Wherein I assert dominion over the basement.

So! I have not posted in forever, because I was eaten by the large piles of crap in our basement and our garage, although never fear, I fought my way out, and then I managed to break not one but TWO computers in the space of 24 hours, because you know moving across the country is not expensive AT ALL and of course you will want to replace not one but TWO computers a few weeks before you move.  Anyways, that  is my excuse for not blogging or commenting on any of your blogs, although I continue to read them on my phone, because oh my holy heck I am sick of purging and reading the internets is a nice break from that.

So! The basement.  Yes.  I finally finished that.  Sort of.  It needs to be packed, but I purged it of all the crap.  Most of the crap, anyways.  We still have a lot of crap but its now organized crap.  This took me most of an entire day.

This is the far wall at the end of the workbench, containing mostly boxes of the Mister's work stuff from a previous job.  Also, decor crap.

As you can see on the right hand side of the above picture, and again below, is a shelving unit that holds....crap.  Kitchen stuff that we don't have room for in our tiny kitchen, old checkbooks, Ikea decor boxes, three dead computers (that pile has since grown to five dead computers), and a number of plastic filing bins. One of my must-be-done items of business upon arriving in California is to buy a large filing cabinet.

Rounding the corner, we have more shelving full of crap.  FYI, if you are thinking of renting or buying a house, and in the basement there is lots of built-in shelving, it is not because the former owners are ever so handy or generous in providing storage. No, the shelving is there because that basement leaks and has water issues, and the shelving is so that their belongings don't get wet.  Jut so you know.

Anyhoo, to the left we have lots of unused plastic bins and baskets, a large box containing unused lamps shades, a suitcase, office supplies, and a large number of folding chairs.

To the right, we have more suitcases, wrapping paper, coffee makers, art not even unpacked from the last time we moved, a difficult to see hutch to the antique secretary, more assorted crap, and an unbelievable number of plastic forks and spoons in that basket in the front.

And lastly...this fiasco:

I would love to give you a dramatic After Picture.  Except that the basement still looks largely like it did before. The one dramatic change is the wall by the treadmill.  Most of the boxes were wet and were recycled;  the rest was donated.

I know, it has a very "it puts the lotion in the basket" vibe to it.  The creepiness factor makes me walk faster on the treadmill.

The rest of the basement really still looks the same.  Now the junk is organized into boxes of similar junk.  Kitchen crap in three boxes, decor crap in four boxes, etc.  See? Pictures do not look very different.

I gave away six boxes of stuff to family:

One sister inherited 27 Harlequin romance novels, a West Elm starburst mirror, kitchen cannisters, and the lamps I was making over for her but won't be able to finish because it is too cold to spraypaint.  The other sister inherited pink sparkle glitter shoes and a number of other items for Denise. My mother received cooking tins, my entire stash of spraypaint (waaah, did not want to give those up), an electric can opener, and she agreed to transport a Keurig coffeemaker to my grandmother.  My inlaws received a cold storage food bag and two olive trays.  Everyone received at least one cold storage bag from Wegman's, because I can never remember to bring them to Wegman's with me and thus end up buying one every time I go.

I also amalgamated my enormous collection of plastic forks.  Apparently I have over five hundred plastic utensils, paper plates, and napkins.  I should have sent this home with my mother.  I probably will if she comes up again before we leave.

There was a full minivan of stuff donated to Goodwill.

That's five trash bags and two cardboard boxes of stuff.  One FLOR rug, three sets of table legs, a ridiculous number of lunchboxes, a baby piggy bank, a roller shade, and a bunch of other stuff I can't remember.

The basement is as purged as it is going to get, peeps. Now it needs to be packed in boxes.

California, here we come!

Oh wait. There's still the garage.  And Project Patch All The Holes.  But then! We are off to California!

Edited to add: I am linking up to Pancakes and French Fries William Morris Project.

Decluttering: the basement workbench

As you've seen many times before, here is my basement workbench (in the far back, behind all the junk in the front).  Note the chandelier, the windshield wiper fluid, Ikea Ribba picture ledges, a suitcase and 400 other pounds of detritus.  

I have zero desire to spend any money on redoing this area, as we are moving in six months (hello, rats!), and this type of organizational stuff won't move with us.  My goal was to clear off the top of the bench, and get all the tools sorted and in one place.  

Slowly but surely I worked my way down the bench.  I made a scrap wood/Ikea Ribba picture ledge pile in the corner. I put the chandelier out on the front porch for donation; it gives a nice Tobacco Road feel to our curb appeal.  I put the suitcase back with the other suitcases.  

