Okay, I have yesterday’s promised closet makeover pictures for you. I apologize that this is pretty anticlimactic because, while I’m thrilled with the new sense of peace and organization this brings me, in the end, it’s still just a closet.
Except now it’s clean and painted and oh yeah there’s no taffy stuck to the inside wall covered with scotch tape.
Don’t ask.
Before:
After (empty):
All of the scratches and general dinginess have been smoothed out and painted over. Justin hung the new shelf using some old 2×4’s we had in the garage, and I primed and painted them to match the shelf.
The really inexpensive hangars are from Bed, Bath and Beyond:
And both types of bronze hooks are from Target:
By hanging the hooks, taking out a few of the winter coats (umm, Katie? Do you really need 4 winter coats hanging in a main hall closet in North Carolina for 4 years?), digging out some storage baskets I had hiding in another closet, and throwing out some of the junk, I was actually able to fit more stuff in here.
The dog leashes and car harnesses came in from the garage, Justin’s baseball hats finally came down from the top of the television in the bedroom, and everything is now much more accessible.
We can even still fit the vacuum in there, and we have some extra space for guest coats. Apparently people appreciate that as opposed to flinging them over the back of a dog-hair covered sofa.
Go figure.
In the end, it really was worth the hassle.
Even though it might not look much different to you, cleaning out this closet helped clean me out a little, too.
Not in a literal enema sort of way, but in a figurative mind clutter sort of way.
Getting rid of crap you don’t need – both physically and mentally – is therapeutic.
Who knew you could get so much from a tiny little closet?
I can’t wait to see what happens when I move on to the walk-in…
1. Finish that damn closet. Yep, it’s finished! And it actually looks awesome. Who knew that painting the inside of a closet, replacing the wire shelf with a real shelf, and adding some hooks and organization could be so much work? But it was totally worth it because I’m convinced this is the type of thing that’s eventually going to sell this place.
Sound crazy?
Think about it. You can walk into a place you’re potentially interested in buying and it might appear clean, but then you open a closet and see where the mess went. Subconsciously, this makes you wonder what else the homeowners might be hiding.
Well I’ve got news for you, judgy wudgy – we ain’t hiding nothin’ but some dog leashes and a Dyson. No skeletons in this closet, thankyouverymuch.
The other closets in the house are another story.
2. Sell a bunch of the “big” items taking up space in the garage and office so they can both get cleaned out. Well, I sold almost everything I listed: 2 desks, kitchen range with hood, and a dining table with 4 chairs. The only thing I didn’t get any bites on was an office chair, so I’ll wait a bit and try again. I have a few other things I want to try selling, so I consider this a successful start.
Now. Here’s the kicker.
I don’t have pictures of the garage and office for you tonight. It’s getting too dark to get a decent picture of the closet, and I’m covered in primer and paint, and I still need to take the mutts on a walk and give them baths, and I’m so hungry and I need a beer.
So those things need to get taken care of. Not necessarily in that order.
But I will update this post tomorrow with photos.
Pinky swear.
And I never go back on a pinky swear.
Notice that I picked the multiracial pinky swear photo from Esquire.com to emphasize the fact that I’m not racist.
Or maybe it was just one of the first photos to show up.
My friend Leslie was kind enough this morning to point out that I neglected to fulfill a promise I made last week about keeping you posted on my weekly goals so I can finally get a bunch of projects done around this wreck of a house.
I was supposed to tell you yesterday (Monday), but instead, I was actually working on fulfilling said goal.
But Leslie made me realize – If I don’t disclose the goals on here (or to anyone, for that matter), I’ll never get them done.
Because no one would give me a hard time about it.
And that’s what friends (and blog readers, who are practically friends because there isn’t much on here I don’t disclose about myself) are for – to give you shit when you start slacking.
Because they care.
I actually have 2 goals for this week:
1. Finish that damn closet so our coats can get off the guest bed and back into the closet where they belong. Haven’t you heard? It’s springtime, baby!
