Simplicity Project #10

This month I'm afraid that I have to reveal one of my dirty little secrets. Some of you that have been to my house might think I keep it neat and tidy (although who knows, perhaps you think I'm a slob). While it's true that I like to keep up appearances when it comes to neatness, I daily battle piles of clutter. Be it mail I think I'll need to reference one day or magazine tear sheets I aspire to mimic, there's always too much lying around. And thus the reason for my dirty little secret. I hope it doesn't affect our friendship or the way you view me as a person. I venture to guess at least half of you have a similar secret. . .

I have 4 junk drawers in my kitchen.

Gasp!

I know, I know. It's disgusting. Who needs 4 junk drawers? Apparently the Wolstenholms do.

So today I decided it was time to clean them out. Oh, I still have 4 junk drawers. They now just each have a purpose of their own.

Here they are before. . .



And after. . .



One for scissors, tape, etc. . .One for note pads and pens. . .One for my writing and correspondence supplies. . .and One for coupons.

I know what you are thinking. Why couldn't you use only 2 drawers for these items?Well I probably could but then they'd get all stuffed and junky. . .at least this way I have room to keep them organized. And besides, I have the 4 drawers, so why not use them?

I hope that even though I am not doing these projects as often as I was at the beginning of the year, you are still finding inspiration here to tackle the clutter in your home. I still feel like I'm buried under a pile of junk all the time, but we are getting there. One step at a time.

Simplicity Project #9

I really am trying to keep up with my blogging. But it just seems the busier I get at work, the busier I get at home. The older Hope gets, the more attention she requires. I thought it was supposed to be the other way around? Not with my little explorer. I'm in a constant state of lookout. Needless to say she can now say, NO. . . and shake her head. She sees mommy do it all day long!

This week I took on a project I've needed to do for a long time. It doesn't matter how much I want to keep my bathroom cabinets neat and tidy, with all that crap it takes to make me look half-way decent, I don't stand a chance of keeping it simple! But I managed to cut down on a little bit of clutter. What with Hope now exploring each and every door she can open, I had to make sure she wasn't met with a landslide of hair product!

Take a look at this mess before. . .


And after. . .


You should see the pile of stuff I trashed or found a new home for! I really purposed to throw out things I wasn't using. Take the bag of old Clinique makeup for instance. I used to work for Clinique about 10 years ago. . . so when I found a bag full of makeup I got for free as an employee, I figured it was OK to toss it out. If I haven't used that shade of lipstick in 10 years, it's likely not the right color for me!

This week I encourage you ladies to tackle your bathroom. Get rid of that suntan lotion from 5 years back. It's likely lost it's SPF power by now! This stuff has a shelf life people. Let's not put our bodies in danger because we can't bring ourselves to toss it!

Simplicity Project #8

This week I took on a project that doesn't necessarily mean simplicity but rather cleanliness.
The refrigerator.
You probably can't tell much in these pictures, but I did throw a lot away. How many bottles of salad dressing does one really need? This is one of those projects that I absolutely hate doing and rarely do. Tonight was trash night so I thought it would be the perfect time to throw food away.
The Fridge Before

The Fridge After

After spending the 10 minutes it took to tackle it, I've decided that I will do this once a month, on trash night!

Speaking of once a month . . . as you can probably tell by the fact that I am behind on my projects, finding the time to do a simplicity project once a week was probably a bit of a lofty goal for me. As I said in my post last week, the minute your attempt to simplify things makes your life harder, you've missed the point. Therefore, I am admitting my limitations and turning this little experiment into a monthly blog post. I hope you will still be encouraged by my projects even though they will be less frequent. Hey, maybe because I'm only doing it once a month I will have time to tackle the big things again. But I suppose I shouldn't go promising things . . . it always gets my in over my head.

Simple Thoughts, Round 3

In the spirit of simplicity, I'll keep this short!

I'm behind. I fear I'm failing miserably at this little project I set out to do. . . and it's only March. But, alas, I am letting myself off the hook because the moment your attempt to simplify things makes life harder, you've totally missed the point.

So even though I owe you a project for last week I'm afraid to say that these really simple thoughts are all you are going to get because I spent the weekend playing nurse to a 10 month old including a short trip to the ER on Sunday morning. All is well now with our little Hope but it was a crazy couple of days.

Check back in a few days as I play catch up with a project for this week! You can bet your life it's going to be a small one! Hey, every little bit counts. That's what I'm trying to teach you people!

