Springtime Fireplace

After cleaning out my fireplace, it was looking pretty lonely. Knowing it wouldn't have a cozy fire in it for months, I piled as many interesting looking clothbound books in there as I could find scattered throughout our house. Decluttering the house of random piles of books was the added bonus!

I wish you could see all of the book titles, I really do have a odd variety in there- from a beautiful old copy of Jane Eyre to the the 1980's personal style classic Color Me Beautiful (what season are you?), some beautiful gold gilded books of poetry and some newer hardcover books with the dust jackets removed.

If you're looking for old books in Seattle, I recommend hitting up Seattle Public Library book sales! 

Pantry Success!

My pantry is no longer filled with pasta that expired in 2011 AND I can park my vacuum in there now, hooray! It's the little things in life that make me oh so happy.

I now know: how to clean vases & when food expires*

The weirdest thing I found: Spray on hair dye, the kind you buy for halloween. It was living between the food processor, some cereal and lightbulbs- clearly the best place to keep it. Also, it had expired.

How to keep it clean: I finally threw away an unopened, Costco sized box of rice noodles after discovering that had expired a couple years back. I'd bought it on a whim thinking that someday I might try and make my own Pad Thai. A restaurant called Amazing Thai (and rightfully so) delivers to our house, why would I EVER make my own Thai food? From now on, I'm sticking to tried and true pantry staples. The grocery store is so close, I can easily run and grab anything I don't have on hand when I know I'm actually going to follow through on making it.

*Seriously though, eatbydate.com! It's exactly as it sounds, a site that tells you when things go bad, incredibly handy for things that are opened or maybe aren't in their original packaging anymore.

Spring Cleaning! (aka The Post I Didn't Want to Post Because It Means I'll Actually Have to Clean My Messy House)

Like I said in last week's Friday Roundup I'm home for awhile and SO excited about it. But since Jason and I have been in and out so much in the past, well, year actually, I feel like our house is in a state of chaos. I haven't taken the time to really clean anything beyond the basic vacuum/dust/shove things in cupboards that's necessary to keep from feeling like Miss Havisham on an episode of Hoarders.

I don't really like cleaning. Currently I'm putting it off by writing this blog post. Perhaps this is it, the time in which I find myself as happy as this drawing of  mid-century woman. Perhaps the key to enjoying cleaning is wearing pearls…I might have to test this theory.

As I've been gearing up to clean, I've been noticing a lot of checklists for spring cleaning on Pinterest and decided to make my own. I do like the idea of a check list, something I can be working at all week and seeing my progress as I go but some of them were pretty intense, I'm not going to be resealing my grout, sorry Martha. I'm more focused on the basics needed to refresh, declutter, reorganize and make me love my house again. Here's the check list I've made for myself:

A note on my checklist:  I'm fully aware that to some, this will seem like a really whimpy cleaning list, and for your house it might be. For us,  it could very well take a full day just to be able to check off the "purge closets and drawers of old clothes" and I just found a can in my pantry that expired 2 years ago. We've got some work to do. 

Spring Cleaning Part 2, An Update

OK, I love a clean house, but I seem to have no choice but to agree with this mantra right now! I didn't think it was actually possible, but in the time since I wrote this post on how I was TOTALLY going to do some spring cleaning this year, my house has actually managed to get messier. Really, you have to step over things when you walk in the door. Yikes.


It's been an absolutely insane year thus far. We've traveled to 6 different countries, multiple states, and turned out a wide variety of work, it's no wonder my house looks like nomads live here.

 So, as much as I'd like to just complain about how my house is a disaster area and I'm completely overwhelmed, here are the few good things I've done/will do this week.

1. I've limited myself to purchases that are storage/organization related, including some awesome baskets in Tanzania.
2. My donation pile is ever growing and I'm planning on dropping it off here this week.
3. I no longer have a wolf head living in my guest room.
4. A reason to clean! I'm hosting family for Mother's Day so I'm planning on having everything look great by then. Deadlines are the only way I'm motivated. 

Spring Cleaning

After a few months of travel, shooting a music video and well, hoarding it seems, if you look in my closets and guest room, I've decided spring cleaning MUST happen this year. The idea of it is incredibly overwhelming, especially since we've still got another big trip on the horizon as well as some important deadlines and piles of work looming over our heads. But, it's officially gotten to the point where I KNOW I'll be more productive with a clean house and office. 

I so wish I could snap my fingers like Mary Poppins and have everything go back into place! Unfortunately, my biggest problem is organization, so many things don't have places that they belong. 

Here are a few interesting links with inspiration and advice I've found...

Martha Stewart's Spring Clean Checklist (if the idea of dusting refrigerator coils seems intimidating and/or unnecessary, this might not be the list for you)

Design Sponge DIY Organization

Make money off  your "junk" (it is after all another man's treasure!)

Closet Inspiration 

Living With Less

Goop's Editing Your Closet

Secrets of organized women 

Do you have any amazing tips for cleaning and organization? Send them my way! 

I hope to keep posting on this topic as I go. If nothing else, it'll be a way to encourage me to keep going! Hopefully what I learn will be helpful to you too.