Thursday, June 20, 2013
Sunday, April 28, 2013
But He Was Still Hungry....
I also went nuts making tissue paper confetti. I had a circle whole punch from a college project which I put to good use! My hand hurt for about a day after punching a rainbow of circles. When I had the invitations printed, I also had signs printed which I mounted on foam board and attached to fruit with toothpicks.
For party favors, I put some leftover wedding favor tins to good use! I never would have come up with this idea if I hadn't been cleaning out my guest closet. I hand drew all the little caterpillars on the labels and filled the tins with caterpillar food (skittles).
I displayed monthly pictures on a giant caterpillar going up the stairs. To make it I traced a kitchen plate onto construction paper for perfect circles.
Here's the caterpillar in it's entirety!
I looked EVERYWHERE to find the giant lollipops for the centerpiece I made. Aaaand, I can't remember where it was that I finally found them! I'll update when I think of it. I just re-wrapped them with clear plastic and taped construction paper number 1s to them. Then I stuck them in a plastic bucket. To weight it down I used pennies topped with shiny blue stones (also left over from our wedding and found during the closet clean out).

Of course, the birthday boy needed his own mini smash cake! Don't ask me why I thought his first experience with icing should involve red and green dye!
After trying to find a mini bundt pan, I realized it would be cheapest and easiest to just order a bundtlet from Nothing Bundt Cakes. After my sister-in-law, they make the best bundt cakes! Besides, when would I ever need to make one mini cake again?
Here's the whole table scape. Cake! Confetti! YAY!
I even made this cute little sign for the bathroom door after seeing a similar one on Pinterest.
One thing is for sure... this mama had fun at this party! And I'm going to scale back a tad for the second birthday party!
Any good party planning tips? What was your favorite party as a kid? I think I'd have to pick my American Girl Doll themed party!
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
Organizey Shopping: The Kitchen
I would love to go on a shopping spree for gear to organize and decorate every inch of my apartment! But since Mr. Budget says I can't right now, I'm going to start a series called Organizey Shopping. I will be window shopping room by room and share what I would love to buy and why.
First up is the kitchen!
1. I would love to get some canisters like these for the pantry. Not only do they look pretty, they would keep foods like cereal and crackers fresher while making it easy to see what needs to be added to the grocery list. I would definitely opt for square and rectangular ones over round ones because they for side by side snugly without wasted space. {source}
2. This cleanser rack can be installed a cabinet door adding extra storage space for sponges, cleaners, etc. {source}
3. This pull-out lid organizer takes advantage of vertical space and keeps lids easy to access. Currently our lids have a tendency to all fall out when you try to grab one. I do not enjoy the extra dishes to wash! {source}
4. These metal baskets are cute and useful! I would stick them in the pantry and use them to maximize vertical storage space while corralling smaller loose items like Lära Bars and packs of gum. {source}
5. I think it would be fun to use clear shelf liner in the kitchen drawers with pretty scrapbook paper underneath. I would choose a paper with a pattern that tiles well since drawers are typically not 12x12. Wrapping paper is another option. {source} & {source}
6. I love these spice jars! They have chalkboard labels and would look so cute and organized lined up on the kitchen counter or open shelving. {source}
7. We could definitely use something like these drawer organizers for our drawer of miscellaneous kitchen gadgets. It always becomes a jumbled mess because we have nothing to keep things in place. {source}
8. Extra pantry space that is easy to access! This one is a no brainer. {source}
Do you use any of these in your kitchen? What is your favorite tool to keeping your kitchen user-friendly?
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Loving Stylebook
It has a closet section where you add photos of all your clothes. Don't they look so cute all little and organized!?
I think this app is amazing for several reasons.
1. It should help me have more variety in my outfits and not wear the same shirt every Friday. Or even worse... wear the same outfit on Friday and the following Monday!
2. It helps me think of more ways to mix and match what I already have to create more outfits because it is easier to see your clothes in this format than smashed together in a closet. You can pick out a shirt and then scroll through and see all your cardigans to see what matches. I totally get stuck in the rut of wearing the same things together when I could do a lot more mixing and matching.