2. Sell a bunch of the “big” items taking up space in the garage and office so they can both get cleaned out. That’s what I was working on yesterday – putting our old dining table, range, 2 office desks, and an office chair on Craigslist in the hope of selling them sometime this week.
Because this is what the garage looks like right now:
Nope, it ain’t pretty.
So far I’ve learned 2 things:
1. I priced the dining table and range too low. I’ve gotten about a billion responses, and now I’m kicking myself for letting people convince me I couldn’t get very much for them.
2. Craigslist folk are unreliable. The lady who was supposed to buy the range told me she’d be here before 10:00. It’s now after 11:00, and she still hasn’t shown. She’s probably going to be pissed when I call the next guy in line, but sorry lady! You snooze, you lose. This thing has got to go.
I should’ve known, though. Erin warned us once about the perils of Craigslist:
So, yeah. It’s not going that great so far.
On a completely unrelated note, have you ever seen the movie Spanglish with Adam Sandler?
It’s one of those movies that wasn’t originally my cup of tea, but for whatever reason I watched it again, and then again, and then again because there’s just something about it that’s so honest about human nature and our flaws and our idiosyncrasies that it just feels raw and real and… I don’t know… imperfect. But that’s okay, because that’s the point.
Anyway.
There’s this scene where Adam Sandler’s life is just crap. He’s an amazing chef with a beautiful house and family, but it doesn’t matter because things are falling apart in his marriage, the kids are suffering from huge self-esteem issues inflicted by their crazy mother who can’t recognize the reasons she’s so unhappy, his mother-in-law lives with them and happens to be a raging alcoholic, and their entire family is having a negative impact on the “pure” and holistic upbringing their nanny, who is a beautiful, single, illegal immigrant from Mexico, is trying to impart on her own impressionable young daughter.
And all of these things are weighing on him. They tear him down every day.
But in this scene he’s about to have a moment – a moment of pure bliss. He’s fixing himself this amazing sandwich. We’re talkin’ the mother of all BLT’s, with crispy bacon, fresh butterhead lettuce and ripe tomato slices, mayo (of course), and thick wheat bread with some Monterey jack cheese that’s been broiled to perfection, all topped off with a glorious fried egg whose yolk doesn’t break until he slices into the sandwich’s divine center belly, the golden fluids bleeding out onto the plate for a perfect dipping opportunity.
Then – then – he pours himself some kind of gourmet-looking dark beer into a tall pilsner glass (at which point I completely jizz in my pants) and the entire scene is done in silence with just the sounds of the egg being fried, the crack and fizz of the beer as it’s poured into the glass, the grate of the knife on the plate.
Perfection.
I will never forget that scene. It’s like this moment he so desperately needs – just himself, the paper, the perfect sandwich, and a beer.
Of course, it all gets ruined for him before he can take the first mind-blowing bite, but that’s beside the point.
The point is that sometimes you don’t have to get too fancy to have a completely satisfying meal. Sometimes a sandwich – a sandwich that you take a little care and time to prepare correctly – can be the perfect ending to an otherwise less-than-perfect day.
And I want to thank my sister, who reminded me of that last night when she encouraged me to make this:
Known henceforth as the “Orgasm Panini,” which, if executed correctly, could cause a paninigasm (thanks Jeff, for the term).
For a list of ingredients I used, check out the description of this photo on the Domestiphobia Facebook page.
Yep. I’m sneaky like that.
***UPDATED***
Here are is the cast of characters for the Orgasm Panini (I figure it’s only fair if you stumbled across this later to not make you search for the ingredients) from bottom to top:
Some type of thickly sliced bread, mayo with lemon juice and basil, Cajun turkey from the deli, fresh tomato, freshly sliced or grated Mozzarella, cooked bacon, artichoke hearts, fresh baby spinach. Toast in panini press and enjoy.
We really haven’t been doing a lot around the house lately.