Simplicity Project #7

This week I tackled a very small but practical project. The "bottle station" in our kitchen. As I near the end of our season with bottles, I am not ashamed to tell you that I cannot wait until they are gone. No more nipples and other paraphernalia to scrub daily. Why in the heck each bottle has to have their own unique "flow system" complete with extra do dads to clean, I am unsure! I would take them out of the dish washer and just throw them on the counter. What a mess! This week I decided to tidy up and make a commitment to fill the bottles with water each time I take them out of the dishwasher, leaving them completely ready for formula that is room temperature. Just the way Hope likes it.
Before

After

I realize this is a very small and seemingly insignificant simplicity project. But you'd be surprised how much little things like this affect your state of mind. I would look over at all this junk and get stressed because I felt like it took so much energy to keep it organized. Then I just gave up and was left with this mess. It will take some level of commitment to keep it tidy, but it's definitely worth my peace of mind!

Simple Thoughts, Round 2

This is an entry I owed you last week. Had every intention of posting it then but life got nutty. I know you understand. Some thoughts about living simply. . . and then I'll post a project later this week. Enjoy!

My boss sent me a video last week that was presented at a recent radio seminar here in Nashville. The video's intent, I believe was to show its viewers how other forms of media and networking may be taking its place. Sad news for radio peeps, I know. . .but even sadder news for the rest of us in how much media has overtaken our lives. I sat there with a splitting headache as I watched how many millions of people are on Facebook and how many billions of messages they are sending (many of which, I promise you come to my inbox each day). There were stats on ITunes, MySpace, Twitter and XMradio but I think the most mind-blowing nugget of info was this:

"One, daily issue of the New York Times contains more information that someone from the 18th century would have come across in their lifetime."

And to that I say. . .WTH? (That's "what the hell?" for those of you not fluent in text message talk.)

I'm one of those girls who's always thought she should have lived in the Victorian Era. After hearing this little tidbit, I'm now pretty sure that the Big Guy made a huge mistake plopping me in the 20th/21st centuries. I don't want all of this information coming at me. In fact, I don't care! I can barely remember to feed and change my child (not kidding, I forgot to feed her one afternoon last month, did I share that with you yet?). I'm sure it's possible that my little brain is smaller than some. . . even most. But who needs to know all this crap?

I've wrestled a lot with this over the past few days trying to find the balance between a desire for intelligence and progressive knowledge and simplicity and peace of mind. I've decided that for me personally - I don't have to be on twitter (so sorry to many of you who love it and love to keep in touch that way). I just can't handle knowing who's going to the bathroom and who's having coffee at the moment. No, for me. . .it's just TMI (That's "too much information" - come on people, keep up!)

In order to keep my simple mind in optimal working order, I'll need to keep the information to a healthy 21st century minimum. I really feel the need to police the amount of data that enters my brain. But that's just me. Each one of us has to create our own boundaries based on what we can handle or what we enjoy. Some of my friends love being on Facebook and Twitter all the time and they see it as a convenient and efficient way to keep in touch. That is wonderful. And I guess that's the interesting thing about progression and technology. It can be a blessing and a curse - depending on who you are talking to and how well it is working for them.

So today I encourage us all to take a moment to stop and think about the information we allow to come across our brain everyday. Is it enhancing our lives or causing more stress? Is it edifying and uplifting? Is it contributing to our personal and spiritual growth? Is it taking away from real, face to face relationships? See I'm an old fashioned girl. I'd take a thoughtful, hand-written note over someone "writing on my wall" any day! Perhaps that makes me out of touch, but I'd like to think it makes me classy.

Lol. (Uh, that's "laugh out loud" - geez, even I know that!)

Simplicity Project #6

This week's featured project made me feel like I was on one of those HGTV design shows (which, by the way I'm obsessed with). Take a look at our extreme makeover, office edition. These pictures do not even do it justice. After completing this project, I felt like I was in a whole new place. It was calm and organized and now I can be so much more productive! Atmosphere is everything when it comes to productivity. At least it is in my world.

Isn't it pretty?

Before

After

Simplicity Project #5

Well I'm just going to go ahead and admit it. I completed this project several weeks ago right after the holidays. We were up to our ears in boxes and stuff in the garage after Christmas. I had to get it done. So I captured it on film so I could share it with you at the appropriate time. Seeing as how Hope's sick with her first cold (so sad!), I thought now was the perfect time to pull this project out of my back pocket.

