Purge: The Entryway

Living in an older home means making the best out of minimal storage. In my house, there are no walk-in pantries, walk-in closets, bathroom linen closets, fabulous closets in the bathroom or spacious garages.

But my house does have one amazing storage feature going to it: double entryway closets.

That's right. Eat your heart out.

Since they are pretty much the only storage we have on the main floor, they are used often, for a hodge-podge of items and get messy quickly – so of course they were on my purge 2014 list.

Closet 1: The coat closet

Before:

I wanted to maintain this closet as a seasonal closet. I went through it several months ago and donated a lot of items, so this time around it was mainly about organizing. I even brought Audrey's coats and snowsuit down from her closet, to join in the fun.

After:

And I even have room at the top of the closet for additional goodies.

Closet 2: The pantry/storage/cleaning closet

Before:

This is the closet that I've had difficulty closing on more than one occasion. As you can see, things just sort of fall out when you open it. This is our catchall closet, and while I didn't want to change that – I knew there was a bunch to say goodbye to.

First off, I knew we had a lot of cleaning supplies, but holy geez.

Once I ditched some of those, I decided the shelf of cleaning supplies needed some order.

I know a lot of people keep kitchen and bathroom cleaning supplies, well, in their kitchen and bathrooms – but until Audrey is older, I'd prefer them nice and high up with all the other cleaning products.

I'm really happy with the new system, and I think it will be easy to stick to, as everything has a home...a very obvious home.

Other items that received containers were items I had in bulk: light bulbs, small light bulbs, baking decorations and Yankee candles.

After:

And a terrible iPhone photo of an angle I cannot capture on my camera:

I love that my brooms and mops are now hanging up. Now I don't have to worry about a random broom attacking me. You can't see it but a broom and two dust mops are hanging up on the frontside of the closet.

Such an easy weekend project that made such a huge difference.

You are my cupcake

Seriously. I can't believe it took me this long to do this...or that I had 5 half empty baking cup containers.

The Purge: My Dresser

I love organizing, but that love has never extended to my dresser. I think it's because I know a lost-cause when I see it. The issue is I have annoying attachments to things in there, and so items always stay – leading to drawers stuffed full of clothes that are impossible to open.

So I figured, why not start with the dresser now before the thought of organizing makes me stabby.

Drawer 1

My earring drawer was an easy place to start, because it always stays organized (thank you ice cube trays for giving me a place to put everything).

Drawers 2 & 3

These two drawers contain necklaces, rings, bracelets, "fancy" jewelry and jewelry boxes. 

I was amazing at how much I either didn't want or needed to relocate.

The items in these two drawers rarely get used, which made me question why I'm giving it two drawers. So I decided to consolidate, and give the extra drawer to my tank tops, which I use most days. (All my tank tops are waiting to be washed, so that drawer is enpty at the moment).

Drawer 4 and 5

These are my undergarments drawers. Let's just trust that I went through them.

Drawer 6

This is myAshley fail. I forgot to take a before of my workout clothes drawer. This is the drawer all my tank tops are usually in though, which freed up a lot of space – so I decided to move my sports bras here.

Drawer 7

I only wear socks on 3 occasions: 1. when I'm in bed and my feet are cold; 2. when wearing boots; 3. when it snows. Yet, here is my overflowing sock drawer.

My really gross sock drawer. I had no idea how many pilly and faded socks I owned (probably because I rarely wear them). I got rid of a bag full of socks.

Even more baffling, I had 6 pairs of hospital socks in my drawer. Apparently, I'm subconsciously keeping them as mementos from all my exciting ER visits. (And if you're counting, yes I know there's only 5 in the picture, but I found another about 30 minutes later in my PJ drawer...yeah, no idea).

I decided to keep my yellow ones, because they make me giggle. The summer after my heart diagnosis, I was hospitalized with pneumonia – I had Brent go home and pack me a bag and requested my yellow hospital socks, because the beige ones provided were ugly. Soon after, the hospital staff started freaking out when I was walking on my own. Come to find out that yellow socks is their code for fall risks. Oops.

Anyway, all 5 beige hospital socks are now with my grandma, who is rather excited about my donation. And I'm excited about my new, spacious sock drawer.

Drawers 8 & 9

This is Drawer 8, PJ pant drawer, which usually contains extra t-shirts that can't fit into Drawer 9. This leads to everything in the drawer being extra wrinkly.

And this is my overflowing t-shirt drawer.

I had t-shirts I wore when I was pregnant and t-shirts I wore when I was several sizes smaller in there – yep, time to say goodbye.

My new just PJs drawer:

My new t-shirt drawer:

I know I have a long ways to go in my purge, but just having this one thing done feels so amazing. I can't wait to do more.

The Start

It started with the office. I woke up one morning and thought "what am I doing?"

I've been working from home for almost a year now, and yet I never merged my former cube into its new home. (Plus my Memeboxes were taking up valuable closet real estate).

And that's when I really started seeing the rest of my house. While everything worked great pre-Audrey, post-Audrey I can't just glide by and expect the same results. On top of acquiring 4 more years of things, kid's stuff takes up a criminal amount of room.

My house no longer felt like home. It just felt like one giant mess.

The lack of space hit a critical level this summer, when we officially ran out of storage room in the basement, and things started piling up in our living space. I'll be honest, since having Audrey – my house has been at a standstill...and it's time for a change.

So, I would like to welcome you to my new focus: decluttering my life.

One project at a time.