 items for the week. (I just realized HOW MUCH CANDY THAT IS!!!)

Total count for February is 79 items.

Clutter Control (Week of Feb 1-4)

Remember my February goal for clutter bustin'? 

Well....here are pictures of (some) of my first attempts to purge unwanted and unnecessary things out of the house. 

There was another one or two that didn't get captured in photograph form, but you get the point.  Luckily for me, Kellen's Kids Klub wants and uses magazines, newspapers, old toilet paper and paper towel rolls, etc., so some things can be reused rather than thrown away (yay for going green!)

My 'official' count was 9 items.

What have you managed to purge this week?

What do YOU do with Christmas cards after Christmas?

I have wondered this for years.

And for many years I have wanted to make a book of them, so that we could remember who sent us cards the previous year pray for the families during the year.

After making my hubby crazy too many years to count regarding this issue, I finally decided to DO SOMETHING with them this year.

I knew that there with this ring thingy's that could hold stuff together, but had NO IDEA what they were called...and that was oh-so-helpful as I was trying to explain them to the guy at Wal-Mart so I could find them.  {Just so you know, they're called book rings}

I finally found them ($1.50 for a package of 8, and they come with 2 sizes in the package), with the help of another female Wal-Mart employee {I'll leave those comments alone} and I was off and running.

When I made it home, I realized that I don't own a single hole hole-punch.  Or if I own one, I can't find it.  Or didn't look hard enough.  Or was too impatient to look very hard at all.

At any rate, I made do with two parts of my three hole hole-punch.

I gathered my Christmas cards....

Used the two holes from the hole punch and made my holes for my 'book'....then stacked and put them on the rings.

Easy peasy and oh-so-cute!!  So now I have contained and organized what was once my Christmas card clutter.

And I am curious....what DO you do with the Christmas cards you receive once Christmas is over?

Couponing

So I have a few goals for my couponing/thrifty endeavor...

The most obvious goal is to save money on things my family already buys.  In case you don't know it, expenses for a family of 5 can add up!

Another goal is to create a stockpile.  I have a vision of our garage shelves lined with toilet paper, paper towels, diaper wipes, toothpaste, easy mac, and enough cereal in stock for my kiddos (among other things, of course) to last for 3-6 months.  I'm learning, so I have no illusions that I'll get there next week, or even next month, but I'm trying, which is really what counts. (In case you're wondering, I don't find this goal in conflict with my declutter goal....I want to stock up on things we as a family love and use....so there are fewer stressful moments when we realize that there is no more toilet paper in the house.  Not that I have experience with that or anything...)

Another goal is to {once again} cook in bulk and store meals in my freezer.  I had been doing this for a while - and had even been organizing meal swap parties for the Sunday school class - and it makes dinners and meal planning so easy.  {Quick realization is that I didn't host a single solitary one of those meal swaps during the fall semester...and I don't think I had one in the summer either.  Shame on me!} So if I combine the freezer cooking with buying some of the ingredients in bulk and on sale, I'll be one happy mamma.

Of course, a lofty goal that I have is to hit the deals so that I ultimately get various toiletries for free (because apparently that is possible), but I know that's lofty and it will probably take a while before I'm ever at that point, so whatever.....any savings is good!

My final goal is to use the money we're saving from being thrifty and couponing and put it to good use.  Whatever that good use might need to be at the moment.  What I don't want to do is save money in this area and have this effort and those savings amount to nothing in our grand scheme of finances.  What a waste that would be.

It's the start of a new month, which means most of the online coupons just reset.  Who is on the couponing bandwagon with me??

February Goal for Clutter-Bustin'

It may not seem like much, but I will be purging 5 items a week for the month of February in an effort to contain clutter and purge items.

I feel like I just did this, but in my efforts to get organized, I am continually coming across posts that insist you cannot organize clutter.  I agree.

I have decided NOT to organize what I do not want or need.  

Instead, I will get rid of those items.  Yes really.  I will.  And they can't be 'trash' items (you know, empty milk cartons, etc).

So, even though the first week of February is a short week, it counts.  So my deadline is February 4th to purge 5 items from my home. 

I'll post a count update and perhaps even a picture of the items (assuming I can remember to take a picture before they're recycled or thrown out).

Care to join me??  Come on....you know you made some sort of New Year's Resolution to get more organized....

Quick & cute weekly calendar

I knew that once I succumbed to pinterest I would be in trouble, but I think I've done a fairly good job at making some of my pins into reality. (This is not to say that I have even completed 1% of the projects I've pinned...not even 1%, but I've done some. Some is good).

I saw one yesterday that was so cute that I decided to take the plunge with it today. 

I saw this incredibly cute idea to make a weekly calendar using a collage photo frame, and knew that this would be a quick and easy way for the entire family to know who needed to be where for the week.  Depending on the space, I may decide to incorporate our weekly dinner menu onto this as well, but we'll see.

I picked up the frame at the Dollar Store ($8)

...then I rummaged through my paper scraps trying to find inspiration for the insides of the frames.

After some experimentation, I decided that I liked the thicker paper better, as it made the frames tight.  Considering that I was going to be writing on the glass with a dry erase marker, I decided I didn't want the glass to be 'wiggly'.  You decide what's best for you.  I played with the color scheme.

Then had what I was comfortable with for a finished product.

Add the days of the week and your calendar with a dry erase marker after you hang in the spot of your choosing and you're ready to go!

Back on the coupon bandwagon

I have fallen off...and now I'm getting back on.

And my first step is to get my coupon circulars organized. (I have them, they are simply in no discernible order).

Something I've learned in this process.....coupon circulars have dates on them...on the outer covers - the covers are like spines in a book and the date is on there (I'm specifically talking about the Sunday paper circulars here).  Kudos to you if you already knew that, but it was certainly my revelation for the day!!

Thinking ahead

So I came across this post today that pretty much sums up great ideas about not getting caught off guard for Christmas when it comes to presents....

Check it out.

Wardrobe Challenge, Week #5

Monday



Tuesday

Wednesday

In my selection for Wednesday, I decided to inventory my clothes against what I have already worn in this 'challenge' to see if I was truly nearing the end. 

Come to find out, after selecting my outfits for Wednesday and Thursday

(I *have* to get back on board with selecting my outfits at the beginning of the week - but moving put a rather large kink in that system), I realized I still have 10 tops that I haven't worn!!

Thursday



Wardrobe Challenge, Week #4

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

It feels like I'm coming to the end of my wardrobe, and it seems like the most challenging part is simply remembering what I've worn and what I haven't!



Wardrobe Challenge, Week #3

Here is the third week of my wardrobe challenge....Monday, August 8th - Friday, August 12th.  The photo section of this challenge is most helpful for me so I can remember what I've worn and haven't worn!

True to the suggestion last week, on Monday night I decided on the outfits for the remainder of the week and took all of the pictures.  What a stress reliever to not have to worry about what to wear!  A tip if you're going to do this, though...be sure to check your calendar so you know what meetings/appointments are (currently) scheduled for you.

Monday, 8/8

Unfortunately, I was dealing with a sick kiddo today, so my wardrobe isn't a 'work' wardrobe.

Tuesday, 8/9

Wednesday 8/10

The color seems very off in this picture, but the top is actually a nice shade of purple...promise!

Thursday 8/11

Friday 8/12, also...Graduation here in Aggieland!!  I'll certainly be sporting my Aggie gear today!