Then I went piece by piece, sorting all the tools, screws, nails, and odds and ends into different categories.  I used cardboard boxes and plastic bins we had on hand.  This took about 3 hours.  

There is shelving right behind that pole to the right, which is why there aren't any pictures of the bench head on.  Please forgive the flash photography, as my basement doesn't get much light, especially when I am taking pictures at 10:30 pm.

There are eleven bins, separated into a box of hammers, leftover Ikea screws, furniture casters, brackets, curtain paraphernalia,  a million boxes of screws in packs that you buy from Home Depot, a separate bin of loose screws (SO MANY SCREWS), various other junk, and two plastic thingamajigs that have little drawers, which contain tools separated by category.  

Below the workbench are a rubbermaid bin of cleaning supplies, a rubbermaid bin of tools like drills and saws, and a rubbermaid bin of home decor items not currently being used. Surprisingly, I threw out or donated very little; it was just a matter of organizing what was there.  It would be helpful if I could find my label maker so I could label all the bins.  For now I  will probably buy a pack of sticky-notes.  

Behold, my NINE hammers.  

I'm pretty sure there are two more hammers in the junk drawer in the kitchen.  

I am making headway.  I have cleaned at least 11 percent of the basement so far.  I will assert dominion over the other 89 percent eventually. 

Edited to add: I am linking this post to Pancakes and French Fries William Morris Project.

Decluttering: more of the basement

I am slowly but surely chipping away at the basement.

The area at the bottom of the stairs--like everywhere else in the basement--is a place that we walk down and drop stuff.

There were bins of swimsuits, bins of curtains, art, toys, more curtains that should have been in the bin of curtains, side tables, a box of expired medicines....all in a three foot space along the back wall.

I packed up all the curtains and put them back in their appropriate bins in the garage.  The art also went back to the garage with the rest of the homeless art. The toys were also packed in a bin of extra toys in the garage that I keep for a rainy day. (Notice a shifting of mess from one area to another?)  The medicines were disposed of.

I cleared out all the way to the workbench.  The little wooden box on the bottom right is meant for donation, and the box above it is still full of medical apparatus like nebulizers and dispensers and thermometers that I can't find room for in the linen closet.  That medical box is also stuffed with a bag full of food meant for donation to a food pantry.  And on top of that bag is a pair of yellow lamps that I am waiting for warm weather to continue spraypainting.

On the left, we have a plastic bin full of last year's filing, and a diaper box full of this year's bills waiting to be filed in a new bin that I have not yet procured.  I would like to get some filing cabinets for this spot.  My filing system needs an overhaul, but since one two-drawer filing cabinet costs about $150, I am scouring craigslist to find some cheap ones.  Until I find two cabinets, the bills will sit in that cardboard box.

You watch, slowly but surely everything in the basement will end up in the garage.

Next up is the workbench area.  This is the area most in need of organizing--I know that we own at least five hammers, and a large selection of nails and screws, but who can find anything in that layer of chandeliers, furnace filters and windshield wiper fluid?  I know that we are moving when our lease is up in June, and I am reluctant to invest any money in an organizing system that I cannot take with us, so this is the area that stumps me.

Edited to add: I'm linking up to Pancakes and French Fries William Morris Project.

starting on the basement

In my decluttering project, one of the items was "deal with the basement."  Unfortunately, I'd say that the basement is probably five or six zones of clutter and is well beyond what I can deal with in the hour or two between the kids' bedtime and mine.

This weekend I had the Mister start by clearing out the old fridge that was downstairs.

We bought this fridge from the previous tenants when they moved out.  They offered it to us for a reasonable price, and we thought it would be nice to have an extra fridge in the basement for drinks and extra storage.  Of course, it died three weeks after we moved in.  Six months later, we are finally getting around to putting it out on the curb.

Its amazing how much bigger the space feels without that fridge. (Don't look at my laundry area. I said don't look! Why are you looking?!)

The second thing I tackled was the area between the stairs and the laundry.  It had become a drop zone for crap. Although the entire basement could be considered a drop zone for crap.  Here is the starting point, although there was EVEN MORE stuff there a few days ago that I sold on Craigslist.

Now, it looks like this.

Nearly everything sitting on the floor in that area was related to painting.  I started by moving all the cardboard boxes to the recycle area. Then I took all the painting supplies and sorted them into bins.   I also sorted the paint--spray paint up top, gallons in the middle, and supplies and samples (the cardboard box on the right) on the bottom. Most of the gallons in the middle were left by the previous tenant, and I will be leaving them there when I move out.  My landlord is particular about not throwing things away.

