Feng Shui Revisited

About 2 years ago I wrote this post demystifying Feng Shui and explaining how I try to implement it's principles into my life.  Well, now I live in Japan.  Hello - Feng Shui Land (what if that was an actual place, like a theme park for really organized people...?).  The Japanese seem to have mastered the art of being clean, organized, and keeping their homes simple (yes it is an art-requiring study and practice).  After all - most Japanese live in small apartments, and it can become cluttered and crowded very quickly.  Therefore everything (and everyone) must be efficient and purposeful.  About half of every ¥100 shop is cleaning and organizing supplies - items such as collapsible colanders and storage bins of all shapes and sizes. 

As you know, we just crossed over into the new year and guess what many Japanese people do during their time off work?

They spend it cleaning.  

Clearing out the old and preparing for the new.  A philosophy that really seems to resonate with me - more so than spring cleaning.  In my previous post I explain that I don't really worry too much about the spiritual or financial associations with Feng Shui.  I focus on the flow of energy or chi.  The way you feel in your home - do you feel calm and refreshed or frustrated and stressed? 
Basically, your home should work for you. 
Things should be easy and comfortable in your own home. 
In the outside world, things are complicated - not designed specifically for you - stressful.  

But your home should be a retreat.  

Calm.  Simple.  

Your home should work for you.  

This being said - Feng Shui will look like different things for different people.
Practicing good Feng Shui is more than organizing, although that is a large part (you might want to purchase a few baskets or bins).  I can have an organized closet yet still feel stressed - like if my shoes are hard to reach or if it's too dark to see properly. 

So here are a few principles and practical examples of how I use Feng Shui to make my home work for me.

• Things you use daily should be easy to reach and stored beautifully and simply. 

Example 1: We were keeping our dishwasher detergent under the sink in the original box.  I really hate sticking my hand down into that cardboard box to pull out a packet.  It's scratchy and annoying and difficult.  Bad Feng Shui.

So I took the packets out of their box, and now they are sitting in a nice shallow box that is pretty and easy to access.  Simple solution: Good Feng Shui

Okay so you might be thinking - "this lady's got problems if she's complaining about sticking her hand in a cardboard box..." but these small annoyances add up very quickly.  Why should you ever be annoyed about anything in your home?  It's your home.  Make it work for you. 

Here's another example:

Example 2: The lids to our pots and pans are always shoved into the cabinet with the pots - laying on random pans, or over to the side.  Every time I try to take a pot out the lids crash and fall.  Bad Feng Shui.  I put them in a nice basket.  Now nothing comes sliding out of the cabinet when I open it.  Good Feng Shui.

Example 3: I recently reorganized my sewing cabinet.  The fabric had been stored on the bottom 2 shelves of a wardrobe - meaning every time I wanted to search for fabric I had to bend down and dig through a dark shelf. Instead of enjoying my fabric stash and feeling inspired about a new project, I felt uncomfortable and frustrated that I couldn't ever find what I was looking for. Bad Feng Shui.  Now all of my fabric is in baskets or bins on the top two shelves - more light shines on them and I'm not hunched over digging.  Good Feng Shui.


I really could go on and on with these examples - my tea cabinet, my laundry closet... all of these areas were a bother to me when I was trying to find something - have you ever opened a drawer and thought "aaaarrrrrrggghhhjddfjdisuesoeiruoeishjaklsdglkasjdf"? Bad Feng Shui.

 

my Feng Shui'd tea/coffee cabinet

• Different family members probably have different Feng Shui.

The Officer and I are very different in a lot of ways (mostly complimentary ones) and things that bother him, I usually don't even notice.  Things like a crooked picture, a buzzing sound from an appliance, the way the dishwasher is loaded...
It's important to ask your other family members (including children) if there's anything in the setup of your home that particularly bothers them.  This is a great way to honor your family and teach your children respect for one another and their possessions.
Here's an example: We had a cute rug on the floor, but I noticed it was really scratchy for our girls when they played on it.  That's bad Feng Shui.  So I moved it to a closet and replaced it with a softer one.
Another example would be our storage solution for Charlotte's toys.  I had organized them in fabric drawers on shelves.  I thought it looked nice.  However, Charlotte was constantly asking "what can I do?"... and not playing with her toys.  I realized that she hated digging through those fabric bins, therefore wasn't playing with any of the toys in her play area.  So I placed half of her toys on the shelf - similar to a display at a toy store - and put the other half in the fabric bins in the closet.  It changed her behavior immediately.  She could see everything at once and knew her options.  I rotate these toys out every few weeks and it's working very well.  Changing these things will increase our family's feelings of comfort and peace - who doesn't want that?