The Garage Before (there was already room for my car on the left of course). . .


And The Garage After (now with room for Dave's car). . .

We got rid of that pile of broken down boxes the next day in the trash. Now we can both park in there. Woo hoo!

I hope you all are attacking your home projects. I'm spending this week preparing all of my items for the consignment sale. It's time consuming but I'm hoping to make a few hundred bucks. Nothing like cleaning and making se dough while you are at it.

If you think about it, please pray for Hope. She's pretty miserable this week. Although I have to say, even though she is stuffed up, she can't stop smiling and playing! That's my girl!

Simple Thoughts, Round 1

Well, I said it would happen and alas. . .it has. No time to think about a project this week. I do have one or two up my sleeve that I completed a few weeks back, but I'll save those for another day. Today I feel compelled to write something about simplicity.

This week I read a verse in Proverbs that, since my discovery of it, has provided me a mixture of motivation and fear. I'll let you read it now to decide how it makes you feel.

"A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest - and poverty will come on you like a bandit and scarcity like an armed man." Proverbs 6: 10-11

So, how do you feel? You still with me? I know. It's a bit intimidating, isn't it? At first I allowed it to be a kick in the pants for me to get off my arse and do something. I would tell myself Jess, don't be lazy. Don't be passive. Go after this stuff. Just get it done! But now, as I really consider what simplicity means for our family and our home, I have been encouraged to find a good balance between going after things and knowing when to let things go for the sake of sanity and some much needed rest.

So this week I challenge all of us to find that balance. For me it means that I am going to skip a meeting at church tonight in order to go home and get some laundry done for my family. It's just what I feel needs to be done - today. Tomorrow might look different. I might let the laundry go in order to spend time with a friend, or with Hope. Day by day, we will have the grace and wisdom we need to make the most of every moment . . . so that we can simply enjoy all of the things God has blessed us with.

Simplicity Project #4

Before I get going about my project, I just have to share this really sweet pic of Hope. I think she may grow up to be a writer. What do you think? So introspective!

This week I chose a very simple project to complete. Work has been a little overwhelming so I'm actually pretty proud that I even found the time to do this one, little thing to create space in my world. Not sure the "platter cabinet" is going to cause any earth-shattering effects either way, but I'm glad to have it done nonetheless. Not too much of a difference but definitely got rid of some items I haven't been using.
Before

After

I am feeling more and more, the need to create space in my life. As certain things seem to be closing in on me, I find refuge in areas I can control such as my atmosphere. It really does help bring peace in the midst of the storm. I hope you all are getting inspired by these posts. Please feel free to share about projects you are tackling in your home!

Simplicity Project #3

This week I share with you a project I usually tackle once a year. Although this year, with my new found disgust of clutter and excess I had the wisdom to go a few steps further.

Pictures!

Now I've always been over the top when it came to these paper memories but ever since the introduction of digital photography, I've gotten worse. It was one thing to take 6 rolls of 35mm film of our honeymoon but now . . . 6 years later . . . think of the thousands of photos we have of our family in just 8 months! And I'm not one of those people who takes the pictures and leaves them on the camera or even on the computer for that matter. No, I'm a frequent shopper at Shutterfly.com so the paper memories are piling up!

This year, I went completely crazy and got rid of hundreds of pictures. High school, college, people I haven't seen in years, whose names I can't even remember. Trash! All trash!

I keep my photos in a dresser in our sitting room. The dresser is a quirky antique with somewhat open drawers. So you can see if there is a lot of clutter in them. My goal with this project was to straighten the drawers and create more space for the thousands of photos I will be adding in the next few years.

Before

After (See the extra room? And what you can't see is that one of those photo boxes is actually empty!)

And the hundreds of photos I threw away! Good-bye boy I dated in 10th grade . . . I don't even remember your name!

This project was especially space-making because I said good-bye to many memories, leaving room in not only my drawer but also my heart for many more, even greater memories with my family.

Simplicity Project #2

Here we go again. This week I tackled Hope's closet. It's amazing how much stuff an 8 month old can accumulate! We were blessed with so many things . . . mostly adorable outfits that she wore once. People just can't help themselves from buying baby girl outfits, mommy included! I think one of the main things that compelled me to do this project was the overwhelmingness of Hope's closet. While I have been so thankful for the overabundance of clothing (what woman wouldn't be happy with choice when it comes to clothing?) I have felt guilty, almost ashamed if she didn't wear it all. And so I have felt the need to downsize.

