The Cooking Cupboard

I am so happy, the kitchen is coming along nicely. We rent a oldish house with NO storage so we have to make do with what we can. So I have turned a cupboard that came with the house into my cooking cupboard. I used 3 boxes ($3 each)I bought from Sam's Warehouse and a wire filing rack($13) from Office Works. So for about$25 I did this...

In the top box is the measuring spoons and cups, bottom one is icing bag and cutters. Smaller one has bag clips.

Templates

I am finding I am needing to make templates for around the house so things run smoothly. I will add them as I make them :D

If you would like any of these as a word document  please let me know.


Week at a glance

Communication Board

Since life is getting so busy here. I made up communication sheets to put on our fridge. That way I don't have everyone asking me a million times a day about things.
 I have made the following templates-
Messages for...(Kept in a plastic sleeve on fridge and white board pen used, we leave messages for each other then wipe off once read.)
Daily jobs- Rooms divided with a list of what needs to be done each day. Plus kids AM and PM jobs. Also in plastic sleeve to cross off and reuse)
Weekly jobs- Same as daily jobs but for the week
Shopping List - I got this off someone else (sorry forgot who) but made a few changes. Has 2 to a page. Just print and cut. I attach ours to the fridge with blue tack and add to it as we need items. Then grab when going to the shops.
Once of jobs/Tasks to be completed- A template to add all those jobs that are once off or every now and then. Like renew library books etc.
week at a glance - with all four of our names on it. I edit it in word then print it for the week on Sunday's and put it on the fridge so we all know what each other is doing. I also put a spot so we can add other dates then I add them to the corresponding weeks template. I have one for each week up to August, so I can then just add info for the dates as I receive it.

If anyone would like a copy let me know and I will email you.

Photo of our communication board. with a spot for menu plan and  kids reward chart. Reward tokens in jar on top.

June Challenge – Home office/study/paperwork.

 I am joining in with this challenge that is posted over at this blog. As our study is part of our bedroom today I am going to sort paper work and declutter clothes and  a few boxes and go from there.

Our new Tv and Cabinet

Had to go buy a new tv as ours was on the way out. But to go with the new tv we had to get somewhere new to store it as it didn't fit our old cabinet. Below is a few pics of before and after.


Old TV cabinet and TV. We got this cabinet for $12  of ebay lol.

New TV Cabinet and New TV. $50 for this cabinet at salvos . Moved all the books, still need to find a home for them. big speakers have gone. And the frame and bits are re placed to other parts of the house

   Xbox , Blue ray payer and sub in the middle

Inside Cabinet
My old shuttle pc to hold movies on to watch, xbox controllers, basket for cords and games.

Outside toys are done!!!

Well I have wanted to sort out the kids outdoor toys for ages. We just had the kids stuff shoved in a corner basically and some in a cardboard box. But a few things stopped me. One- no time, Two - unsure how to do it , Three-couldn't find what I was after. So I finally sorted them out today and it only took half an hour to forty five mins to do. :) The green bin and red tub we already had. The bin was used for camping(cleaned it well since we hardly go camping anymore). And the red tub just had random items in it under the house waiting to be put away. Also the hanger we already had for stuffed toys in DS room. But got rid of a heap and didn't need it there anymore. The only thing I had to buy was the blue wheelie bin.

Blue bin - Balls
Green bin- Bats
Red tub - Random
Red Hanger- Protective Gear, Baseball gloves, toy hard hats

Before

After

Organising one self

Well I have decided that I am going to organise myself as well as the house. What do I mean by that. I don't mean getting clothes ready the night before etc.

I mean getting HEALTHY! Organising me!

So my top 5 things to do are

1.Get fit.- Started jogging/Running 30mins a day when I'm not working. As work is like exercise.
2.Eat better. - Eating muesli for breakfast, salads for lunch and portion controll
3.Go to bed earlier(when I don't have night shifts). - No later than 10pm
4.Go to the dentist and get all my problems sorted. - Will do in the next few weeks when DH is fully better so he can do the house work
5.Have me time(so I'm mentally fit as well.)- Going to take up a sport I can do once a week at night, thinking ten pin bowling.

We deserve this, we do so much for the house/family. We are entitled to take a few hours out of the week.

So what are you doing to Organise one self? Could be so much as taking time once a week to just have a bath by yourselves so you can center to what ever you want.

