De-Junking.

My office is a calming and productive place. I love having all my clothes and makeup and, oh yeah, work stuff in one place. It's my own little corner of the house. No boys allowed.

 

And then sometimes I let it get really bad--like really messy and really disorganized and really terrible. I find that since I take care of the rest of the house, my own little sanctuary gets neglected. I'll run a vacuum through there and spritz some (homemade) Febreeze but that's really it since I'm the only one who goes in there and I'd rather spend energy on the more publicly beneficial rooms. When I know we're having company I scrub the front room, kitchen, and bathrooms. My office? Not so much. I've read before that a lot of the time women put themselves last to care for others, I think I did just that with my office.

 

Within the last week, in an effort to rid our entire house of dust and unneeded junk, I tackled my office. I spent SIXTEEN hours cleaning my office--going through every box of mementos, organizing every financial document, and tossing every dried up nail polish or expired tube of mascara.

 

BEFORE

 

 

Sigh, so bad.

 

 

The closet was awful...because when I was cleaning other rooms I could just shove all the junk in the closet and shut the doors. Out of sight...not so out of mind. It drove me crazy knowing I needed to organize my space and get things back in order!

 

 

My vanity...this was actually after I had already straightened it up a little bit.

 

AFTER

 

 

A place for everything and everything in its damn place.

 

 

Oh my gosh, there was a closet under all that mess!

 

 

Last time I was grocery shopping at Target I picked up a few tiny, colorful bins. My makeup used to be in the vanity drawers...and in a small container...and in the bathroom medicine cabinet. I separated everything by category into different bins and put everything together where I could see it.

 

From my office alone I dragged out SIX bags of trash/recycling--getting rid of old birthday cards with no sentimental meaning, old college papers (I found one where I very seriously quoted Eminem and laughed for a full ten minutes), and notes from friends who I no longer talk to. I tried to be ruthless because I have a habit of holding onto things for sentimental value when there's no need to hold that sentimentality anymore. I feel so much lighter and rid of that junk in the trunk...well, not my actual trunk but you know...

 

I'm so happy our home is now purged of junk and sparkling clean!