The life and times of Libby Withnall

Finally, after far too many weeks, I managed to get all the bedrooms and bathrooms tidied and cleaned. Feels so good.

Once I’d done the main cleaning I spent a bit of time tidying up my stuff in the bathroom.

While we’re here how about I quickly show you how everything is organised.

I LOVE these glass organisers – I have one for my jewellery…

and one for (most of) my makeup.

Then I have all my skin care in a pull out cupboard.

My top drawer has more make up, hair brush, hair ties and bands, tissues and my glasses cleaning cloth.

My other drawer holds all my sample products – these are so good for weekends away, and spare body washes.

The main basin area has some of Kevin’s stuff (funny how guys don’t need anywhere near as much room as us girls!), my hair products and a little container with my lush bath bombs, etc. Underneath we each have a basket with spare products and our toiletry bags.

I was thinking of doing a video showing things in more detail – let me know if you’d like me to do that.

Anyone care to share how they organise their bathroom and beauty products?

Just as the school term draws to an end I’m finally getting my new routine (and heel spur) under control, and as such I’m starting to get around the house and do a more thorough tidy and re-organising of some rooms. Yesterday I tackled the walk-in-wardrobe. As you will see it rather needed it.

Basically I went through every item, getting rid of anything that I no longer liked or was flattering on (you know those things we buy when we’re feeling desperate).  I then tidied the shelves. And finally put away the clothes that don’t currently fit…. but I’m hoping will soon… .

Before….

After… the tubs up the top house Winter clothes.

Before…with my heel spur I back to wearing Crocs again 99% of the time so moved my other shoes to a less prominent position.

After….

Before….

After….probably could do with a little more tweaking…

Before…and the main reason I needed to do this job…. clothes to donate, amongst other things, piled on the floor.

After… Kevin can now get into ALL his drawers…

It’s once again a joy to walk into my wardrobe

One thing I do want to get is some rails so I can better display (and remember to wear) my scarves.

Next job… the ensuite….

Taking a break from watching the Iditarod to show you our new fridge. This is the one that we planned for when we built this house 5.5 years ago and I’ve been patiently waiting for the day we’d get it. Our old fridge was 12 years old and starting to muck up – it wouldn’t make cube ice, was moldy and discoloured and because it was so deep it was hard to get to things at the back.

As you can see it will be so much easier seeing what’s in there and getting access to it.

I think we need to streamline what we keep in the freezer – at the moment we have 3 different kinds of ice cream!!

Last week Christy and I tackled her wardrobe. I cleaned out and sorted the shelves (while she played an online computer game with her friend) and later we went though her clothes and a tub of clothes handed down from Amy.

We managed to find some pants (of Amy’s) to replace the ones she’s outgrown over the Summer. So at least her wardrobe contains clothes that fit her. And everything can now be easily found.

Yes again.

Unfortunately it has been in this state for quite some time.

This was originally the girls computer desk, hence the pull out shelf. But now that they each have computers on the other side of the room this has become a dumping ground. I think it’s looked like this, getting gradually worse, since the October school holidays when I started decluttering my scrapbook supplies.

Of course mess attracts more mess, which was certainly affecting my scrapbooking mojo.

Yesterday I decided it was time to get the room restored to it’s former glory and went to Office Works to purchase some supplies to fill up this big gap to stop this happening again, and to make the room look more finished.

Since I knew Kevin would be tired after work I thought I’d try and make them up myself, since I did get three of them. Luckily they were VERY easy to build and I had them done in no time.

For less than $70 and half an hour of my time I had three great new storage units. Then today I got stuck into the mess and sorted out what I was keeping and what I was getting rid off.

I will buy three matching trays for one top of the drawers next time I’m at Office Works but these work for now (borrowed from around the house). Oh, and I still need to add some labels.

Just a bit of an improvement don’t you think?

To recap… before and after…

Then, of course, I thought I’d best tidy up my desk area…

Ah…much better… now I can’t wait to actually do some layouts.

with just over 6 weeks to go and a couple of presents bought or ordered….it’s time to break out the Christmas planner.

When I was getting the planner out the Anthea Turner “The Perfect Christmas” fell out and almost hit me on the head . Totally forgot I had that book so I look forward to reading through it again.

I also discovered I hadn’t yet shared my Christmas note book with you so I decided to make a video. As you’ll see I had a bit of fun trying to work out how to show it to you – with everything being reversed in the camera .

Here are the resources I mentioned in the video.

Flylady  Holiday Control Journal (free)

Organized Christmas (free)

Cut the crazy out of Christmas (blog that accompanies paid class)

Get Organized for the holidays (paid class)

Yes, yes, I know, I seem to always be tidying up the scrapbook room. But this time I did some major reorganising and tried to be ruthless with getting rid of old products.

Before:

After: Under the desk looks messier as the extra containers are the ones full of stuff to give to the kids or donate. I’m also on the lookout for some extra storage that will fit nicely under there.

A close up …before…

and after…

Before …still need to go through the drawers and cupboard… I got rid of the tub (which stored stickers by theme – now in clear trays in the photo above. Also moved the letter stickers (above).

After….the embellishment drawers got moved off my main work area.

Before….

And after….bought all five purple boxes that Office Works had in stock and hope I can pick up some more (and relocate the baskets)

I’m so much happier with how this looks – it had gotten too cluttered. Now I’m inspired to get on with my UK album – I’m up to Scotland now .

We spent part of Friday re-arranging Christy’s bedroom (at her request) and tiding (at my request). We got it finished this morning and we’re very happy with the result.

Before…

After….

Before…

B

After…..

After…the chest of drawers at the end of her bed is full of lego.

I’ve had this task on my to-do list for about a week but finally on this wet, cold Spring day I got to it.

Before….

and after…

It took a few hours. For the time in ages I took EVERYTHING out and wiped down all the shelves. I’m trialing a swap of the bread bin for a basket and made sure all the opened packets made their way into containers (will need to pick up a few spares tomorrow).

I’m so happy with how it looks. I keep on going to take another peek .