 So what to do now?  Our first job is to recognize the things in our homes that are bothersome.  Maybe even write a list.  Then slowly, perhaps choosing one task a day, begin changing these areas of bad Feng Shui.  Don't worry about tackling it all at once - this will likely increase your stress levels even more.  In doing this, we can gradually free ourselves from the daily frustrations in our home. 

I hope this post has helped you in some small way.  I certainly don't profess to know everything about Feng Shui - and people who are really into it may not agree with everything in this post, but that's okay with me.  I am on a journey to make my home the best it can be - this is one of the ways I accomplish that.  We can create homes that are filled with peace and order - it just requires a little bit of awareness and planning. 
Happy New Year and Happy Homemaking!
xoxo
jessica

*CTSB* - Organzing Children's Clothing - Melissa from Love Affair with My Brother

Is the condition of your home giving you the summertime blues?

Today we have Melissa from Love Affair with My Brother to help us get organized! 

Take it away Melissa!

Time to get organized! Because Spring isn’t the only time for big cleaning projects!

Hi, I’m Melissa from Love Affair with My Brother. I have been sewing for 19 years, quilting for 10 years and being crafty pretty much my whole life. I have been a “collector” for much of my life too – my husband uses the word “hoarder” but I don’t like that word! This is where today’s post comes in…

To say that my baby never wanted for clothes would be an understatement! She has always had more clothes than I have ever owned in my life. At times this was completely understandable – after all there were days when she was an itty bitty baby that we went through three or four outfit changes in a day. Now…this just means that I have more baby clothes than I know what to do with. Oh, and did I mention that at 19 months old she is already wearing 3T and 4T clothes?!?

This is a QUEEN size bed and her clothes (everything but what currently fits) fill the ENTIRE bed!!!

Needless to say it’s time to go through everything and get organized.
Here’s what you need – 5 bins, a sharpie and some tape for labeling – oh yeah and the ability to make some tough decisions!

I labeled my boxes Give to Friend, Donate, Keepsakes, First Year Memory Quilt, and Jammy Quilt.

I have two big projects in mind that I want to do with her clothes – I want to make a first year memory quilt – I am using things like my favorite onesies that she wore and cute tops. I will be cutting these apart and sewing them back together – I really needed to sort through her clothes and make decisions because I am the kind of person who will hold on to her entire wardrobe because 20 or 30 years from now she may have her own daughter and if I saved these clothes for her then she wouldn’t need to buy anything. I know…completely crazy right?!? That’s why getting organized and making some tough choices is an absolute must for me.

The other project box is for a “Jammy Quilt”. I am taking all of her fleecy and soft jammies and I am going to cut them apart and make a cuddle quilt for her. I am really excited about this project and I think it is a great way to preserve some of the clothes that she spent the most time in as an infant.

Here are the types of things that ended up in the Keepsake Box:

The dress on the left was handmade for her and the shirt on the right was actually mine when I was a baby.

That was pretty much my criteria for the “keepsake” box. It had to be handmade or something that I couldn’t bear to see cut up or given away. Her Easter, Halloween, and Christmas outfits all ended up in there too. The box looks as though it is going to overflow, but that is because I decided to keep her sleep sacks and winter snow suits as well. We live in the Pacific Northwest and if we have another baby I really don’t want to start at square one with everything.

The "give to friend box" was all of Anne’s 18 month clothes and larger that weren’t going in the keepsake or quilting boxes. This made the donate box even easier to fill because if it wasn’t going in one of the other four boxes it was going there!

Did I mention I had a really cute helper?

Believe it or not this activity entertained her for the entire hour it took me to sort through the mountain that was her clothes. She played with her old shoes, climbed into one of the boxes and for awhile just sat on the bed and handed me clothes one item at a time.

