and 3 hours later, here is the AFTER...
Ahhhhh! After doing a happy dance in my newly uncluttered closet, I moved on to the second biggest job on my to-do list: organizing our finances. Overall, I’ve always been pretty responsible about money and bills, but I’ve never quite known exactly how much debt my husband and I have combined or how long it will be before it’s all paid off. Between student loans, new cars, and a couple credit cards, I always procrastinated doing this because I was worried that the truth would be a bit discouraging. After going through statements and figuring out interest rates, payments, and budgets, I was relieved to find out we would be debt-free way sooner than I expected, not to mention we now had a tangible, effective plan that would save us money in the end. Alright, so there might have been a little happy dance after this, too.
With so many things going on at work and on the weekends, I got a calendar and recorded every event, appointment, and to-do for the next few months. I had so many wedding and shower invitations on my fridge that I was running out of magnets and space, but this helped me to clear my mind and my fridge. I totally cleaned the inside, too, as well as the pantry, by pulling everything out, getting rid of expired food, and cleaning the shelves. While looking through the kitchen cabinets, an overloaded folder of various recipes, which I had ripped out of magazines and jotted on random pieces of paper, stood out to me. I rarely opened that folder because of how disorganized it was, so it was as if all those years of collecting recipes had been a waste. I finally sat down and organized the recipes into a binder using page protectors, and now I have an easy way to find what I'm looking for and the papers are safe from spills and splatters while cooking:
(I have no idea why this picture is sideways.)
Throughout the month, one-by-one, I went through all parts of my house and started throwing away garbage, boxing up things I could sell or donate, and re-organizing anything that still had a purpose in my life. Even though some of this was tedious and time-consuming, I know the newly-created space, functionality and peace of mind made it worthwhile. Every time I finished a new task, I felt wonderfully productive and like a weight was just lifted off of me. I also found cool stuff that had been lost and forgotten at the back of closets or the bottom of drawers, which turned each chore into a little treasure hunt. I made life easier and more rewarding for myself by making more room for the things I value and letting go of the things I don't. I actually accumulated so much stuff to get rid of that I decided to have a garage sale. So despite my month of cleaning and hard work, it looks like I'm having mimosas and making cash this Saturday morning : ).
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