Oh, boy…the bathrooms.  Our bathroom is a mess.  Disorganized and in need of a deep clean.  So today was a little daunting and I really didn’t want to do it, especially considering cleaning the bathrooms is my least favorite chore.  But I persevered and got it done.  The guest bath didn’t need much organization – just a light cleaning, so I didn’t take any pictures of that.  But here are the before and after shots of our bathroom…

Under my sink:

The hardest part of organizing under John’s sink was going through all our “extras” and our “travel” items.  I decided that I probably didn’t need to keep six travel-sized bottles of the same shampoo and four half-full travel-sized bottles of body wash.  So I kept the ones that were most full and put our “travel” items in one bin and our “extras” (toothbrushes, toothpaste, contacts, etc.) in another bin.  Here is the before and after under John’s sink:

We have three drawers in our bathroom and here are their befores and afters:

And the full bathroom before and after:

Since my kitchen is not very large, I got most of the kitchen cleaned and organized on Day Four.  But I did have a few things to do.  The door leading to our garage is in the kitchen.  There’s a landing where we put an old bookcase that houses all the kitchen items that don’t fit in our kitchen.  After living here for 8 months, it has kind of become a disaster.  So organizing that area and cleaning out our fridge were my two areas of focus today.  Here’s the before and after for the bookcase.

Today is the day I’ve been waiting for.  My kitchen cabinets are a mess!  When you look at the picture of my kitchen, you’ll see that I don’t have much space to store anything.  I have three sets of upper cabinets, one big lower cabinet and two skinny lower cabinets.  I also have one wide drawer and two six-inch wide drawers.  That’s it.  And we moved from a house with a very large kitchen with tons of storage.  Making things accesible in this apartment has been a challenge, but after decluttering, cleaning, and organizing the cabinets, I think I might have found something that works.  I got through the cup/plate cabinet, the spice cabinet, the Tupperware cabinet, and one of the skinny lower cabinets.  I also organized the cutlery drawer (and cleaned out the crumbs in the cutlery organizer!) and my skinny drawer with kitchen gadgets. I didn’t need to organize the pantry because I just did that a couple of weeks ago.  But the refrigerator could use a little help.  We also have a landing outside our garage door where we have a large bookshelf we use for storage of all the kitchen stuff that didn’t fit in our miniscule kitchen.  I plan on getting to that tomorrow on Day 2 of our kitchen cleaning party!

Here is the kitchen before.  Notice the lack of storage:

Here is the cup/plate cabinet before and after:

The spice cabinet was so hard to use!  I didn’t have a very good system of storing them, so they just got put back where ever.  As I was pulling the spices out, I realized I have 4 jars of ground mustard, 2 jars of Cream of Tarter, 3 jars of ground ginger, and 2 jars of onion powder.  All because I didn’t know if I had the spice and I couldn’t find it when I looked before going grocery shopping.  Solution: a Spice Inventory.  I typed it up so I could read it posted it on the inside of the cabinet.  I also grouped my spices by (sort of) alphabetical order and I’m storing them in bins for easy access.  Take a look at the before and after:

Here’s the before and after for the Tupperware cabinet:

The cutlery drawer before and after:

The skinny cabinet where we have some small appliances, before and after:

And, finally, our pantry, which as I said earlier, didn’t need a lot of work:

Today is all about finishing up the living room.  If you finished your living room yesterday, take a break today!  I don’t really have a before picture of the living room.  It didn’t look dirty – things were picked up etc.  But here are some after pictures after I deep cleaned.  (Our living room is one big room that runs into the dining room.)

Today will be day one of two of working on the living room.  The plan is to declutter, clean, and organize.  Go through all the spaces where junk collects and declutter.  Then while you have everything out, clean the space.  Before you put it back in, organize it.  It’s a bit labor-intensive, but it is worth it.  Today, I worked on our toy storage, crafting storage, and coffee table.  I also pulled out our DVD’s, dusted the shelves and put them back in alphabetical order.  Tomorrow I’ll be working on cleaning the other areas (i.e., windows, vacuuming the couch and the floors, and baseboards).

Here is the bookshelf we use for toy storage.  As you can tell, it was getting out of control – and 2/3 of his toys are in storage!

I pulled every last toy out of the shelves, dusted the shelves and organized the toys by type.  I put all the cars together, all the animals together, the blocks together, etc.  I took pictures of the things in each container and plan to print the pictures off and put them on the outside of the containers. I also bought a bunch of Ziploc bags and organized the puzzles.  I put the pieces of each puzzle in their own gallon-sized bag and then put the puzzle and its pieces in a jumbo bag.  Hopefully this will make them much easier to store.

Finally, I worked on my crafting center.  I have craft items for Grant, as well as my sewing and jewelry supplies.  It wasn’t terrible before, but there was room for improvement:

I followed the same procedure: pull everything out, clean, and organize.  I thought about the quote from yesterday and threw away things that weren’t useful.  Then I rearranged them so I could access them a little easier.

One last thing…our son has been testing the limits, as all two-year olds do.  He frequently tries to throw toys that he’s not supposed to, or he decides not to pick up his toys.  In the case of the former situation, the thrown toys are automatically taken away.  In the latter situation, he knows that he gets to keep the toys he picks up.  If he decides not to pick them up, Mom and Dad get to keep them for awhile.  So, we have two baskets on top of the TV.  The basket on the left is for toys that have been taken away before noon.  The basket on the right is toys that have been taken away after noon.  The “before noon” toys get returned the following day, but the “after noon” toys have to wait until the day after tomorrow.  It’s worked very well and G gets to see his toys that have been taken away.  When he asks for them, we get to reinforce why they’ve been taken away.  And we’re pleased to say the baskets are less full now than they were when we first started.