The last item to get packed up was her “going home outfit” from the hospital.

Here’s what it looked like when everything was sorted and packed

And now I can honestly say to my husband “No dear not everything is staying”. Now I just need to get myself to the Goodwill and to the Post Office. I suppose I also need to start cutting up her clothes to make her memory quilts too, but that is another day and another tutorial!

For now things may look like this for a couple of weeks until I can get to the post office and the good will.

My husband was so happy when he came home and saw everything cleaned up and put away!

And here is how my helper looked when we were all done – needless to say nap time quickly followed the end of this project!

What do you need to go through and organize? Do you have a hard time parting with things too? For me it is all about the memory attached to the item. Good luck with your summer cleaning and organizing and don’t be afraid to get the kids involved if it can entertain a 19 month old, then it can definitely keep older children busy!

I would love it if you took a few moments to check out Love Affair with My Brother, we love new followers! We do weekly tutorials and great giveaways on a fairly regular basis! Thanks for spending some time with me today!

He's on his way home...

Two of us wearing raincoats
Standing solo
In the sun
You and me chasing paper
Getting nowhere
On our way back home
We're on our way home
We're on our way home
We're going home

-the beatles

So this is what I do when I've been crafting all day and I realize it's 4:15 and I have 30 minutes until my hubby gets home :)  Actually, even when I've been cleaning all day (okay..I never clean ALL day...)
- it still seems I need to pick up.  So I let my senses be my guide.

First - Sight

I stand at the front door and look up.   What is the first thing I see?  Usually toys and fabric scraps.  Sometimes laundry.  So I start there.  The view should be nice when he walks through the door.  I pick up the toys and put the fabric scraps over in my pile.  Then I walk to the couch area and make sure that is picked up - that way there is a nice place to sit when he comes home (don't worry - I don't untie his shoes or anything...)

I also try to fix myself up a bit - after all he's been in an office with women wearing sassy business clothes all day...it would be nice if he didn't come home to me in my p.j.'s with peanut butter in my hair.  I usually just throw on jeans and a clean shirt, brush my hair, reapply deodorant, and put some concealer under my eyes - takes about 3 minutes, but I look (and feel) way better.  I also try to wipe Charlotte's face and make sure she doesn't look like a total ragamuffin.

Second - Smell

I try to create a pleasing aroma throughout the house.  I usually do this is by lighting candles, but sometimes the smell of clothes in the dryer, or the smell of a clean bathroom is great too.

Third - Sound

When I'm really on my A game, I put on some fun music -  not too loudly.
Music just puts everyone in a better mood.

Fourth - Taste

Now Ryan gets home earlier than most, so I usually don't have dinner cooking when he walks in the door.  But I at least try to have it planned and prepped.

Fifth - Touch

We love to greet Daddy with hugs and kisses.
What better way to show someone you're glad to see them?

Now, some of you may roll your eyes at this and think it's a bit June Cleaver but here's the thing.
A good marriage and a happy family takes work.
I'm certainly no expert on that, and there are afternoons when I practically knock Ryan over as I pass him in the doorway, reaching for the keys, leaving to find my sanity. 

But I really appreciate what he does - heading off to work every day, and I really appreciate that I get to stay home with our sweet Charlotte.  This is one of the ways I show him that.  And on those days when I am crazy, he takes over - knowing that I try most days to make our Home a calm, lovely place for him to come home to. 

I also know that I only have one little kiddo. 

So here's my question: 

How do you Mama's of more-than-one make your home a happy place to come home to?

Happy Homemaking!

jessica

Cleaning/Organizing Tip: Children's Books

Since we will be moving soon, I have started sorting through Charlotte's books. It occurred to me that occasionally I should clean, repair, and sort her books (I'm sure some of you already do this...).  I rounded up all of her books and some wipes,

then started putting away the "babyish" ones, and cleaning books that accidentally became coloring pages...

or sticker books...

and repairing pages that have been too loved...
It's sooo much nicer now - I know what she has, and she knows what she has, and things aren't so cluttered.