Hope's Closet Before

Hope's Closet After


And then the really huge pile of stuff I will be consigning or giving to Good Will

Now this display does not take into account the new clothes my mom brought back to me from the many, generous family members in Florida that yup, you guessed it, just couldn't help themselves and bought Hope not one, but many new outfits for the spring and summer. Good thing I took this shot before I crammed all those in there! No seriously, I am thankful. She will need to be clothed this summer.

Let's just say with 50 more Simplicity Projects to go this year, you just might see Hope's closet show up one or two more times!

I am so thankful that the Lord has given me vision to do this for our home. Even with traveling twice for work last week, I still feel an amazing measure of grace and space for Him to work and to speak. I know it is in part because I am being obedient to this task. Cleaning house feels great!

Upromise

I'm sure many of you have seen this program at your local Publix supermarket. They do a great job promoting it. I grabbed a flyer one day months ago and put off joining until late in November. Man, am I glad I joined before the Christmas Shopping season!

If you are not familiar with the program, visit www.upromise.com as soon as you finish reading this post.

Upromise is a program developed to help you save for college through your normal everyday spending. You can register your Kroger Plus Card, Publix Card (they have one specifically for Upromise), your Harris Teeter card, etc, etc. Then you can register your Debit Card and any time you use that card to eat out at participating restaurants, a small % of what you spend will be deposited in your Upromise account as savings for college. BUT, the most productive way to save is by shopping online through the Upromise site. It links to Macys.com, Kohls.com, Shutterfly, SnapFish, Vista Print (just to name a few) and any time you shop on those sites, a % of what you spend is deposited into your Upromise account for college savings.

As of today, Dave and I have saved over $20 for Hope's college fund! We can link our account to her 529 Savings Plan so the money is invested as well. The most amazing thing about the program is you are saving without even thinking about it! You can ask your family to link to your account so every time grandma and grandpa spend money, they can save for college as well!

The program is free and although $20 in one month doesn't seem like much, over 18 years it will add up. The thought of paying for college in 18 years is so overwhelming. At least this little effort takes some of the pressure off.

I hope it works well for all you mommies out there! Now you have a very noble excuse to purchase things online!

Happy Shopping. . .I mean, College Saving!

Simplicity Project #1

Happy New Year everyone! I pray you all had a wonderful holiday and that 2009 is off to a good start. It is for us. We got so much done over the holiday. I'm dreading the return to work tomorrow a little bit but that's life isn't it?

So here we go. Our first Simplicity Project for the year. I had planned to start small but since the Christmas decorations had to be taken down and put away, there was no better place to start than with our storage unit full of stuff. Now let me give a small disclaimer . . . this picture does not include the mounds of boxes and stuff that was temporarily located on my bedroom floor when I captured this shot. So much of the decor was dumped there as we began gathering it to put it up. So although the "before" picture looks bad, it was really a lot worse!

What do you think? Are we organized or what? What you also cannot see is the box of Christmas decorations that we are giving to Good Will. Woo hoo! Let the purging begin! I feel like I have so much "space" in my life already.

BEFORE


AFTER

A Move Towards Simplicity

I just love the way the Lord confirms the stirrings He's put in our hearts. After my post "Simplicity or Sephora" a few weeks ago, I felt very compelled to do something specific regarding fostering simple living in our lives. I've had an extreme burden and desire to get rid of the clutter and excess to make room for new things the Lord might want to bring us. But let me be clear - I'm not talking about material things. The Lord has blessed us with so much and that abundance (mixed with a bit of stuff we've accumulated on our own) is just too much to manage. It takes time and energy and mind space. I feel He wants to bring us divine appointments and knowledge and we must create physical and spiritual "space" in our lives for those things. So I'm starting to clean house. More literally in the physical sense but also in the spiritual sense as well.

I've kept these things in my heart for the past month. Besides what I shared in that post, I've not really spoken to anyone about it. Not even my husband (and let's be honest, he doesn't really keep up with my blog). So you can imagine my surprise when he shared with me on Christmas that he felt the Lord saying we needed to be more "efficient and effective" in 2009 (thank you PD for our tendency towards alliteration!). I was so excited to know that God was impressing the same things upon his heart. I walked away from that conversation feeling like I really needed to do something drastic in order to keep myself accountable to this task. I have to admit, I felt (and still do feel) nervous about committing to anything specific but I believe it's time for me and for our household to get serious.

