closet? check.

hello! i know i'm a bit late coming back from the weekend...but i did manage to get quite a bit done! i tackled a major project - cleaning out the walk in closet. i cannot believe how much stuff we crammed in there. five bags of clothes & i don't know how many bags of trash later...it's a clean, organized space.

i'm hoping to work my way through our house & get things cleaned up. all of the clutter has really been bothering me, kind of stressing me out. it's hard for me to relax when there are piles of stuff everywhere.

my plan is to check one thing at a time off my cleaning list....even if it's a drawer at a time. splitting the chores into small pieces made the process less intimidating.

i would have shown some before & after pictures, but frankly, it was pretty awful before.

weekend

so before the weekend started, i had all these idea of what i was going to do...get laundry done, clean the kitchen, work on art, clean up my studio, organize my office, read a couple new books, blah blah blah...

i actually did clean...the house. a lot. like a LOT. did the dishes, unloaded, reloaded, ran the dishwasher, unloaded again, vacuumed upstairs & downstairs...and even the stairs themselves (which i hate because it's so awkward but, man, they were gross). scrubbed the spots off the stairs, wiped the walls of the stairwell down (random spills over the years), cleaned the shoe area, did tons of laundry. cleared out the clutter on our kitchen island & dining room table. switched out the shower curtain for the new awesome one we got for our wedding:

(notice the vito tail - he was helping)

and then i was exhausted. i used all of my cleaning energy on the rest of the house rather than my studio & office.

the dogs were helpful - they barked a lot at the vacuum cleaner, kept watch at the window for weirdos, hung out on the porch, and did this:


and since we've been making a lot of homemade ice cream lately, i treated myself to this:


we ran a bunch of errands on sunday - got some stuff for the house (picture frames, kitchen gadgets), picked up a birthday present for my mom, got a table for my flat file that hubby is building me, ate a snack:


and then we bought this:


and now, we will not be able to get anything else done. ever. good thing i cleaned the house first.

p.s. i now have a sudden urge to dye my hair blue (again), get my nose pierced (again), and get a tattoo. hmm.

design sponge blue-ness

i heart design sponge. seriously. great ideas for decorating, projects (& instructions!) large & small, beautiful pictures, recipes, business advice, etc...its truly a site for inspiration. since the past three months had been so focused on the wedding, i sadly neglected one of my favorite places to visit. here are some things that caught my eye as i've been perusing past posts:

i adore this color blue! go here for a tutorial on painting furniture

blue frame from here

since we've been doing some reorganizing at home, i've been oogling bookshelves:

all bookshelf pics from here

amazing refurbished chairs from here

DIY wine tube rack from here - for all of those mailing tubes i've kept! i knew they would be useful someday (right, hubby?)

pics of some cute nurseries (don't get any ideas punky!) - i just liked some of the blue items & bright colors:

blue table!
blue stand!

blue crib! LOVE all of the color in this one!

(all nursery pics from here)

blue kitchen from here

loving this color combo from here

as you can tell, my obsession with blue has not wavered in the least :) so, what websites inspire you? i'm always searching for new ones!

weekend

how was everyone's weekend? hubby & i got a lot done around the house! we focused mostly on the kitchen & dining area, cleaning things up, putting away gifts (new plates! new appliances!!) there are still some things to unclutter, so i'll wait on posting pics of that stuff. here's our new wine rack though:


we also did some errands - groceries, target, lowe's...i bought some dirt (for the first time EVER) and some little succulents and planted them. i'm new to this whole plant thing - i've managed to keep a couple pet friendly plants alive for the last year & a half and decided to expand my little collection. we'll see what happens. wish me luck :)


oh we also made our first batch of ice cream (in our new ice cream maker) and it was AMAZING! (ben & jerry's recipe)

it was nice to hang around the house together for the first time since we've been home from the wedding. there's something very pleasant about puttering around as a married couple :)