Who else has a room where all the random stuff gets stored?  You know, when company is coming over and you just don’t have time to find the right spot for whatever it is, so you just throw it in that random room and close the door.  All the while, praying that your guests don’t want a tour or question, “what’s behind door #1?”.  Well, that room for us is the downstairs bedroom that we use as an office.  It very often becomes the catch-all area…

It’s been driving me absolutely crazy recently.  I walk in and immediately want to either burn everything or throw it all away, without looking at any of it to see, is this something I should keep?  No.  Trash it all!!!

So on my day off today, I made a short list of rooms in our house that I specifically wanted to tackle, and this was at the top.  I think the hubs will be happy with my decision.

Here are the before pictures…

First you have “my area”, which is my little desk and the filing cabinet we purchased last fall from Staples.  That’s all that was supposed to be in this area… Somehow I’d inherited what Andrew calls the “garage” for Reynolds’ plasma car.  My area wasn’t terrible, but when you turned to the left…it got much scarier.

Andrew’s area…

This are had become just unruly.  Not his fault, but his desk had been overtaken by forms, a cup of computer sticky things (or USB drives) and random other things including my tool bag.   Then there is the treadmill and the trampoline that just don’t have homes, the baby rocker that was brought down a few weeks ago for a party we had, you know, just in case a baby needed to rock.  And the bookcase that I just don’t know what to do with, mainly because it’s enormous and we don’t have a ton of books or other knick-knacks to fill the space.

Lastly, there’s my closet – that I worked on earlier this year, revamping it to house the wrapping paper and other gift supplies and some craft things that I’ve started collecting (maybe not intentionally…).

It was waaay out of control.  I partly blame a toddler.  But then I also blame my laziness (sad face).  From boxes and tissue paper that hadn’t been put away, to mantle decorations that were unruly to construction paper, coloring books and gifts, you couldn’t walk in the room anymore.

This was my first project of the day and I was excited and determined that it would look amazingly better after about an hour.

Without any purchases, just with organizing and corralling, here’s where we are:

The mantle decor has been stored in a box (for now – I’ll be looking for a better solution this weekend).  Tissue paper and bags have been put in their rightful places (the larger rubbermaid container at the back of the closet).  Craft supplies have been put together in a Halloween candy basket.  The Christmas ribbon (which I’ll admit, is completely overwhelming) is in a box and old GAP bag.  The dead sewing machine (one day I’ll try to fix it or just throw it out) has been put next to the notions so that I can find everything all at once.  The Christmas/shower/birthday gifts I’ve already purchased are all corralled together in one spot at the front of the closet.

With the closet looking better than it was, I moved on to the actual office.  Putting papers, etc. away (either in the trash or the filing cabinet).  Putting a few pictures on the wall – that’s my Nama and PawPaw (my dad’s parents) who were so very elegant and dapper…along with a picture of Andrew and me with my Aunts and Uncles from last year.  {Nama and PawPaw would be so proud to see that photo}.

Then, in the middle of the window I thought I’d be smart and put up a picture my friend, Shields painted of a happy, fat bird a couple of years ago.

To Andrew’s side, which is the most impressive…I put a lot of the papers away, some in his chair that are more of me saying, “Hey Love, I’m not sure what to do with these, but I think you should look at them and put them away where YOU know where they’ll be…”

I stuck the treadmill in the spot where Nama’s sewing machine had been {one day I’ll get up the courage to use hers…}.  Cleaned up the  bookcaseSo that it looks a bit cleaner and not so disheveled.

But then, there’s still the random bar.  This was in our dining room until it was recently re-modeled.  Anyone need a bar?  It’s pretty nice…the top spreads apart so that there’s more surface area…  {Willing to sell for cheap! :)}

Ready to tackle your crazy and unruly catch-all space?  Go ahead!  You can do it without spending a dime!

Now to check this room off my list and move on to the next!

Happy weekend y’all!