3. Do you ever buy a cute skirt and then realize none of your shirts match it? Or buy a turquoise shirt and realize once you get home that half your wardrobe is turquoise now? Guilty! But with this app, I can see how a potential purchase could work with my wardrobe before I buy it! It also makes it easy to see that I have way too many t-shirts but not enough blouses so that I know what to shop for.
4. It makes getting dressed in the morning so much faster! Which is great for a night owl like me who moves like molasses in the morning.
5. It tracks how often you wear each item. Which will make cleaning out my closet a piece of cake. I can just look in my app and get rid of anything I haven't worn in the past year. And less unnecessary stuff in the closet = less time spent managing it!
6. It also can track cost per wear if you put in the amount you paid for an item. Those $200 boots you splurged on don't seem so bad when you realize you have worn them so much that it's only $1 per wear. I think it will also help me to see which things I wear the most so that I know what types of clothes it makes sense to spend a little extra to get better quality on like my black pumps.
I have about 95% of my clothes photographed and added to my stylebook now and about 2% of my jewelry. I guess I need to get on that.
I am so happy to have an app to keep my wardrobe organized! You have no idea how happy this makes the organizer in me. So happy that while I was sick in bed with the flu and discovered it, I totally snuck out of bed to add the first few pictures of my clothes so I could start playing with it. Yes, it made me feel worse but it was worth it! Ha ha.
Note: This is not a sponsored post. I just really like this app!
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Organized Cleaing Schedule
Cleaning!
I like this photo because it looks like the bottles of cleaner are sad that they are stuck inside cleaning instead of playing outside.
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One of my goals for 2013 is to come up with a way to stay on top of keeping things clean with minimal effort. My usual system looks something like this:
A) Spend an entire weekend exhausting myself by cleaning all the things!
B) Fail to clean all the things -or-
Clean all the things and then not clean ANYTHING for the next month because I earned it!
C) Repeat
This system has several problems.
A) It stinks to spend a weekend cleaning instead of relaxing
B) It's impossible to clean an entire home in 2 days while taking care of a toddler
C) Some things need to be cleaned more often than once a month!
I have also tried schedules of different things that I need to clean on different days of the week. But the problem with that was if I missed a day I felt like I had to double up the next day. And then I would quit.
I think I have finally come up with a system that works for me! I am so excited and can't wait to share it with you!
Step 1
Make a list of daily chores. These are things you try to do every day. Don't get too crazy with this list. It shouldn't take more than 30 minutes. Set a timer!
My daily list looks like this:
- wash and put away dishes
- wipe off table and high chair
- wipe kitchen counters
- pick up/put away
- wipe bathroom sink/counter
- scoop litterboxes (if needed)
- take out trash (if needed)
Step 2
Make a list of the rooms in your house that need cleaning. Depending on how many, you might have a one or two week rotation. I came up with five and assigned them to Monday-Friday. Exclude weekends from this schedule!
Here's what my rotational list looks like:
- Monday: Bathrooms
- Tuesday: Dining Room/Living Room
- Wednesday: Master Bedroom
- Thursday: Kitchen
- Friday: Guest Bedroom
Step 3
Make a list of the things that need to be cleaned in each room. Then, on the day of the week assigned to that room, spend no more than 30 minutes checking off one or two things on the list for that room. DO NOT clean the whole room! Just a manageable chunk! The goal is to clean everything on the list once a month. But again, don't stress if you don't! Just start the next month with the things you didn't get to the previous month.
As an example, here's what my bathroom list looks like:
- Clean tubs
- Clean mirrors
- Sweep and Swiffer Wet Jet
- Clean litterboxes and replace litter
- Clean toilets
- Dust vents and lights
- Dust baseboards
- Clean window and windowsill
- Wash shower curtains and liners
Do you use a cleaning schedule? What works for you? Also, I'd love to know your favorite cleaning products. I personally was amazed when I removed a rust stain from my shower with Mr. Clean Magic Eraser and can't imagine dusting without my Swiffer Duster!
Saturday, March 2, 2013
Miss Me?
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| {source} |
And Happy Belated 1 Year Blog-aversary to Organizey Dreams! That's right... this little ol' blog started on January 2, 2012. Enjoy a virtual bundtini on me!