Give it a try sometime!

p.s.  You will have to excuse my pictures this week.  Charlotte smashed the lens of my camera as she swung it around by the cord...I'm working on getting a new one, but in the mean time I am using my phone...ugh.

xo
jessica

Spring Cleaning Update

I've been playing along with Ask Anna...'s Spring Cleaning Challenge.  I have to admit - it's been kinda hard but totally rewarding.  Here are a few pics from my cleaning adventures.

I cleaned all my windows using hot soapy water and a squeegee:

I dusted all of my vents:

dusty

clean

 

I washed my drapes:

I cleaned my floors ( I scrubbed the corners with a toothbrush and everything...)

Wiped down my walls, cabinets, and doors

(yuck!  how did they get so dirty?!)

much better :)

Cleaned out and organized my freezer/frig (don't worry I did buy food yesterday...):

Dusted everything in my house - including the insides of my cabinets:

Just a few more days to go!  My house really looks great!  

Have you been spring cleaning?

xo

jessica

Time is on your side...

Ever feel like you don't have time to clean?  I do.  Like, every day.
Actually I'd just rather spend my time doing something else.
BUT the cleaning must get done.  Sometimes I have to set my timer every 20 minutes and I will sew/craft for 20 minutes, then clean for 20 minutes, and so on.
So I had fun with the stopwatch on my phone and timed some basic household tasks.  I did not hurry through them.  They really don't take that long (assuming you're not interrupted by princesses or pirates) and make a big difference. Here's what you can do in short increments of time.

Got 10 minutes? 

Clean the bathroom (toilet, sinks, tub, floors, trash): 9 min 43sec

Got 8 minutes?

Fold a load of laundry and put it away: 8 min 7 sec

Got 6 minutes?

Vacuum the main parts of the house (living room, play area, your bedroom): 5 min 23 sec

Got 6 more minutes?
Change your sheets:  5min 41sec

Got 5 minutes?

Swiffer (I don't mop) the kitchen and eating area: 4 min 28 sec

Got 4 minutes?

 Put away the dishes from the dishwasher: 3 min 55 sec

Got 4 more minutes?

Sweep the kitchen and eating area: 3 min 28 sec

Only got 3 minutes?

Wipe off the kitchen counters: 2 min 27 sec

Now that's not so bad right?  If you did them all at once it would only take 46 minutes!  

Just 46 minutes, and your bathroom would be cleaner, you'd have clothes in your drawers, clean sheets on your bed, your floors and counters would sparkle and the dishwasher would be empty!  

I can do that.  It may take you a more or less time depending on your house. Try timing yourself and see.  At least now I have a reference point so when I don't feel like putting the dishes away I can say to myself - "it only takes 4 minutes....get over it."

We are also implementing a new system I call the "5 minute pickup".  It happens right before bathtime.  I set the timer for 5 minutes and Mommy, Daddy, and Charlotte pick up anything we have that's lying around the house - toys, clothes, shoes...  It is AMAZING how much of a difference this makes.

Happy cleaning - and if you want some serious cleaning tips, head to Ask Anna... She is kicking my tail with her Spring Cleaning Challenge!

xoxo

jessica 

Demystifying Feng Shui

I've been wanting to write this post for a while now, ever since having a conversation with my sister about what Feng Shui is.

(pic from here - a good post about how to feng shui your bedroom)

Here's wiki's definition:  an ancient Chinese system of aesthetics believed to use the laws of both Heaven (astronomy) and Earth (geography) to help one improve life by receiving positive qi. 

The part I want to focus on is the "improving life by receiving the positive".  When applied to the home, it means that your home should be a positive place. It should make you feel positive.  Not annoyed.  Not exasperated.  Not stressed...........good luck right?  But it doesn't mean your home has to be perfectly clean.  It means your home should work for you.  Many of the aspects of Feng Shui are spiritual and claim to help you be more profitable in your money-making endeavors.  I'm not going to focus on that - the best way I know how to explain how I use Feng Shui is to give examples.  So here are several ways I have "Feng Shui'd" my home lately.

1.  The ironing board.  I was storing it in the laundry room.  Logical place in my mind.  However, every time my husband opened the door, the ironing board fell over on him.  (this never happened to me....must be his masculine muscular structure that forcefully swings the door open...)  Anyway, it bothered him.  Your home shouldn't bother you.  So I moved it.  Now it is over by my crafting area - which works well for me anyway.