And, I’m ashamed to admit, the closet (which admittedly had more to do with putting off other things I should have been doing than actually making a closet look nice) isn’t even done yet. But almost.
I promise.
Sort of.
My avoidance of all topics home related is most definitely not because everything is finished. I could share a list of the things we still need to do before we could ever hope to sell this place, but then I’d probably start crying and my tear-soaked keyboard would malfunction and I’d have to add to the list yet another piece of electronic equipment that’s crapped out because it can’t handle being around me and my hormones.
By the way, I love the fact that being a woman allows me to blame all irrational behavior on hormones.
What? You think it was immature to throw my POS cell phone across the room? Well it was the hormones, bitches!
What? You think I made the waiter feel bad because I cried when he told me they’re out of tiramisu? Well don’t blame me – it’s the hormones!
Love it.
Anyway.
Like I was saying, the fact that we haven’t been working on house projects has nothing to do with the fact that we’re done. Far from it. It’s just that with Justin working his butt off to get promoted (and coincidentally inviting me, of all people, to fancy events) and me gallivanting off to exotic places like Costa Rica, Miami, and Nebraska, (okay, they can’t all be winners), we just really haven’t had the time. Or the money. Oh, and my whole quitting my job to “find myself” and make a huge career change thing is actually fairly time consuming too. And I’m talking about writing – not waiting tables.
But I thought you should know that I’ve finally taken another step towards completing the office. That photo you saw of the paint job above is the room in its interim phase. I was just taking a breather before moving on to the next step.
And what is the next step, you might ask?
Organization, organization, organization.
Oh, and I want it to be pretty.
The overall mental plan for the room is to build a new work surface, create a wall of shelving and storage, and paint the existing bookshelves. If I can find a deal, I might replace the ugly fan with a new light fixture. I’m working on a very strict budget here, so the goal is to make this as comfortable and functional of a workspace as I can (since I will mainly be working from home), without spending more money than I’ll be making in a year.
This means we’re getting rid of the two cheap-o desks that were given to us out of pity by another Airman when we moved into our very first shoddy apartment and had only a bed frame with mattress, an old trunk (used as a coffee table), and an entertainment center to our names. (Yes, we knew what was important.)
Seriously. We didn’t even have a couch.
So those old desks will either go on Craigslist or we’ll donate them to some other poor military person just starting out. (Have fun with that, friend! The debt-less road to materialism is a long one.)
The tentative plan in my head is to jerry-rig a new L-shaped desk into a corner of the room. The long branch of the “L” will be constructed using filing cabinets (I will need lots of file storage) and some type of narrow-yet-long table top component. As you can tell, this part is yet-to-be determined.
It looks almost exactly like this desk from West Elm, but at just over $150 including tax and shipping, the Overstock version is less than half the price:
The shallow drawers will be perfect for some pens, a couple of notepads, and some of the electronic-y type computer equipment (DVD drive, external hard drive, etc.) that doesn’t need to stay out all of the time.
Not a bad deal, huh? Although West Elm does have an awesome mirror version of this desk that I think would look pretty damn sweet in the office. But, at $599, it’s just a little out of my budget. And I’m pretty sure it doesn’t come with a maid who will stand next to it all day to wipe off my fingerprints and tell me to get back to work when I distract myself by squeezing pimples and checking for food in my teeth in its reflective surface.
Plus, I hate to think of all the bad luck I’d have when I crack one of the mirrors by throwing my cell phone too hard across the room.
Okay, well I guess I already knew that since doing the floor research for our kitchen (did you know they make cork flooring?)… and I suppose I’ve owned a bulletin board or two in my life. But really, up until recently, my favorite cork only came in a bottle.
A few weekends ago, however, I tried a fantastic DIY project I found over on YHL. That couple is so inspiring!