“Have nothing in your home that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” ~William Morris

So, today, we’re doing a clean sweep.  We’re not diggin in cabinets or closets yet – just surfaces.  Grab a trash bag for trash and a box marked “Give/Sell” to collect things you don’t want or need.  I also had a basket for things that belong in other rooms, since I’m notorious for not putting things where they belong.  Remember the above William Morris quote as you go along – if you’re not using it or you don’t LOVE it, it goes.  If you can’t find the strength to part with it, try creating a box labeled “Declutter – STORAGE” and put it in the basement or garage for six months.  If you don’t go after it in those six months, you don’t need it.  (I got this idea from this blog.)  I’m actually doing this in addition to the Give/Sell box since we’re in an apartment and we might need some of the decor, etc. when we move into a house.  It was actually very cathartic to go through and everything and throw stuff away.  I’m so used to just putting it where I think it should go, when all along, where some of the things should go in the trash.  (Especially those cheapy Kids’ Meals toys!)  I also had to remind myself not to organize other areas as I put stuff away.  Just put it away and we’ll deal with it later!  So, here are a few before and after shots of my first day.  If you have a blog and want to post pictures of your progress on it, feel free to leave your link in a comment so we can all follow each other!

Before                                   KITCHEN                                 After

Before                                        LAUNDRY                                          After

Before                                            COFFEE TABLE                                     After

Before                                                   DINING TABLE                                         After

Before                                                          SEWING TABLE                                               After

Before                                                   DESK                                                   After

Before                                        NIGHTSTAND                                   After

Before                                          MASTER BATH                                 After

As you can see, there pretty much wasn’t any surface in our place that wasn’t covered in stuff.  Kind of ridiculous, huh?  Oh, and here is the world’s cutest helper decorating my DECLUTTER/STORAGE box:

Here is the laundry basket full of things from various rooms that didn’t belong.  When I was finished with all the rooms, I took everything out of the basket and sorted it according to room.  Then it was really easy to just take each room’s stuff to where it belonged.

Now that we have some visual progress, hopefully it will be great motivation for tomorrow: Day One (of two) of the Living Room.

WE MADE IT!  We have finished the challenge and I think we could all agree that we’ll never be the same.  My official verdict is this:  It was tough.  In order to complete this and do it right you have to be a very dedicated person.  I’m not that person, so I had quite a few cheats (if you’ll recall!).  But, in the end, I did end up losing some:

I lost a combined total of 3 pounds and 5 inches (1.75 inches lost at my waist!).  My physical stamina also increased.  At the beginning, I was able to do 16 push-ups in one minute.  Today, I completed 31.  I also only did 31 sit-ups at the beginning and today I did 51.  I didn’t bother to do the wall-sit since I performed in the “Excellent” range the last time I did it.

Overall, I’m pleased with the results.  I do think I could have had even better results had I stuck to the plan to a T.  But with a busy  family and a tight budget to stick to, I honestly don’t think it was very realistic.  I know, though, that my exercise and eating habits have changed and for the most part, I like the change.

Thanks to everyone for following along with me, encouraging me, and keeping me accountable.  I know for a fact that I would not have gotten this far without you!!!

My next challenge is a spring cleaning party – ’cause, hey – a clean house contributes to your health too, right?  Check out the about section and check back tomorrow for a new post!  (By the way – we’re going on vacation, so the spring cleaning posts might be a little sporadic, but I’ll be trying!)

*Breakfast: bowl of Kashi Go-Lean cereal with skim milk

*Lunch: Grilled cheese sandwich with chicken & tomatoes, apple

*Snack: almonds (do I have to admit they were chocolate-covered?)

*Dinner: Black Bean & Corn Taquitos

EXERCISE

*Circuit One: Dumbbell Presses (1st set: 15 reps, 2nd set: 8 reps; 3rd set: 3-6 reps); Dumbbell Flys on Body Ball with Crunches (to muscle failure); Leg Presses (1st set: 15 reps; 2nd set: 8 reps; 3rd set: 3-6 reps); Jump Squats (to muscle failure); Jump rope fast (2 minutes)

*Circuit Two: Close-Grip Push-ups (10 reps on body ball); Frog Push-ups (10 reps); Bench Dips (to muscle failure); One-Leg Squats (10 reps each leg, then hold midpoint position on last rep to muscle failure); Leg Extensions (muscle failure)

*Circuit Three: Pike Push-ups (10 reps); Static Lunges with Lateral Shoulder Raise (10 reps each leg); Side Lunges with Anterior Shoulder Raise (10 reps each leg); Jump rope fast (2 minutes)

*Circuit Four: Sumo Squats with Tricep Extension (20 reps); Tricep Kick-backs (15 reps); Pike Crunches (20 reps); Hanging Abs (15 reps each side)

*Circuit Five (perform only once): Chair Pose (1 minute); Extended Plank (1 minute); Side Plank (1 minute each side): Mountain Climbers (1 minute); Bicycle Crunches (100 reps)

VERDICT

Um, not much to say today.  I worked out and I ate.  I didn’t want to do the former and I really wanted to do the latter. But only one day left of the program!  Our gym is also doing a 90-day challenge that ends tomorrow as well.  Weigh-in is Wednesday.  I know I didn’t lose much weight, but what I gained was confidence and strength.   So, that’s a winning situation, I guess, huh? 

We have two days left on the challenge!  I’m kind of not excited about the last two days, but I WILL go to the gym and do the workouts.  We’re leaving in a few days and will be gone for almost 2 weeks, so there is much to do around the house.  But getting to the gym will be a priority for me.