Happy Place Organizing

Hello friends! 

Hope this finds you doing well. I am really enjoying my spring break. Today I spent the day with some work friends at a small beach not too far from home. I may share some pictures soon. 

I've been working in my happy place again (actually most of this has been done for a few weeks) and have moved some things around and reorganized some things. Want to see what I've been up to? Come on in!

We'll begin to the left as you walk in the door. 

I really didn't do much of anything here except  change out some of the things on top of the white cabinet. Lots of random junk stuff!

The big change I made was moving my two white shelves. These used to be in a corner in an "L" shaped configuration. I had to move them out of the corner for the hubby to access the panel for the guest bathroom shower during the redo, so I decided to move them across the room. My sewing machine cabinet and file cabinet used to be on this wall. 

Here are the two shelves side by side. I eventually want to replace these with an Ikea Expedit shelf system. These shelves are over 20 years old and were super inexpensive. They are still in decent shape but they definitely need to be replaced.

These shelves got reorganized in the move. I used several baskets and bins that I moved from various places in the house to store stuff in. It looks a bit less cluttered this way. I labeled the bins to make it easier to find what I am looking for as well. The striped bins used to house my DVD collection but I am about to redo my system for organizing them so I no longer needed these bins.

I am still liking my gift wrap organization station I put together a few months ago.

I have too much stuff!

Moving on, this is one of the shelves that hold the glass top that is my desk. 

And here is the desk. I took the two small while vertical shelves and turned them on their sides and placed them on my desk. I really like this system. 

I was watching HGTV on this day....House Hunters I believe. 

I am loving my new washi tape holder I ordered from Amazon. It is designed to hold eyeglasses. but it is perfect for washi because of the dividers inside each tray that prevent the rolls from moving back and forth. It is perfection!

And...it's so pretty! I am loving clear storage lately.

Each drawer holds approximately 27 rolls. I couldn't fit all my washi in this unit but it held the majority of it.

I love the spines of my planners and notebooks in this picture. So pretty!

This is another favorite on my desk. I wanted to redo my filing system and keep files to a minimum and in sight instead of in my file cabinet. I find if I keep things out where I can see them and easily get to them I am more likely to use them. I was terrible about letting things pile up before I would file them, but since I started this system I haven't done that. Remember I said I am loving clear storage lately. Well, I wanted an acrylic file box so I could see my pretty file folders that I have picked up over the past year or so at TJ Maxx. I really didn't want to pay the price for one on Amazon and I remembered I had purchased this acrylic beverage dispenser for a couple bucks a few months ago. It was still under my kitchen sink, so I got it out and would you believe it is the perfect size for my file folders!

I am loving it!

It has handles on the sides.

And here is where the spout used to be. I kept it in case I ever change my mind and want to use this for a drink dispenser again, although I'm really doubting I will.

I love how pretty it is and functional too! I can switch out the folder in the front and have a new piece of "art" to look at when I feel like it.

OK...moving on around to the window end of the room. I My 2016 Katie Daisy calendar is a favorite right now as well. I just love her style!

I put a different curtain up. This is the one I made when I first took over this room as a craft room.

My small blue ladder sits beneath and holds a few pretties as well as some jars for storage. Two of them are empty! My paper shredder sits to the right of the ladder.

I am not loving this setup but it will do for now. I would like to put the drawer cube in the middle and the two metal card catalogs on top of it but they are too heavy and were causing the top of the cube to sag, so I switched them out. I need to repaint the card catalogs. I painted one silver for my niece's wedding. We used it for seating place cards. I'm not sure what color I want to paint them now.

Moving on around is my vintage mail sorting desk. This thing is a beast! 

I still want to make a skirt for it...someday! I have bins of old photos under the desk that need to be sorted and categorized. I started this a few summers ago and never finished. Maybe this summer.

The shelves and top hold a variety of craft supplies. My two Raskog carts sit in front for now. 

You may remember the two Antonius organizers I picked up at Ikea when I took Miranda and Shahid to Orlando to the airport last Friday. They hold a lot of my Project Life and planner stuff and I have room to grow.

These two Target Dollar Spot baskets fit nicely in the top of one of the carts and hold more Project Life stuff and notebooks.

And finally, my sewing desk is now situated just inside the door to the right. Not ideal, but I don't sew too much and I can always move it to my dining room table if I need more room. I hemmed a few curtains recently and I was able to do it with no problem, so it will stay here for now.

If you noticed the box underneath, this is what it is for. I wanted a designated spot to put items that I decide to get rid of. Over the past few weeks, I have purged several boxes and bags of stuff. Some went to donation and some to consignment. I plan to put it all in one box for now and when it gets full, I can sort it and get rid of it. I may try to find a couple of those stacking baskets later on, but for now this box will do.

