Out of the Closet. (At Least Most of my Junk.)

Yesterday, my productiveness was legendary.

I wish I had taken a before and after picture of our walk-in bedroom closet for you.  But since I didn't, allow me describe it.

Not our closet...just a random pic online.
Ours MIGHT have been worse.  

Before:  stacked storage bins and miscellaneous items (purses, bags, dirty laundry) had toppled in the doorway.  Therefore, the entrance to the closet was completely blocked.  Literally. 

The situation occurring past the blockage was pretty bad, too:  garbage, books, CD's, etc.  It was the embarrassment of all embarrassments, in the most spectacular way.  

Generally, no one ever sees our room.  

We keep our shiz together, like 75% of the time, in the area of the house that people will see if they stop by.  

The door to our room remains closed to shifty eyeballs of those who are outside of our family unit, just waiting to judge us on the typhoon-like state of our bedroom.

Fun thing I found #1:
Halloween card from Chris sent
from Iraq.

We went to a Superbowl party at a house last Sunday.  

This party made me realize that just perhaps, we weren't normal.  And that at 30-something we needed to get some of our crap together.  Most specifically, the crap most people would never, ever see. 

 (Gads, let me clarify: I KNOW we aren't normal in more ways than I can count on my two hands.   This post just has to do with cleanliness.)    

The living area of the house we visited was gorgeous and clean.  But whatev, I can do that, too, when we have company coming.   

The epiphany came at some point after halftime when I heard a squeal from Maggie.

She had found a cat in the master bedroom.  

Cats, because of allergies, are something that we are probably never going to own again and have never owned as long as Maggie has been alive.  

In college and grad school we had two phenomal cats:  Happy and Flipper.  They were the best cats.  EVER.  Especially our tuxedo can, Happy, who I am pretty sure believed he was a dog.  

Fun thing #2:  Visitor's Guide.
We were hoping to see Greg Iles.  We didn't.

They had grown up around small children and nothing really fazed them.    They were our entertainment when we were really, really poor.  We recorded them playing on the bed, playing in the bathtub, sleeping, eating....animal lovers know how it is, right?  

We have hours of video of them.   I'm sure  we forced people to view the footage at some point in time.       

So, Maggie usually does backflips when she sees a cat.  And because of her unadulterated enthusiasm, the cat normally freaks out and hides under a bed.  

This cat, however, allowed her to squeeze its face and hug it for quite some time.  I learned later that the sad little thing was thirteen years old, and probably wasn't even able to run away like it truly wanted to.   

And I felt bad about it. 

#3 FLOPPY DISK!

The cat wasn't the epiphany, though.  The cat was in these folks' bedroom.  Which was IMMACULATE.  It looked like a magazine. 

Now, since we have lived in Florida, we have had tours of many houses.  However, 90% of them were inhabited by retired/semi-retired folks. 

And I sort of EXPECT that their houses/rooms would look like Traditional Home magazine.  

However, these people had two small children.   I had just assumed that everyone who had kids had trash and shiz lying everywhere.  

Let me tell you:  even their bedside tables were clutter free.  And their bed was made.  WITH THROW PILLOWS.

This troubled me and inspired me at the same time.   It prompted me to action.

#4:  $30 certificates to Bakers Square.
Are those even open anymore?  Any takers? 

I decided to tackle the most shameful area of my entire house:  the master bedroom closet.

I took some advice, however, of a friend.  She said, "no matter what you do, stay in the room you are cleaning ~as much as you can .  If you need to throw items outside the door to deal with later, you do that."  

This seems like such a simple little thing, right?  Just stay in the freaking room!  

Don't start the closet, then think about the dishwasher that needs to be emptied.  Then distractedly notice that the floors are dirty and vacuum/mop them.  Nor should I even allow the gobs of laundry mocking me inside the laundry room to even inhabit my mind.  Not one teeny bit.    

STAY IN THE DAMN CLOSET.  

#5:  .32 stamps.
What year were THESE from?

I have serious ADD when it comes to cleaning.  I will start one project, drop it, then move to another.  This is why things rarely are finished to  par.  

I was ruthless with my clothes.  I took them out of the bins/off the hangers/out of drawers and inspected every one of them.  No more of the sentimental crap that got me into this mess ~ literally ~ that I was facing yesterday.  

I donated five garbage bags of clothes.  

Really, I wasn't going to wear a mumu, as fun and as comfortable as I thought it looked.  There was no way, if I wanted to stay married to my husband.  For some reason, I think mumus would be the line in the sand and when I start wearing them, it might possibly be the end of my marriage.

I didn't need to keep panties that I wore BEFORE my husband and I ever even met (we've been together 13 years).   

I threw those out, along with any g-strings from that area.    Because...really.  Who the HELL am I kidding?  

So yesterday, I didn't make it out of my pajamas.  That was the price I paid for  digging into the monstrosity first thing in the morning.  I didn't brush my teeth nor did I put deodorant on.  I was FUNKY.  

But I got the job done, pretty much.  There is some tweaking here or there that needs to be done.  I want to organize it a little better and maybe put some closet "systems" in there that make it look classier.  

This is what we got, though.  To some it might look cluttered, but it is a 180 degree difference from where it started.   And believe it or not, it was about 7 hours worth of work.  

I had these hooks in my garage for years and didn't know what to do with them.
THIS MUST have been a Pinterest idea; I don't come up with these ideas on my own.

Containment and Peeing in Public: Opportunity Lost

 
A good friend came over on Saturday morning to install THIS:

Her escape plot is FOILED!!!!!!!!!

THIS is going to make my life so much freaking easier, I am almost doing back flips.   Maggie is not going to be able to run outside NAKED ANYMORE!

In the past few weeks, nothing will keep this child inside.

She knows how to unlock doors, turn dead bolts  and is not afraid to run full tilt down the street, her family just an afterthought residing in that two-story craftsman style brick behind her.

The neighbors probably think we have zero control over our brood, and honestly, we sort of don't. Particularly the two year old.

But thanks to our friend Hank, his tool box and this J-lock, we have more control than we have had, like, ever.

It's a good thing we live in a cul-de-sac.

Not such a good thing that there was a water-mocassin in our yard two weeks ago that almost bit Wesley.

Just ONE of the many number of reasons this two year old needs to be contained.

Oh, also it was pointed out to me that I was super-duper mean on my post yesterday when I stated that my brother was "pushing 40."   He is actually 35.  

I rounded up on his age and what I meant was that he is on the "latter half" of this decade to 40.  As am I.

I was using it as an illustration, people.  Sheesh.

He's still not getting any younger ladies.

Another thing I wanted to mention:  yesterday Chris and I ran errands ALL DAY and about half of that time I had to use the bathroom, but I didn't want to use a public toilet.

I realized that I didn't move fast enough on my Go-Girl purchase that I discussed a few weeks ago.

I was sitting in the middle of the Publix parking lot  ~ or PUBIX, as my dad likes to call it ~ waiting for my husband to pick up a prescription, and I realized that I COULD PEE RIGHT THERE AND NO ONE WOULD KNOW IT!

I was wearing my adorable Boden Denim skirt that I could just yank up a little.   I could just pee in the Go-Girl and not one person in that parking lot would be any wiser.

Totally freaking cute, right?  BodenUsa.com  

I'm going to have to order the Go-Girl pronto.

I better get back to my futile task of cleaning up the house.  It is futile because the two year old keeps tearing everything apart after I clean it up.

So I am really not sure why I am bothering with it.

I don't know how people do it with multiple children at home, I really don't.

 I mean, really, hats off to you.

It's about 2pm and I'm almost ready for vodka.  

Whew.