30 Bags in 30 Days: Days 26-30

And here we are, and the Laundry room.  The ever so fitting finale of my bags series.  I must have you know that the amount of stuff thrown away from this room was remarkable.

I don't know about you, but when we buy something new we always tend to keep the box for a month or so just in case we have to return the item.  Come to find out we have not thrown away our boxes in over 10 months.  Do you know how many baby items we have bough, purchased, or received in 10 months??

This many:

Also behind th pile of boxes you will se the mountain of other stuff we are donating, and to be honest there is lots more that I didn't even take photos of. 

We ended up doing most of the laundry room the day we did the office closet because we had to have a place to put the stuff we wanted to move to the laundry room (that also explains the Christmas tree that is still us as this photo was taken the first week of Jan.) :)

We did awesome in this room and really had over 10 bags of things that were garbage or donations.  My husband even went through all his old stuff that he has kept forever and got rid of some stuff!  So proud of him - I didn't even ask him too - I just told him to put the boxes that he never gets into into the attic. 

I have definately been enjoying my more organized areas of the home already. We have already started creating my craft space in the walk in closet in the office downstairs. Stay tuned for a post on that!
So that's it folks.  30+ bags in less than 30 days.  What was the most random item you found in your cleaning??  I didn't find very many shocking items, but we have already made $60 on stuff we have been selling - so that's something that was definately unexpected!

30 Bags in 30 Days: Days 24 & 25

Another easy day here!  I combined the two and just got one bag out of it.   Here is a photo of the pile (on the floor).

I would also love to draw your attention to the book/magazine shelf on the wall.  That would be a hubby Pinterest project of a shelf made from a pallet!!  Free projects are my favorite!

Source: pinterest.com via Cassie on Pinterest

30 Bags in 30 Days: Days 19-23

We are now starting to enter into the downstairs territory which means we are getting to the REALLY scary part. Our home has a full basement that we really only use for laundry and watching tv in the late evenings. The basement is completely finished with two guest rooms and a bathroom, but because those are not regular usage areas we tend to store lots of stuff there.

Also contributing to this problem, is our lack of a garage.

Here's what happened:

Day 19 - Office Small Closet:

(my bags)

(my newly organized closet)

Yes the closet pictures IS organized. Linens on top, then Games, then gift wrap, then sewing supplies, then scrapbooking and other craft supplies. I also would like to add that I am super glad we did not find out the gender of addy for many reasons... one being the fact that I am set on baby gift bags for LIFE.

Day 20 & 21: Office Walk-in closet shelves and floor.

(embarrasing before)

(awesome after)

(what we got rid of)

You may we wondering where the REST of the stuff went since the stuff we got rid of is not nearly enough to clean that entire mess of closet. It turns out this closet is where we put stuff we want to keep but don't have a place for yet. So there were about 30 gift bags that I folded down and put in their proper place. There was also some baby stuff that we moved to the Laundry area. Basically this night we started the Laundry room as well so we had places to put stuff. These days are starting to run together but that's OK! It's just getting our projects done faster.

I am planning on turning that walk in closet into a craft room of sorts. It will still have some regular storage, but I'd like to have a place where I can leave my sewing machine out and some craft messes without it being visable to others.

Day 22: Office Desk

Day 23: Office Bookshelf

We did not actually get rid of anything on the bookshelf. FAIL. But once you see the laundry room post you will see I definately made up for it. But I did find this lovely book Amy Butler's Little Stitches for Little Ones which you see projects from coming very soon! :)

30 Bags in 30 Days: days 16-18

When I added Addy's "areas" to the cleaning list I was actually doubting that I would come up with bags of stuff to get rid of.  I'm saving most of her clothes in case we end up having another girl, and same with a lot of her toys - plus we aren't toy crazy in our house so there aren't a zillion to go through.  What I did find was lots of empty boxes and bag from baby gear that we had been keeping in case we had to return something and now that we know we aren't going to I could part with them.  I also moved some of the stuff she isn't using any more down to the storage totes (sniff sniff) and made a lot of space in the areas we cleaned.  I actually didn't get rid of anything that was on her shelf which was one of the days but I got rid of enough in the closet and drawers to make up for it. 

Closet:

Might I also plug that the box under the bag on the left is one of my FAVORITE baby items ever!! It's the Inglesina Fast Table Chair that we use on our counter for addy to sit, take to restaurants, put at the table...ah.  Love that thing, a sweet gift from my sweet friends Amy & Erlene.

Dresser:

Does anyone else cry or almost cry every time they put away some of their babies clothes?? Sheesh. 

30 Bags in 30 Days: Days 12-15

So I have actually had a few of my friends say they are joining me on this challenge!  One even suggested that we all share what the randomest item we found was... so keep your eye out for "that" item during this process. 

Here are my bags of proof:

Day 12 & 13 - bedside tables and jewelry.  Note that I never actually said what size the bags had to be.  I found that since jewelry is small and our bedside tables are a simple shelf that there wasn't a whole lot to go through.  These were somewhat of vacation days and I combined them to one.

Day 14 - TV Cabinet:  Our TV cabinet upstairs really has become the catch all of all random items in our main living space.  We very RARELY even use the TV up here, but I like to have it for the occasional quick video for Addy every once in a while. 

before

after

Keep in mind those shelves are DEEP so there was a lot of stuff behind the visable, and now there is not!  Here is the photo of what we got rid of.

Lots of VHS tapes we finally were able to part with, a bunch of garbage, and some random "where on earth did that come from" items.