And then lastly, our pastor shared this past Sunday that he wanted to encourage us to "live lean" (there's that alliteration again) in 2009! Wow, what confirmation! I knew then that a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do!

So here I go . . . today I introduce to you "Project Simplicity 2009." Each week I plan to share one before and after project from our home where I get rid of clutter and excess. I plan to start small and work my way up to the big things. I will likely give items to Good Will or someone in our lives that could use some extra dishes or baby clothes. Hey, I might even get brave and try one of those crazy, mommy consignment sales and make a few bucks to contribute towards our family vacation. I'm not quite sure what it will look like exactly but the idea is to take baby steps towards a lean, efficient and simple life. I'm going to go ahead right now and say it might be hard to come up with 52 projects so I'm going to let myself off the hook right now and say perhaps it won't be every week, but I'm committed to giving it a try. And I will at least address the issue once a week even if I don't have a project to share.

My hope is that this will create a new way of living in our lives and perhaps encourage you in this way as well. We all really do have so much more then we need. What would our lives look like if we got rid of all the stuff and focused on what really matters? I'm hoping to find out!

Simplicity or Sephora?

The other day I was in Sephora with a few girlfriends. As I was browsing through the sea of cosmetics, I quickly found myself overwhelmed and maybe even a little annoyed at the choices laid out in front of me. I went in to purchase an inexpensive yet very effective eyeliner but was bombarded by 58 other eyeliner options carrying empty promises for brighter eyes and much higher price tags.

And then for some reason my mind wandered to thoughts of Little House on the Prairie. Bear with me here, this is not quite as random as one might think. I was watching Little House for a few minutes the other day while home with my mom and Hope. We love Little House. It is wholesome and reminds us of when I was young. I kinda looked like Laura Ingles when I was little. But I digress. . .So I was walking through Sephora thinking about Little House and how times were much simpler then. Laura Ingles wasn't plagued with the pressure of making a decision between liquid or mineral makeup. No, Laura had much more important things to worry about like stuffing her dress with apples to make her bosoms look bigger. Ah, classic. I'll never forget the sight of those apples falling to the floor and rolling down the school room isle.

I've been thinking a lot lately about the simple life. Perhaps it's due to constant news headlines about our current economic state. Or perhaps it's because adding a baby and all that comes with it into your life and your home makes you want to throw everything away and live with one set of dishes and one set of sheets and one small set of clothes. Whatever the reason, I also know that the gloom and doom news reports are also making me a bit disgusted at our culture here in the USA. I realize that this economic downturn is not something to take lightly. Considering the tens of thousands of people who have lost their jobs, I take it very seriously and I pray that the Lord would provide abundantly for them. But then there are those of us who are simply living in fear because things don't look like they did 12 months ago. We can't own a big SUV anymore because gas got too high. We can't get a boob job because we didn't get that quarterly bonus (I've got three words for you . . . Laura Ingles' apples!) We can't shop at the high end supermarket for all organic food because it's just too expensive and we should save our pennies for when this thing really goes south. Blah, blah, blah. Maybe we weren't supposed to have those big, fat SUV's in the first place. Maybe we're not supposed to have 37 different mascara's to choose from. But this is the culture that the world has created. We've done this to ourselves and now I feel we need to take inventory and really prioritize in our lives.

I believe we've become so used to having stuff at our disposal that we are mistaking an opportunity to simplify as an economic downturn. We are more taken care of and richly blessed than any nation in the entire world. Yet we freak out when life happens and forces us to re-evaluate our spending and our priorities. We are now so used to choices we've let them dilute our convictions and our focus.

So I'm taking this downturn as an opportunity to take a look at my own life. Will I choose simplicity or Sephora? I know it will not be easy but I choose simplicity. Sure, there will need to be a huge paradigm shift in my thinking, but in the end I know the diligence of living with less will prepare me and my family for all that God has for us. As Christians we tend to think abundance refers to stuff. Although the Word promises us abundance, it also addresses where we need to store up our treasures. . .and it's not here on earth people!

Will you join with me in evaluating your own life? I'm not suggesting that anyone give up the things they enjoy or the blessings of their lives. No, I still plan to shop at Sephora . . . just with a different point of view. I will not be sucked in by all the choices, believing I should spend my money and try something new just because it's there. I will shop with greater restraint and discernment, obtaining only what I truly need . . . because I believe that when we can learn to live with less, we will end up having so much more.