See, I’ve never been great at organization. Back in third grade, my teacher had to call my mom because I never brought in any homework and my parents never responded to any notes that went home. So my mother came into school with me one day to check my locker, and lo’ and behold! There, crammed into every nook and cranny of that small, metal space, was at least 7 months worth of homework, notifications, and permission slips.
It was my filing system – my filing system from whence nothing ever returned. I still utilize it today in some spaces.
But I digress. Like I was saying, my kitchen was completely eschew with sticky notes strewn with phone numbers, favorite recipes stuffed in junk drawers, and shopping lists scattered about like so many dust bunnies.
Case-in-point (don’t worry, I’ll spare you the photo of my junk drawer):
Say “hi” to the cookbooks I never use!
Little did I know with this sticky-note-in-the-cabinet-door situation, I was very close to discovering the solution (if only I had been born a wee bit craftier).
This is so easy, my friends! I could still make it happen after 2 glasses of wine.
You will need:
12″ x 12″ Cork Tiles (I found mine at Target in the bulletin board aisle).
They come with the mounting tape, but I opted to use 3M Command Mounting Strips because, having used it before, I was positive I’d be able to remove the tiles if the mood struck without causing harm to my gorgeous alder cabinet babies.
And, if you’re feeling extra frisky, go ahead and get yourself some colorful push pins. Sure, any plain-old tacks will do, but the colorful ones make me happy.
That’s it! That’s all you need to complete this incredibly inexpensive project.
Next, because I have a small indent inside my cabinet doors, I had to cut the tiles to fit inside. Simply measure the space in your doors, and then transfer that to the tiles. I had 8 1/4″ to work with, so I measured that distance across the top and bottom of one of my tiles and put a dot at each point.
Then I drew a line connecting the two dots.
Just cut along the line… and viola!
I put a piece of the command tape in each corner.
Testing it out…
I was originally going to fill the inside of the door in its entirety, but I ended up waiting to see if I could find something magnetic on which to stick my magnetic grocery list (see the side of the fridge in the first picture). Unfortunately, after no such luck, I had to improvise.
*Note: I’m sure I could’ve found some type of sheet metal, but I didn’t care to work with the sharp edges (let’s face it – I’m lucky the hubs trusts me with the scissors). They also sell magnetic strips at various places, but my objective was CHEAP, so those were a no-go. I did actually find these really cool magnetic pin board tile thingies at Target in the same section as the cork tiles, but they were significantly more expensive (and not as easy to hang without causing damage).
SO, I ended up with this:
I’m not sure I’m crazy about the whole shopping list-clipped-to-the-chip-clip-hanging-from-the-3m-command-hook look. It’s just not as neat and tidy as the one over on YHL. Maybe I’ll turn the whole thing into a cork board, if I ever get back around to it. The great thing is that for around $5, I was able to get 5 cork tiles!
Since remodeling our kitchen, I have decided that drawer bases (aka. base cabinets with drawers instead of doors and/or pull-outs) are the best. thing. ever.
I can now store my empty food storage containers with the lids on.
Now that I’m embracing this whole domesticity thing, you have no idea how much pleasure this gives me. It gives me the kind of pleasure that used to require a battery. And I’m not talking about a dust buster.
I no longer have to pull heavy plates down from the wall cabinets over my head.
My utensils, plastic wrap and storage bags? All conveniently near the food storage containers, dinnerware, and refrigerator.
And I no longer need to crawl inside my cabinets to reach my baking dishes, pots, pans or their matching lids!
Finally… finally… no need to lift the spices one-by-one to read the labels.
And the cooking utensils aren’t collecting dust in a container on the counter!
There’s an added bonus, you say? Maybe one of the best parts I’ve discovered about these huge storage drawers is that they really don’t require expensive interior dividers. All it took was some cheap cabinet liner from the dollar store, and viola! Instant organization. The plates don’t slide around, and the spices don’t roll and spill throughout the drawer.
Who knew this could make me so happy?
Looks like I might need a little travel adventure to put things back into perspective…
