In the Depths of my Freezer

I have a dirty little secret.

Now, I'm all about full disclosure here.  You have come along with me this year as I turned my mess in to a home.  Please don't judge me for what you are about to see.  Believe me, I've judged myself plenty over this one.

It all started, I'm ashamed to say, almost three months ago.  I had make a big huge pot of vegetable soup, and while I was putting some in the freezer, one of the containers opened and spilled a bit.  I started to clean it up and then heard "TO INFINITY AND BEYOND" being yelled from my livingroom.

Hearing this means one of two things.  My little man is attempting to fly like Buzz Lightyear, or he is about to catapult something in the air in an attempt to make it fly like Buzz Lightyear.  Either scenario, not so good.

So, long story short, I left the mess. I forgot the mess.

The mess froze.

I did think of the mess every now and then, but usually when I was right in the middle of something and didn't have the time to empty the freezer and give a good cleaning.

And then my fridge got a smell.  It was totally unrelated to the soup frozen on the floor of my freezer (some alliteration for you), but I've had a hard time getting rid of said fridge smell. We couldn't actually trace it back to a food.  Nothing was spoiled, nothing had a naturally strong smell.  Not quite sure what's going on there, but I cleaned and scrubbed  the fridge last week. Yesterday, I did the freezer.

Oh. My. Goodness.

GROSS.

Wanna see??

The yellowy stuff, that's the soup.  The other ickiness spotted around the freezer, I have NO clue what that stuff is.  Well, other than totally and unacceptably gross. 

Wanna see closer?

Soup, with bits of what seems to be bread crumbs?  Not sure, still gross.  Very VERY gross.

 And this?  This is just the gross stuff that has no name.  I am seriously so ashamed that I let my freezer go this far.  That's what happens when you have an over stuffed freezer.  Be warned.  Well, not really.  I'm sure most people clean their freezers much more frequently than I do.  Is that hair? Oh my...

I got my little man in on the job.  This is him at the very very very start, before he got a good look at what he was going to clean.

Then he looked in and said, "Mama, that is yucky!"

And him hard at work.  I swear he loves to help me clean! And he has so much fun it makes me actually not mind it too much.  Kind of.  This job just really grossed me out, so I really couldn't find much fun in it.

I forgot to take after pictures.  Mainly because my little man was having so much fun it took a little while to get him out of the freezer so I had to get the stuff back in quickly.  But it is clean now.  Unfortunately, the smell still resides in my fridge.

I currently have sections of today's newspaper folded up on each shelf to try and soak up the smell.

But that is a totally different post.

I have to go take a shower.  Those pictures make me need one.

Cheers!
Marina

The Shed is Clean!

But my house is a mess.

This is the living room.  That cat sitting on the couch on the far left.  Yeah, if he doesn't get an attitude change soon, he's on the chopping block as well. I kid, but not really.

This is the front hall.  I couldn't get around the corner to show you around the corner, but you get the picture.  Stuff.

I can hardly contain my excitement about tomorrow.

Yay.

Marina

New Friends and Progress Pictures

Yesterday, after I posted about our trip to see the donkeys, I emailed the Donkey Sanctuary to let them know about the post and to ask them a few questions about our trip.

Kim was nice enough to email me back with all the information I requested, as well as the names of all the donkeys that were in the pictures. So I wanted to share with you the names of our new family friends.

This is Amigo. He seemed like such a shy guy and just peeked at us while we were brushing and loving Summer. When we approached him he would tap his feet (a sign they are nervous) so we just let him watch.


This is Tibet. She was so calm and let us come up to her while she was resting and pet and talk to her. She is such a sweetheart.


Angus was on the field side of the fence. Andrea took this picture and I just love it. He looks so content looking across the field at all his friends.


THIS is Summer. This little lady totally won our hearts over. Especially my little man. We started talking to her and brushing her and when my little man wanted to move on, she followed us where ever we went, wanting more. I think little man could have stayed there all day brushing her side. I think Summer would have stuck around as well!


This is a mother daughter pair, Speckle and Juanita (who has the fly mask on). I took a picture of these two because when Alexander saw them he excitedly said "Mama, look! The donkeys are hugging! They love each other!" And it does look like they are hugging, doesn't it?


This is Earl Grey. He was itchy! He spent a lot of our time there at the feeding trough, so we didn't get to know him too well.


Those are our new friends, as my little man calls them. He poured over these pictures all day today, talking non-stop about his visit with the Donkeys. Needless to say, we'll be visiting again soon!

In case you missed it yesterday, here is the link to The Donkey Sanctuary of Canada .

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To keep you updated on the toy clean up that is currently going on in my living and dining rooms, here are some pictures. If you missed the before pictures visit this blog entry

I have to admit, all the books that were on this shelving unit are currently in a big laundry hamper. I haven't figured out what to do with them yet, but their removal makes such a huge difference in how the space looks (even though it is still a huge mess).


This still looks like a bit of a disaster, but what is in the bins is finally organized. Plus, I moved the bins with the toys the kids play with often in to this shelf so they don't have to drag them through the two rooms.


I have finally labeled all of the bins so everyone knows what goes where. Funny thing, little man pays no attention to them what so ever, but when my husband saw them, he was very happy. Now I can't complain about him just stuffing the toys where ever they fit.


I had these big plans to take pictures of the contents of each bin, print the out, laminate them and stick them on each bin with velcro.


Then reality hit and I grabbed some sticky notes, a pen and some tape and drew my own pictures.


This was a real big thing for me. Usually the big task of getting the real pictures and making them look all pretty would have been enough for me to stall and procrastinate this job away. I didn't realize this until I had finished labeling. And while it doesn't look all that pretty, it is functional. In the real world (and at nine o'clock at night when I'm putting the toys away), that is all that matters.