2.  My sink.  In our bathroom, we have his and hers sinks.  For about 3 months now there has been a small piece of plastic in my drain that I stare at every time I brush my teeth.  It grosses me out.  Why have I left it there?  Because I am lazy.  But every time I use my sink I get an annoyed feeling.  Bad Feng Shui.  So the other day it took me about 3 seconds to reach in there with a pair of tweezers and take it out.  Now I have positive feelings instead of negative when I use my sink.

Is this starting to make sense?  You might think it seems silly - but start noticing around your house - what is annoying you?  What doesn't work for you?

3.  Last example:  Coffee.  My sister noticed that every morning she had to walk across the kitchen to get the sugar for her coffee.  And every evening she had to move the coffee beans across the kitchen to the grinder.  Not a big deal - but why not have them all together in a common place?  So she rearranged some things and now has a happy little coffee station. 

Again - not a big deal, but those little annoyances of life add up.  You should not get annoyed in your own home. There are plenty of other things to annoy you "out there".  For more information you can go here.  You can find lots of other resources by googling it - just try not to get bogged down with all of the "extra" stuff - just keep remembering YOUR HOME SHOULD WORK FOR YOU!!!! 

(pic from here)

your feng shui guru for the day,
jessica

p.s.  If you have more tips for how you feng shui, please tell us in the comments!

*Inspired Homemaking*

Happy Friday friends!  Check out these links for some great inspiration to make your home lovely.

A great way to make your house look cleaner in 5 minutes from the Inspired Room.

Make this ADORABLE wreath with Ramblings from the Sunshine State

Make this super super cute bustle skirt with Simple Simon and Company.

Also with Simple Simon and Company - these adorable fox pillowcases. 
Hello.  Cuteness.

Make a cute retro potholder with Going Sew Crazy.

Cute stuff huh?  Have a great weekend - got some great things coming for you next week.
It will be my one year blogiversary and I will be having a fun giveaway!!
jessica

Sewing "room" Redo

I use the word room cautiously because it is actually just a corner of what is supposed to be a formal dining room - but it also houses our baby grand.  So far in my crafting life I generally cut things out on the floor.  It's not so good.  My dining room table is usually covered in food or playdough (although the new tablecloth is helping that situation!) so I generally just spread things out on the floor.  My husband - the wonderful man that he is - finally realized how much I needed a table, and armed with new power tools from Christmas and his birthday, set out to make me a crafting table.  He used these plans from the lovely Ana White's blog, and he made this table!

It folds down quite compactly and slides right back against the wall.

Thanks hubby!  You are the best.  The. Best.

I also swiped this armoire from Charlotte's room - in our other house she didn't have a closet in her room so we used this.  Now she does have a closet and so this was the perfect solution for my fabric stash.

A floating shelf from Ikea holds my library:

And mason jars along with other various containers hold my scissors and pencils/pens/exacto knives.

You really can have a sewing space in any little part of your home.  It really helps to have everything accesible and sitting out.  If you have to drag out the machine and everything before you begin - you won't do it as often.  AND I kind of like having it all in a central location in our home.  It is a little messy sometimes - but I can sew and still feel like a part of the action - whether that be watching NBA basketball or building lego houses :)  Hope you all are inspired to make your sewing/crafting area a little more appealing.
jessica

4 household chores I hate and how I am learning to get over it....

The other day my mom and I were chatting about cleaning, and she sent me to this post over at the Inspired Room.  Something in this post really clicked with me - perhaps it is my aesthetic personality - but I am attracted to all things lovely.  Including cleaning supplies.  You should go read her post for yourself, but what it basically says is, make cleaning an enjoyable experience for yourself.  She recommends lighting candles, making some coffee, using good smelling cleaning supplies, and listening to good music.  Sounds like a plan to me.  So here's what I did.
My number 1 nemesis: LAUNDRY.

• It stares at me while it's in the hamper 
• It sits for a day in the washer
• it gets wrinkly in the dryer
• sits for a day in the basket waiting to be folded
• gets tossed back in the dryer so I don't have to iron it
• then sits in the basket all neatly folded until one of us needs it.  