Day 15: Bathroom Drawers

Anyone else LOVING the feeling of getting rid of all their stuff??

30 Bags in 30 Days: Days 7-11

The closet and dressers are complete.  This is the area I was most concerned about because it involved the participation of my husband.  He was actually very willing to go through his stuff and most of what we got rid of was his (because I go through my clothes quite often).  Here is his ginormous pile!

Seriously only about 3 items were mine in this pile!!

So now our closet is ways organized.  He also managed to free up a whole drawer in his dresser so now I don't have to shove things in and worry about breaking drawers when I put away the laundry!!

We also implemented a pinterest idea:

Source: Uploaded by user via Cassie on Pinterest

Shower rings on a hanger to hang your scarves.  The only problem is they slide around and it gets off balance.  I'm thinking that a lot of hot glue can help that problem!!

Here are my other bags of proof:
Day 7: Living Room Drawers (in a couple side tables)

Day 8: Coffee Table (we have a hidden storage compartment)

Days 9-11: were all closet related and photos are above which easily is 3 LARGE bags worth! 

Phew!

30 Bags in 30 Days: Days 5 & 6 - End of hall Closet & drawers

At the end of our hall lies a closet perfectly designed to collect random items. The top has random kitchen stuff, the middle shelf has towels and dishrags, and the bottom shelf has everything from dog shampoo, to makeup, to medicine.

The drawers below contain a random assortment of: food processor attachments, placemats, cloth napkins, clothing, hats, etc.



From the drawers I was able to collect:

Some clothes, some extra curtains, and some expired cake mix.

From the cabinet I was able to collect:

A lot of garbage, and a lot of extras of things I won't be needing and I knew a friend might be needing so I pawned them off on her.

A lot of the trash cam from me consolidating packages of things. So I had two ibuprofen containers... put the contents into one and threw out the other. Also got rid of some dishrags that were way overdue.

Loving all the stuff we are getting rid of!!

30 Bags in 30 Days: Day 4 - "Coat" Closet

Well silly me forgot to take a before photo of the dreaded "coat" closet.  My husband suggested putting everything back the way it was but that is just too exhausting.  Then I remembered "that show" from when I was younger that had a closet that opened and tons of stuff fell out during the opening or closing credits.  I thought it was Sanford and Sons but I CANNOT find a photo or video of it anywhere online!!  So I was going to post a photo of that closet.... so you get the idea.
Here is the cleaned out version!

I put a box on the top shelf to hold all our hats/gloves for safe keeping and got rid of a TON of stuff including jackets, empty boxes, an old vacuum, and garbage!!

Here is our "bag(s)" photo:

2 large bags of trash and two bags of donate/sell items!  So you can probably now really imagine what the closet looked like!!

SOOOOO good to have that cleaned out, and we even have room for... coats!!!

30 Bags in 30 Days: Days 1-3

Here I am on day 3 of my purging project.  I have actually enjoyed this!!  It feels remarkably good to just get rid of some stuff!

Day 1: Kitchen Drawers - these tend to get a bit out of control - especially the tupperware drawer and junk drawer.  Yikes. 
Before of one drawer:

After of Same Drawer:

I was amazed and how easy it was to have a clean non-frustrating drawer.  The tupperware drawer especially would drive me nuts because I'd have to push everything around just to get it closed.  Ugh. 

Ridiculous things I learned during these first three days of cleaning. 

-I had 5 sets of measuring spoons (I kept 3) 

-I had some very old cake mixes shoved in the back of my pantry

-I had two cannisters for a lot of spices so I consolidated and created a lot more room in my spice drawer

-I had way more tupperware than any person could use in a wash cycle

Here are my "bag" photos for proof that I did in fact get rid of a bag each day.  Bagged items are trash, other items are donate.

Day 1 - Kitchen Drawers

Day 2 - Pantries

Day 3 - Kitchen Cupboards

Not too shabby if I say so myself.  Next comes the dreaded hall "coat" closet.  ugh.

30 Bags in 30 Days

Remember the 30 Bags in 30 Days Challenge I posted about here a few weeks ago??  Well I have a confession to make.  I couldn't wait until January to start.  And then I was thinking oh, I'll just post it in January so it seems like a "January project."  Then I thought... who cares?!?!  Anyone who want so join in on this challenge will be doing in in their own timing anyways, so why not just start it!

The Challenge:Picking 30 areas of my home to clean out and get rid of a bag's worth of stuff. All good items will be donated or sold.

Would anyone like to join me?? Here are my areas I plan to attack, you obviously will need to modify the list to your own needs. If you plan to join me go ahead and share your list if you'd like!   If you aren't ready to start yet, take the last few days of the year to get your list put together.

1. Drawers in Kitchen
2. Both Pantries
3. Cupboards in Kitchen
4. "Coat" Closet
5. End of hall Drawers
6. End of hall Shelves
7. Living room drawers
8. Living room Coffee Table Storage
9. Closet (clothes)
10. Dressers (clothes)
11. Closet Shelves
12. Night Stands
13. Jewelry
14. TV Cabinet in Upstairs Living Room
15. Bathroom Drawers
16. Addy's Closet
17. Addy's Bookshelf
18. Addy's Dresser
19. Office Small Closet
20. Office Walk-in closet floor
21. Office Walk-in closet shelves
22. Office Desk
23. Office Bookshelf
24. Dresser in guest room
25.Closet in guest room
26. Laundry room white shelves
27. Laundry room black shelves
28. Laundry room water heater room
29. Laundry room floor
30. Extra day for laundry room because I know I'll need it :)