Cheers!
Marina

Bathroom After Pictures

I have been searching my blog (not that it took too long because there are only 58 posts) for the before pictures of the bathroom.

They are in fact not here.

Strange thing is, I know I posted them. I remember EXACTLY what I was doing when I did it, and all the expletives I used at the time (not really) because my camera was on the fritz.

So I had to use my old one.

And then to upload the pictures, I had to install the software that came with the camera (I didn't know until yesterday that I have a SD slot on my laptop).

Which is when I learned that the software isn't compatible with me anymore.

And that neither Bill Gates or Bill Hewlett or David Packard are going to be creating an update for me.

And then I cried. And so did my old computer because it needed a fan blown on it to work.

Do you remember?

Well the whole point of all that was to post those pictures and I'll be danged if they aren't here!

But they aren't and I'll just post both the before and after pictures.

Bit of a warning though, these are not nearly as dramatic and the other rooms. I did go through everything, much of which I really still use (I went with the if I haven't used it in three months it was outta there). So things were pretty much just rearranged so they weren't falling over each other anymore.

I did get rid of a HUGE load of make-up. Some with an expiration date of 1998, April. I don't wear makeup all that often, as you can tell.

Ok, so here they are:

Another warning, we have a long narrow bathroom which makes it very hard to take pictures, so these pictures aren't the best, but they are the best I could do with two monkeys running around my legs.

This is under the sink. And those are my little man's underwear. It is looking like he is his father's boy.

This is the after, not too much different, just more organized. I find it so hard to organize stuff in this cabinet because of the dang pipes. There is a new fancy way to do pipes, but my husband, who is a plumber, won't do it for me. It would give me so much more room though.

This is an extra cabinet we have beside the sink because there isn't enough room under the sink. It is generally just a open the door, toss your stuff in and close it as quickly as possible. You know, like many tupperware drawers across the country.

Tidy. And minus ten thousand pounds of make up from the 90's.

Sink shot from above. See that shelf there. That is my husband stuff. Except for the shaving cream, that is pretty much it. HA! to be a man.


Tidy.


The tub. More than half those shampoo bottles are full except for one shampoo. I didn't like them, but couldn't throw them away. I hate throwing away things that I paid good money for. So I kept them there as a constant reminder that I shouldn't waste my money trying new shampoos when the one I use now works the best. (Not really, but it sounds a lot better than I was just too lazy to do anything about them)


After. Look at all those Aveeno bottles in the rack. I should really take out stock in Aveeno. Seriously.


This is a before and after in itself because this corner always looks like this, except there is usually a laundry hamper sitting under the light switch. You've seen that before. My husbands clothes are typically hanging out of it.



That's them! It feels nice and tidy now, even if there isn't that much of a difference. And because I'm clean on a molecular level, I didn't have to scrub or anything. Just tidy.

The next room will be more thrilling. I promise.

I just need to decide which one to do next...

Cheers!
Marina

Before and After: Office

Christmas came early this year and both of the children napped this afternoon, so I got to do last minute things and take the after pictures! So here they are. There are MANY pictures, mainly because there were so many areas that needed working on, and because it wasn't just the office that had to be done.

Because of the nature of our home, pretty much all of our rooms, save the kitchen and bathroom, are multi-purpose rooms. Which also meant they were multi chapter rooms when reading the organizing book. At first when I started I was really hard on myself because everything was taking so long, but with two rooms now looking really nice I am so happy that I stuck with it.

In the spirit of full disclosure, there are still little things that need to be done, and I will state those tasks with the pictures. My main focus was getting the office done, but it trickled out to the dining room and the living room as well, so there are minor things that still need to be done that pertain to those two rooms.

Here we go!!

Before: Bookshelves




After: Bookshelves





Before: Desk area



After: Desk area

Everything that was in the desk drawers has been filed, dumped or re-purposed. The drawers are now used to store all of my craft supplies :)



Before: New computer area

To make room for my treadmill, I had to get rid of the desk. Which was really a blessing in disguise because for me, any open desk space is a place for papers to collect. So I used this hutch in the dining room as our new computer station.


After: New computer area

There is just enough room to house the bills that need to be paid, and the pouch they go in when they are paid. Everything else gets filed in my newly organized filing cabinets!


Inside the hutch. The bottom shelf is full of stuff we have to take to the cottage (batteries, candles, flashlights etc) so that shelf hasn't been completed yet because our cabin isn't finished yet. What was originally in this hutch was all of my corning-ware, which I have now stored in the storage space in the dining bench, with the ones I use the most now in the kitchen.




Before: Filing Cabinet

Ok, so I didn't think to take pictures of inside the filing cabinet, but this is what the area around it looked like. This was what took me the longest to do, getting all the papers organized and filed correctly. To start I had to go through all the files and dump the papers I didn't need, and then re label and organize the files and papers left over.


After: Filing cabinet

Not much difference, but trust me, the insides look pretty, lol


Before: Bike area

No, we never used the bike, lol.


After: Bike area

I'm happy to report that I have been using the bike every other day for the past two weeks, and the treadmill on the days that I don't use the bike. I just sit or walk, gazing lovingly at my newly cleaned room. Well, actually, until yesterday there were still piles of books and magazines lying around, but you get the picture.


Well, that's it! I'm pretty proud of myself, even if it took me two and a half months, lol. It was well worth the wait. The pictures are from odd angles because the room is an L shape, but I hope they show all the work that went in to the room.

The one thing I learned from this room? I hate paper, I love my books, and there are many things I enjoy doing that I totally forgot about, probably because of the mess. Ok, that is three things. And there are more now that I thought about it, but those are the most important.

Thanks for looking! I'll be back later this week to tell you what the next room is going to be!

Marina