stuff i am excited about because i am a nerd

i wanted to write about some things that i am excited about right now. as i mentioned before in another post, i had some goals and ideas for 2017. i had been thinking about a couple things, prayed and meditated and then received some confirmations on some of the actions and ideas that i had half baked in my mind.  

some of these goals include minimizing all kinds of stuff; household goods, clothing, extra stuff, toys, books, grooming products, etc.  and then organizing whatever is left over.  and then learning to be more intentional about purchases.  i also am working on this idea of positive parenting and discipline.  and virtues.  and limiting the amount of waste we produce.  and limiting the number and amount of toxins in our bodies and homes.  and then community building.  and preparing our family in case of disaster (like emergency kits and updating a will, etc).  and prioritizing my spiritual and physical health and well being.  there's a lot more!  but i'm really excited about all of these.  and i'm excited about trying out new things, new ways of going about life, and thinking about things.  and ultimately having these thoughts shape my actions.  i just feel ready in my life and where i am at in motherhood to work on these ideas i have had in my head for the last few years.  action!  i love it!  
"Absolute repose does not exist in nature.  All things either make progress or lose ground.  Everything moves forward or backward, nothing is without motion."
-Abdu'l-Baha
so.  the first concept i want to post about is this idea of minimizing and organizing.  over the last few years, i guess because i'm such a type A person, and have realized over time that parenting is not formulaic and there has to be education, reflection, growth and very importantly--flexibility, the way i can feel a little bit more in control and calm is by having a clean and orderly house.  i was not always this way and mess didn't affect me so much, but now after having kids, the state of my environment really has influence on my stress level.  i feel like i have also come to a time where we know that we won't be having any more kids, we are out of the infant stage with our kids, i can mostly fit into my pre-pregnancy clothes and we are on the road to weaning, and the kids are a tiny bit more independent.  so it has just felt natural to start re-evaluating the stuff we have in our house.  and i'm always up for an organization project.  so over the winter break hubs and i got to work.

the little closet under the stairs, or harry potter closet, i turned into a pantry a few years back. after awhile i realized the space could be used better. so, we stacked the wire racks and anchored them into the wall and removed the hanging storage stuff on the right that wasn't really working well. then i went through everything and threw away old and expired food goods and consolidated and just did a bunch of organizing. and now the space is so much better. i still want to either build or find a shelf or rack to put towards the back though.  

the items that i use a lot are more towards the middle and top of the rack so that i don't have to constantly bend down to grab things.  that was one of the things i wanted to fix.  and things that are similar are grouped together; canned items, grains, beans, snacks, etc.  

this is where i want to add a shelf to organize this stuff; teas, big jugs of oil and vinegar and drinks (and we still have some leftover halloween candy)

so on the left side of the closet i had some of those hanging ikea bins and wire baskets that held tea and a few other random stuff, but every time i went into the pantry i would bump into them and knock something over.  and the little bins weren't really organizing anything that well.  so i took them down and will use them somewhere else.  maybe the laundry room?

we also worked on the linen closets upstairs. hubby painted them and cleaned them out. i still have to organize the linens because i think we can get rid of some sheets. but now the closets are painted white and the shelves are white and somehow that makes me feel like they are fresh and clean and bright haha. and we hung deodorizers in there. 

i mean, it's not really that exciting, it's towels, right?  but i'm just glad that the closets are all freshly painted

linen closet still needs to be organized better but it's not too bad right now

i had a chance to sort through the other harry potter closet that is upstairs that ends up being a catch all.  mostly it contains the kids' toys that we don't keep out downstairs.  i don't have all the toys out at one time because it's too much.  i want the kids to focus on a few toys and not feel overwhelmed and stressed out.  and also hubs and i don't want to lose our minds because we are picking up and tripping over so many more toys.  anyway, we also store our luggage and some other random stuff.  and the closet was looking like an earthquake hit it.  so i spent time purging some stuff of ours in there.  then i pulled out ALLA the toys that the kids have, put them in the front living room and we all sorted through them together and decided what we can gift to another child and what we can keep.  it was great!  we got rid of stuff, we gifted gently used toys to our friends and strangers in the community (via the buy nothing project), and the kids (well, Z) learned some lessons.  we learned that even though we like a toy, we no longer have a use for it, or we have outgrown it, so we can appreciate it for when it was useful and pass it along so that another kid can enjoy it.  we learned a little bit of detachment. and then we learned it again when we delivered the toys and gave them away. haha.  and we had to be reminded of why we were giving the toys away.  but it was good. and then i rotated the toys that were downstairs.  it was a great exercise in systematically sorting through some belongings and being more intentional about what we keep and why.  it was helpful for me, too, because i would soon do that with some of my own stuff.  after the purging of some toys, i was able to re-organize that storage closet.  and actually, i organize that closet a few times per year.  so i'm thinking that if i have to do it that often, the system is not very efficient, right?  i will have to think about how to make it better.  because currently, i have to move a bunch of boxes and containers out of the way and pull all the luggage out to get to whatever it is i need, and it's really annoying.  i'm sure i can make that work better somehow.  that'll be added to the list too!

that's all i will write about in this post.  i had more, but it was too long!  more to come later.

tell me about your organizing ideas!