We have come a looooong way in organizing and de-cluttering since starting this blog. We had a successful garage sale and sold a lot of old books & movies to Half Price Books. But of course there is always more work to be done!
Since we no longer have to tackle entire rooms, my husband and I have decided to have Organizey Weekends! He's not too excited by the name, but the idea was his. Instead of me bugging him about organizing things all the time, once a month we will pick an area we need to work on and have a weekend focused on organizing it. I'm not sure what my posting schedule will look like, but I do plan on posting at least once a month now.
Some of the areas we would like to tackle include:
- desk
- guest closet (basically a 2nd storage unit at the moment)
- storage unit
- CDs (if you only knew how many my husband has!)
- toy storage
- master closet
Saturday, November 17, 2012
See ya later, alligator!
P.S. Alligator print image is from Etsy. You can buy one fromZeppiPrits!
Saturday, September 15, 2012
Pictures, Pictures on the Wall
Since my patterns weren't exact, I used a piece of printer paper to make precise guides for determining where to put the nails in the wall. I put the paper on the back of each frame and lined it up with a top corner. Then I marked a hole where the hanger on the back was. This part was super easy, no measuring required!
I repeated those steps until all the pictures I had were hung! I still need to find the white mattes I have somewhere to replace the maroon ones. I also need to buy three more 5" x 7" frames since I only have one. I am waiting to hang the one I do have in case I can't find the same one and need to buy all four to have them match.
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
Bathroom Bliss Part 2
The top shelf has less frequently used items like beach towels, extra crib sheets, nail polish, and a basket of hair accessories.
Below that, we have burp cloths, my "second bathroom drawer", a small basket with extra razor blades, a basket of medicine, and a basket of travel sized toiletries. The basket I refer to as my "second bathroom drawer" is a basket with a handle that I pull out while I am getting ready and then put back in the closet. It prevents a lot of items from cluttering up the counter. It holds things like my hairbrush, contact solution, and glasses case.
The third shelf down has some drawers that used to be below the sink where you couldn't even open the bottom one. They hold nail clippers, first aid items, and make up. The basket to the right of them holds extra items from packages that come with more than one.
Then on the lower shelves we have towels, sheets, and cleaning supplies. I plan on putting a child proof door knob cover on this door once our son is opening doors on his own.
The sheets I have sorted in stacks by which bed they fit on. Towels are also sorted by size. I relocated the old towels we don't really use under the sink so that the ones we use fit in here. I still like to keep old towels around because they come in handy for cleaning up big messes.
The back of our bathroom door also needed a little help. We have these handy hooks from my college days, but too much stuff had accumulated there, including my Mary Kay travel bag I hadn't used since December. Now it holds just my winter and summer robes. I think the winter one was in the wash when I took this picture.
It was difficult to photograph under the sink, but it mainly holds less used items. I also tried to put baby safe items under there since it will be tricky to install child safety locks on all 4 cabinets due to the material they are made of and the fact that we are renters. So we have old towels and extra toilet paper under there, as well as our travel toiletry bags. There are no crazy chemicals or medicines for our son or cats to get into.
We have been doing a pretty good job of keeping our bathroom organized. Having things in places that make sense makes all the difference!
Do you have any tips for getting and/or keeping a bathroom organized? We would love to hear them!
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Bathroom Bliss Part 1
May
Storage unit
Yes, I realize it is September now... I guess it took me a while to recover, ha ha. Deciding to stay in our current apartment for another year also slowed down or momentum for getting rid of junk before moving. Now that the "it's too hot to move" heat of summer will be leaving soon, we are hoping to create a new de-cluttering/organizing schedule and get it done!
First, I'm going to share a couple of ways we re-purposed items from our bathroom set we got for our wedding. We have a beachy/ palm tree theme going on in there. This cute little umbrella toothbrush holder is great... only I have an electric toothbrush that doesn't fit in it and my husband doesn't like to leave his toothbrush sitting out. So, it's new job is makeup brush holder! I love how it keeps them handy and prevents excess makeup from building up in the drawer.

Our bathroom set also includes this cute little hammock soap dish... but we use liquid soap! Since my husband likes to remove his rings when he washes his hands, it became a ring hammock!