UGH - I am terrible at it.  SO  I have 3 new strategies:
#1  Use wonderful smelling laundry detergent.  Gain is my weapon of choice lately.  It smells amazing AND the smell lingers on and on.  Yes, it may be a tad more expensive - but it's cheaper than hiring a maid right? (btw, you can use that rational for many many things....)
Strategy #2:  "A load of laundry a day keeps the laundry blues away".  To avoid the 6 days it takes me to usually take care of 1 load, I am now completing one load (washed, dried, folded, put away) every day of the work week.  So far it's working pretty well (it's been 2 weeks now), and it's not that big of a deal to just do one load.
#3  I bought that super-cute yellow kitchen timer from Anthro, and I use it as my laundry timer, because neither washer or dryer ding or beep when they are done.  This way I stay on top of it.  Even Charlotte knows that timer is for the laundry (the other day I used it to time baking cookies and when it "dinged"  she said "Oh! Time to check the laundry" :)

Onto #2:  Dishes
Again, the product is key here.  I am in love, I mean in love with Finish Powerball Tabs.  It really cuts down on the rinsing time, and leaves dishes sparkling clean.  I am also trying to run the dishwasher at least once a day.

#3:  Dusting
I use Flylady's timer method here.  I set my kitchen timer for 10 minutes, and I can dust everything important in my house during that time.  Only 10 minutes a week.  I also like rewarding myself by lighting a candle on my newly dusted mantel!

#4:  Paying the bills
Yeah this one's no fun.  No one likes to see money leaving their account to pay for things like medical bills and student loans.  BUT it is a necessity.
#1 thing that is helping me - this app on my smart phone(thanks mom and dad!) called Billski.  It sends me an alarm 2 days before each bill is due, and it has a little icon sitting at the top of my screen until I pay it.  It's really helping me.
To actually pay them, I fix myself a cup of coffee, try to wait until Charlotte is asleep so that I can think, put on some Pandora (I'm loving the Hawaiian IZ Station), and get cozy on the couch.  I also try to think of some reward - like looking at favorite blogs or something - for when I'm done.

So there you have it - one step closer (or really four steps closer) to my New Year's motto of Balance.
I want to hear from you - any tricks you have for conquering your least favorite household chores?  and remember - the more comments you leave, the more chances you have for winning that lovely little apron!

-jessica

p.s. Let the record show that I actually completed all of these tasks before posting this.  Just so you know I am for real :)  OH and none of those companies pay me to say any of that - I'm just telling you like I would tell a friend.

Thrifty Transformation

Looking through several DIY magazines this holiday, I was inspired to organize my crafting area a bit.  I found this little thing at a thrift store for $4, and decided it would be perfect for organizing ribbon, trims, buttons, etc.

Obviously it needed a little love.  

SO I  removed the little birdhouses, and bought a can of spray paint.  

I thought a happy blue would be nice. 

I painted it - not worrying about being perfect because

I wanted it to look old.  

Once the paint dried, I got out the sandpaper.  The trick to making something look vintage is to distress it in the areas it would normally be worn down.  

Such as around the knobs and corners, along the edges, or where light may have faded it.  

That was it!  Then I just filled it with lots of little notions -several of which I got for Christmas - thanks Jo!  

One step closer to a more organized chaos.  

Have a great Monday!

jessica

*Inspired Homemaking*

Today I am going to clean my house.  I rarely devote a full day to it - I usually squeeze in a bathroom cleaning here and a laundry session there.  But it is almost time to bring out all of the holiday decorations and I want my home to be CLEAN before I decorate.  So I did some reading for inspiration and these are the links I found:

Organize your mail situation with Real Simple:

Learn how to fake a clean house with Real Simple:

Prepare for the busy-ness of December right now-

Martha has some great tips.

Take the 5 minute flat-surfaces challenge with

Cleaning up the Clutter.

Well okay, I guess I had better stop blogging and start cleaning.  

I'll let you know how it goes

(not because I think you are sitting on the edge of your seats 

waiting to see my clean house...

but because it helps me to think that I am accountable to you ;)

Happy homemaking!

jessica