I have been organizing like crazy lately due to my new obsession of watching organization videos on Youtube. It started with just watching craft room organization but I have branched out and am watching organization videos for kitchens, bathrooms, cars and more. I have always loved to organize  but watching these videos has made me love it even more. Anywho, while my craft room may look like a mess, it is actually very organized. I just have a lot of stuff in a very small space. I will be sharing a few of the things I have been organizing soon, along with one of my favorite thrifty finds ever, so stay tuned. 

If you made it to the end...bless you! I know I can be long winded! So, do you like to organize? If so, and you have any tips or tricks, leave a comment for me! 

Until next time.....

Happy Place Organizing!

Hello friends and Happy Monday! I never got the chance to post over the weekend so I thought I would share a few craft room updates with you tonight. Over the weekend, the hubby and I had a date day and saw the Peanuts Movie. It was super cute! We had a nice lunch and did a little shopping too! I have begun making purchases for my upcoming trip to Prague. Now...as you know, I am a Florida girl and do not own a lot of winter clothes. It does get cold here but it tends to warm up during the day so we have to layer and most of my layers are fairly thin. I will be needing some warmer clothing to take to Prague since December and January are the cold months there and it even snows! Fingers crossed that it will snow while I am there! Anywho, I found a cute pair of short black boots at TJ Maxx. I also ordered a pair of riding boots from DSW and they arrived Friday. So excited to be a boot owner finally! I will share my Prague purchases in a few weeks after I have finished hunting and gathering..lol!

So, after we got home from our day out, I put groceries away and immediately started working on partnering everyone for the Christmas Ornament Exchange. So excited about that! It took me about 3 hours on the computer copying and pasting, assigning and reassigning partners, and so on to get it all sorted out and then I had to e-mail everyone. So, no time to blog Saturday. Thanks again to everyone who is participating! Sunday was a lazy day and I spent some time playing in my happy place tweaking and rearranging. Let me share.....

Over the past couple weeks I have cleaned out the closet and  rearranged a few smaller pieces of furniture in my room, which leads to reorganizing. I am always reorganizing things when I think of a more functional way to store things. This is what lead to cleaning out the closet....

You may be wondering how that led to me cleaning out the closet. Let me explain. At school, if we want to get rid of things in our classrooms, we just sit things out in the hall for other hoarders teachers to grab. One of the Pre-K teachers had this in the hall. It was still in the original packaging. I decided to bring it home and use it in my craft room. So, I put it together with the original thought that I would use it for stickers and scrapbook supplies, but after assembling it, I knew it would work perfectly for a gift wrap station. Well, most of my gift wrapping supplies have been housed in the closet, so I began digging it all out so I could sort through it all and get rid of some things and store the rest in this piece.  It works perfectly!

I assembled it inside out so the craft brown side would show. I love this look! It should have looked like this, but I did not want that bright color in my craft room. It would not have matched anything. It sits on top of these two little shelves next to my sewing station.

I put a tag on the front and wrote this on it....because that's what I believe. :)

The baskets below hold ribbons, bows, and basket filler/grass.

The little metal container holds some tags. 

The shelf on the right holds cards and stationery items. I have been trying to send snail mail out more often....especially to Miranda. She enjoys getting mail from home. 

Here's the most recent mail I sent her. She received it today and sent me pictures. I had fun water coloring the envelope! We used to call her Randa Pooh when she was little so Pooh Bear adorns the card as well. I used paint, stickers, washi tape, and drew all the little black and red hearts myself.

I need to get started on another one to send soon!

Moving on, I placed the tray I thrifted a few weeks ago on my big desk for now. It holds a few of my apothecary jars full of goodies, along with my twine holder and my glitters.

Back in July when I took Miranda to the airport in Tampa to leave for Prague, I went to the Container Store. I purchased this piece and am so glad I did. I left it empty until I came up with the best use for it. A few weeks ago, I decided what that use was. I am using it to hold all my die cuts, ephemera, enamel dots, flair, cork pieces, and so on for scrap booking. It works great!

I sorted my die cuts and ephemera by color and each color has a box. Here are my pinks and blues.

This one holds all my cork pieces.

This one holds flair and a variety of other decorative pieces.

Moving on to my desk....this is how I just left it. I was in there piddling a little while ago and have been trying to leave it clean when I finish.

I recently decided to use my Recollections carousel to corral all my tools. It is working out very nicely. I like having all of these often used items in one spot.

I use my vintage mail sorters to hold stickers. Here is the one that sits on my desk.

This little milk glass dish sits on top of my file cabinet to the right of my desk. The other mail sorter sits just behind it.

Do you remember the metal tissue box cover I received in my Thrift It, Gift It, Facelift It challenge back in August? Well, I finally put a box inside and I gold leafed the feet and wreath on the front. I love it now! The box inside is painted gold. Very elegant little trash can tidy tub isn't it? :)

And, that my friends brings me to the end for now. It is almost my bedtime! I am excited that we have Wednesday off from school for Veteran's Day! My sister and two best friends will be coming over that evening for our weekly planner night and I am excited to see them. I hope you have a wonderful week my friends. 

Until next time.....