Making our bathroom more functional involved clearing off some of the items we had been storing on the counter, reorganizing our bathroom drawers, re-organizing all of the items under the sink and in the closet, getting rid of expired medicines and products, and putting away some of the stuff hanging on the back of the bathroom door. In other words, we did it all!
I had been wanting some kind of dividers to help our drawers stay in order, so I was excited when I found these plastic ones in the Dollar Spot at Target! My husband and I now each have one skinny one and one larger rectangle one. They are a huge help when it comes to keeping things in place, and I love the $2 price for all four. For my drawer, I mainly have makeup. I also store my toothpaste, floss, contact case, eye drops, and current favorite nail polishes in there.
The rest of my nail polishes and makeup were under the sink in boxes and not very easy to get to. I dug them all out and got rid of everything that was too old, dried up, or no longer my style. Then they were relocated to the linen closet for easier access!
Stay tuned for a post about what we did to get our closet and under the sink space organized coming soon.
Do you have any re-purposed items in your bathroom? Do you like things out where they are quick to grab or put away for a clutter-free space? Does your makeup collection still have old things like body glitter?!
Sunday, July 8, 2012
Update and ideas
Since our decision to renew our lease means we will have a 2-year old while still in this apartment (how is he almost one?!), we now have plans to do a major switch around to give our little dude his own room!
In the mean time, here are some of my favorite organization ideas I have come across recently.
1) A DIY shower caddy using a second shower curtain rod. I love that you can customize with how ever many baskets you need. You could also use a second rod like this for hanging pool towels or clothes to drip dry over the tub.
If you know where this photo came from, please share! I found it on Pinterest with a dead link. :(
2) A Thousand Words blog, has a great system for organizing photos.
3) 2 Little Hooligans has this clever idea for corralling gift wrapping supplies using a stool.
Do you have any great organization ideas you have discovered recently?
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Guest Bath...Check!
May
Master bathroom
Storage unit
I decided to put our guest bedroom/closet on hold for now. It's crazy how much stuff we have to go through in that one room and I was losing momentum and becoming overwhelmed.
One of the main things I tackled in the guest bathroom was organizing the cabinet. Since I give our son baths in this room now, one of my goals was to make room for his towels, washcloths, and bath toys in here. It started off looking like this.
By getting rid of some things and relocating some things, I was able to clear off the top shelf completely! Then I gathered all of the baby wash cloths and towels from our overflowing linen closet and moved them in here.
I also gathered up all of the bath toys and put them in the bucket which just fit on the top shelf. The bottom shelf holds baby toiletries, lint rollers, and a few extra supplies for guests. This kid has enough shampoo/body wash to last until he's 10!
Mr. Babycito only uses a couple of bath toys at a time right now since we put his little tub inside the big tub. In between baths, his current bath toys hang out on the soap dish to dry.
And his tub hangs over the big tub to dry like this.
I re-purposed the basket that held bubbles at our wedding as an extra toilet paper holder. This helped free up some of the space in the cabinet. I love that the blue bow already matched the shower curtain and clock!
The drawer to the left of the sink is mostly empty. The one to the right holds some extra travel bags and a few things my mom leaves here so there is less to pack when she visits her grand baby. Once you have kids, your parents no longer visit you. It's all about the grand kids, ha ha.
I also organized under the sink. I threw away a very leaky silver polish and cleaned up its mess. Then I mainly just arranged things better. On the left we have the litter box lids that we don't use currently. On the right there's an extra scale, watering cans. And a trash can. I actually switched the too big round trash can under this sink with the too small square trash can in our master bathroom.
I am loving the results! Now it's time to tackle the master bathroom! Do you store a lot in your guest bathroom or is it more for guests? How do you store your extra toilet paper?
Sunday, May 13, 2012
Sweeter dreams!
We bought our old mattress at The Dump. Yes, that's the name of the store, but it is actually quite fitting. They advertise highly discounted prices because they buy from businesses that are closing. In reality, they sell cheap, defective junk. I have a friend who had a similar experience. The mattress was okay at first. But when it came time to flip it top to bottom like the instructions said, we discovered the bottom wasn't even a finished surface. It was definitely not the same bed we tried in the store. Unfortunately, at that point there was nothing we could do.