Car project

Here is a sample of what I will be making for the car. This one is a trial and will post better pics later. It is just a rectangle of plastic with holes punched down the side and bottom and then ribbon threaded like a shoe lace.

My new baby

Well I have decided to buy this one from office works. They only had the silver in stock, so I purchased on the office works website and it will be delivered to the store to pick up. Can't wait to try it out :D

Decisions Decision

With all this cleaning and organising I am looking at buying a label maker. But have no idea which one to buy......

So I am going to go shopping and see what I can afford then research them then buy one! yay!

Pantry

I sorted the pantry a week ago and I'm happy to say it has basically stayed the same YAY!

One thing that helped is having everything of the same together. I have all the larger items in jars then the smaller items I have put in 10L starmaid containers.

*First one I have all my cooking things(coconut, bicarb, icing sugar etc).


*Second one I have all the school lunch items(muesli bars, rice crackers, fruit tubs for the week, as they are big I put the spares away).




*In the last one I have all recipe bases and my pasta items that don't go in my storage jars(rice paper, sushi papers, lasagna sheets)



The snack box is also handy if we have to dive out anywhere fast as we can just grab a water bottle and the box and we are ready to go.

It's catching...

Well no pun intended but hubby came home a couple of days ago and said I bought these today(storage boxes with compartments)to sort my fishing gear out. :O And he bought a new back pack to keep most of it in as well. So it's all ready for when he wants to go fishing(which is ALOT :P). Well up to this point he had either just thrown it all into an old tackle box, or floating around in a smaller bag or an old plastic box he keeps his bits and pieces.

The result after sorting it was 1 bag of rubbish from old real boxes etc about 7 items to get rid off and 3 beautiful boxes all sorted :D.

Family Meetings

We try to have one each Sunday night as a moment to spend together. We each take turns by saying what we would like to say to each other then we give the person we are talking to a chance to respond. It has helped heaps.

For example tonight DD brought it to our attention that the boys are forgetting to shut the toilet door, so the boys replied that they will try and remember. We also sat down and discussed the system I would like to try and they had their input of what they would like to try. Hubby even said he really wants to do it, but sometimes its hard to know what I have done. So asked if I can mark it off with a white board maker on the plastic sleeve(I have the lists in plastic sleeves in the folder)so we can wipe it off when we start the week/month again.

It isn't always negative a lot of the time it is positive. Tonight DS said to DD " All I want to say is I love you and thank you for helping me with my room" (she helped tidy it up with him).

It has opened up our communication as a family and all it takes is about 10mins. The kids know that no matter what at this time of the week it is just for talking and they will get heard. Since they feel heard they come and talk to us the rest of the week now and not bottle it up.


Oh and one more thing before I call it a night.....
Don't forget to smile

Our daughters room is nearly done

NB: Warning this is long with pics :)

Since we rent we can't do much to this place , but we are lucky that the landlord will let us do a lot. We are allowed to put nails etc up. So I have done our daughters room up as her birthday present last year.

She used to share with her brother and we used this room as a study. But since she is growing into a young lady asked if she could have her own room. Moving was out of the question so we changed rooms around, we moved our son into our old room and we moved into theirs and put our computers in the bedroom as ours was now the larger room and our daughter has the study. It is small and have to walk threw it to the toilet and it still needs a few things done but she is happy with it so far. We have De- cluttered 2 shopping bags of things to the bin and 6 items to the op shop. We still have her desk draws to sort and paint the top of her desk(going to paint it pink and add stickers) and a couple of other things. 

We did all this on a very small budget, you can get bargains if you look for them.

All this was done over 9mths.
Desk -$8 eBay

chest of draws- $10 garage sale (contacted front of draws and top with pink little pony paper)

small bedside table- hand me down from mum

Book case - got given from work office, was black painted white, hung butterfly material as curtain and used tapestry cotton to make tassels

Memory board - $5 (canvas with material over it, fastened with staple gun. Then ribbon crissed crossed over and held in place by brads. add flower to top)

Bed - $8 eBay

mosquito net -$5 garage sale

picture behind bed - $5 towel

Silver frame with pics- $15 for frame, printed pics on computer

Teddy in bucket- $5 white metal bucket (on clearance), teddy given as gift. flowers around teddy.

Curtain ties- $3 per pack of 3 butterflies, $1 ribbon. glue ribbon on to back of butterfly

flowers on windows- $2 x 2 sheets from crazy Clark's.

flower canvas- $6 each. had outline I just painted it.