Somebody has a problem with hoarding Benjamin Moore sample pots.

Actually I had wayyyy more than this but I pared down when we moved six months ago.

I started with the easy area. I knew this wouldn't take that long if I just sat down and did it, plus, I used cardboard boxes and plastic bins I already owned to sort stuff, so the whole thing was free to me.  The workbench area (the area across from the fridge in the first picture above), on the other hand, is going to be an all day job.

The workbench area, honestly, will require some kind of sorting apparatus, like small bins and plastic hooks on a pegboard and I just don't want to spend any money on this rental.  I know that we suffer from the "fourteen hammers" syndrome, where you can't find one when you need so you go buy one, but if you just cleaned your basement and a few junk drawers you'd find that you already own fourteen hammers.  And a bunch of screwdrivers. And fourteen levels. And fourteen boxes of drill bits. And fourteen measuring tapes. And so on and so forth.

Then there is the "I don't have room for this stuff in this kitchen" area across from the workbench.  Plus the "where am I supposed to store decor stuff I'm not using but don't want to get rid of" area.  And the "87 boxes of crap from my old office that I won't throw out" area.  And the "oh, I might use that someday" area.

Its a slow process, folks.  But its a start

Edited to add: I am linking this post up to Pancakes and French Fries William Morris Project. 

Phase One of basement play area re-do

The basement play area is in need of reorganizing (Project #7 of Projects I'd Like to Tackle in the New Year.)  The kids like to jump off the treadmill, its difficult to keep them off of it, the playhouse blocks the view of the tv, and things were just generally a mess down there.  So we rearranged a bit.

Here are some pictures of the basement before. This is the view from standing by the backdoor:

Most of the toys were kept in the cube unit in the front of the room. You can see that the treadmill is out in the open, although off to the side, which meant that my kids found it a thing of fascinating wonder.

The area between the treadmill and the tv was also a giant mess.  Crap gets hidden behind the chair.  The kids catapult from the treadmill off the chair onto the picnic table and up onto the roof of the playhouse.  This has led me to literally get rid of all child-sized furniture in the room.  If they can move it, they can use to climb onto the playhouse roof.  No mas. 
 

The back of the room was a catch-all for stuff, like a toddler bed, kitchen table, chairs, two old tvs, a weight bench, and bins of the Mister's out of season clothes.

And now (sorry for the dark pictures, it is a basement):

The tv and the treadmill were moved to the back of the basement.  The elliptical machine from upstairs joined the treadmill in its new home downstairs.

(Ignore the pile of stuff to the left that will be donated to Goodwill.)  

We moved all the cube units and bookshelves to form a half wall separating the play area from the exercise area.  Originally, we considered hanging a curtain to separate it, but we settled on this because it would have been difficult to hang the curtains because of the drop ceiling, and this way doesn't block the light from the door. It also provides a definite line between the exercise space and the play space, so the kids are now very aware that they are not to play behind the shelves in the exercise area. 

 I'm pretty excited that now when we have playdates, both moms have a place to sit, instead of the floor.  The bigger toy items like monster trucks, cardboard blocks and trains have been given homes in large tupperware bins  beside the playhouse.  

There is still a lot of work to do. Phase 2:

1) The walls are really bare, as you can see in the pictures above.  I need ideas for large, inexpensive artwork that would work on those two walls.  The walls were just re-drywalled less than a year ago, and we hope to move within the next two years.  This space will probably stay as a playroom for when we visit (pretty frequently), but I'm hesitant to do a gallery wall or put a zillion nails in the wall.  Also, inexpensive would be good.

Ideas?  I don't have anything in mind.

2) The art area.  At the bottom of the stairs is a large area I plan on making into the art area. I put the unused kitchen table over in this area, and would like to find a cabinet to hold art supplies. 

To get more floorspace, we are getting rid of the easel. Honestly, I'm not a huge fan of the chalkboard paint trend, but we need the floor space and this also allows me to make an area where three kids can be on the chalkboard at the same time.

I'm thinking of putting some Nerdy Baby flashcards above the art wall. 

So I'm excited that the basement is now more user-friendly.  Already the kids have learned that the exercise area is off limits, so that has reduced the amount of time spent hollering at the kids to get off the treadmill.  Its also nice having a sitting area where an adult can view the entire play area.  Before, only the gray chair was in the play area and it faced the tv, so it wasn't easy to keep an eye on everyone. 

Now I just have to find some art and an art supply cabinet, and I can cross Project #7 off my list.