After sleeping on it for 5 years, it looked like this...
We put a yardstick across it to really show how bad it was. It was sunk in 3-5 inches on each side, and the middle had a hump higher than the edges. The sinking had started before it was even a year old. And we were both having trouble sleeping through the night and/or waking up sore.
We decided to start our shopping off by learning our sleep numbers so we would know what we were looking for. They actually were closer together than we expected. With 100 being hard and 5 being soft, I am a 30, and my husband is a 40. But we aren't fans of how comfy (or pricy) Sleep Number beds are.
So, off to Sleep Experts we went! My full sized bed I bought in college that is now our guest bed is a Simmons from there. And it's a great bed! I call it "the cloud bed" because it is THAT comfy.
Our new king sized mattress we picked out is also a Simmons Beautyrest. It's sooooooo much better! And flat! The sheets stay on better too. Plus, it comes with a one year love your mattress guarantee! We even saved some money buy getting a mis-matched box spring.
We went back the next day and got new pillows too. Our old ones were too flat for our new bed. I guess our old one kind of had built in pillows after becoming so lumpy and deformed. Of course, everything got brand new allergy covers to protect it and keep us healthy. After sleeping on it for two weeks, we are definitely having sweeter dreams now!
Any amazing mattress recommendations? Do you prefer soft or hard? Memory foam or pillow top? Spill the beans in the comments.
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Regift(bag)ing
First, I sorted all my gift bags and threw away all of the crunched up old ones. The next step was deciding what to store them in. I didn't want to spend any money on it right now, so I went into my laundry room to grab a couple of paper grocery bags. Instead, I discovered a couple of white bags from Loft! I got really excited because they are much prettier looking! Everything fit perfectly in the bags, but I was one short. Luckily, I found a Bed Bath and Beyond gift bag that was similar. Here are the sorted and filled up bags.
I used a sharpie to label what was in each one. One holds tissue paper, gift boxes, ribbon, bows, and gift tags. The next one holds gift bags for holidays, weddings, and baby showers. The last one holds my non-specific gift bags. I labeled it miscellaneous.
The final step was putting them up on the shelf and hoping they fit... I had just enough space for them! I love it when things work out so easily like this! I hope the rest of the closet is this easy to organize (yeah right)!
As for how I store rolls of wrapping paper, I don't have very many so they are in the flimsy clear plastic box that a 4 pack I bought at Target one year came in. It stands up vertically on the floor of the closet.
How do you store your gift wrapping supplies? Do you like to reuse gift bags and tissue paper or buy new?
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Party planning
I started off by making a kids party ideas board on pinterest. If you haven't signed up on pinterest yet, I highly recommend it! Here are some of the fun ideas I found:

1) Ducky Punch from TidyMom.net- this would be cute for a baby shower
2) Goldfish Party from Cake.- I love fishes cause they're so delicious! Buckets of Goldfish crackers would also be fun for a pool party or beach themed party.
3) The Very Hungry Caterpillar Food from Project Project- Gotta love a theme that comes with a menu! And The very Hungry Caterpillar is one of my favorite kid books.
4) Lego Cake from LikeCool.com- What little boy doesn't love Legos?!
5) Sea Turtle Cupcakes from theBERRY.com- This would be perfect for a Finding Nemo Party!
6) Monkey Cupcakes from Squidoo.com- These would be cute for a jungle themed party!
I think I am going to go with a Very Hungry Caterpillar theme for my baby's 1st birthday! I have tons of great ideas.
The next step was breaking out a notebook to jot down my favorite ideas that I want to incorporate into his party. To do this, I made a separate page for each of the following categories:
- Decorations
- Cake
- Food & Drinks
- Serving ware
- Activities
- Party Favors
- Invitations

Since I will be making decorations, favors, and cakes plus designing my own invitations and other items that I will need to get printed, getting organized now is vital!
The next step is making my party planning schedule!
Do you love party planning? What is your favorite theme for a kid party?














