Princess board - $12. painted kaiser board and covered it with scrappbooking paper. painted word and put rhinestones on it. glued word to board

Flowers on bed and around lamp- $3 each from crazy clarks

covered tissue box - Cant remember price. Covered with scrapbooking paper with ribbon and stamps, ribbon and flowers

notice board - $7 painted normal one with paint and put rhinestones on it

Wall stickers around walls

mother and child lamp -$10 garage sale

High school musical quilt cover - $10 clearance kmart

office chair -$6 ebay

Storage boxes for school books - Free, got the boxes the reams of paper come in from work. Our daughter now has a box for her school books for each year. These are labeled and put under her bed against the wall.



If you want to see more photos of anything please ask.

The big step..

Since I have decided to get rid of everything we don't need, it has been a huge job. But I am feeling so free. I feel sad that I have so much to sort threw but also happy that I am doing it. I now understand how much this affected my family. 

So far in the last 6 mths we have gotten rid off

*3  huge trailers worth of stuff to the dump. (most of this was stored under our 2 story house not used for 4 years)

*4 strippy bags to the op shop 

* and a huge mountain of items we will have a garage sale to get rid off.

*but the biggest thing to me is some old chairs I have moved house with 4 times,  saying that I would do them up etc. They are now gone, it hurt to get rid of them. But I had to make my self do it, I have not had time in the last 4 years and now my life has gotten busier they had to go. 

also

*a heap of old pictures that I got from my dad. I have never hung any of them up as I didn't like them but kept them since they where from dad. After years of moving they had stayed in the same box and most of them had mildew and where broken, so I decided to put them where they belong and that was out of my house. I still have memories of them and thats all I need.

and I am still going but I only have our room to go and 2 storage containers of craft items in our sons room to go :) 

In our room I have already gotten rid of 2 garbage bags of junk that was in boxes under the bed and 2 boxes of items to go to the garage sale and 10 items of clothing to the op shop. I shouldn't have that much more to get rid off, its more organising to do then anything .

A photo of the stuff we are garage selling.... *blush*

The story behind it all....

I am ashamed to admit but I was a huge hoarder. The amount of stuff I used to keep was far from normal, but I have worked out why I used to keep every thing. You see my mum had me when she was 39 and all my family where quite old, so as I grew up one by one my family soon left us. Also my mum left my dad when I was about 2 and he didn't contact us again for a few years, I was just getting to know him when he was diagnosed with bowl cancer. I was 7 at the time when it finally spread and took his life. So me keeping things was my way of having control things would not leaving me.

I have grown a lot in the last few years and have my beautiful family of my husband and 2 children now and also my mum that I am very close too, so it's time to say good by to the past and start a new life that we all deserve.
 

Time to get organised!

With our son starting prep , my daughter starting grade 5 and my husband now working. (My husband was the stay at home parent with our son as I was the main worker) I find we need to be alot more organised, my husband did a great job with the day to day things of the house but like alot of men things got overlooked. So now with my hours dropping from full time to part time I have taken over the house again.

I'm  so over having clutter and no system so I have decided it's time to get ORGANISED! to the full.  I plan to menu plan, have set days for certain things like washing ect and have set daily jobs that must be done each day. 

So far its kinda working. 

I have a list for every room and keep it in a lever folder that sits on the top shelf of my book case in the kitchen, also in the folder I have a list of all the once off jobs I would  like to do and for example of a room list here is the kitchen one...

Kitchen

Daily

Sweep floors

Clean off benches

Wash up

Wipe sink down

Wipe  stove over

Wipe cupboards,

Take rubbish out to bin

Weekly

Monday - Clean regularly used appliances / wipe dryer out

Tuesday – disinfectant benches  / sort dump and go

Wednesday -Mop floors / Wash broom and mop

Thursday - Clean fridge /   wipe out side of fridge,

Friday - Clean sink and dish drainer ( bi carb) /  clean bins

Saturday - Tidy drawers / wipe out oven /menu plan/mop

Sunday - Tidy pantry / Tidy bookcases / Cooking for lunches 

Monthly

Week 1 -Sort out freezer

Week 1 -Deco web

Week 1 -Wash curtains

 

Week 2 -Clean oven

Week 2 -Sort on top of Fridge

 

Week 3 -Scrub floors

Week 3 -Pull stove and cupboard out and clean behind them

 

Week 4-Wipe over Windows and walls

Week 4 -Sort cupboards- towel / under sink