Some great organization ideas...

I decided to visit Pinterest to get some ideas for organizing. I was going to look for ways to organize my office, my desk and my crafts. I have grown on crafts supplies so my old system is not working. The first thing that caught my eyes was this. A jar to keep ribbon in. They simply removed the ribbon from those aggravating spools that take up so much room and wrapped them around the large craft sticks. I really like this idea. 

On that same Pinterest board, this caught my eye.  It is a shoe bag used to store craft supplies. I have had one of these for years inside my craft closet for glue guns, glue sticks, velcro, tape, hem tape, etc. It works fabulously. I love it. So I thought I would share this idea with you again in case you missed it the first time I posted it. 

Then I notices she had done small hanging organizing bag for nail polish. Oh my gosh! If  you knew how many times a month I have to go through my big basket of nail polish to be able to find the shade I want you would understand why this is thrilling to me. I have over 50 bottles so this would be perfect for me.

I also saw this idea and I must tell you that I did this as well a couple of years ago. It is amazing how much cabinet space I have under the sink after I did this. 

Can you see a pattern? I got so obsessed with the multitude of uses for hanging shoe holders that I am ending up blogging about that instead of my original intent. One lady had this inside her kitchen pantry. Several people I know do this and keep school snacks in them. She fixes them on Sunday night and labels each one with the child's name and the day of the week. So at lunch packing time, she just goes to the pantry with the lunch boxes and fills them with the presorted snacks or juices.

I did like this one because of the colorful background. The pockets are wider than shoes so I am not sure what it was for. But I love the size of it.

Another that I definitely need is a place to store gloves, mittens, scarves and knit hats. I am constantly trying to find my winter wearables.

This is one of those racks that can holds shoes or sweaters. But someone cleverly uses it to hold board games. How neat is that?

Well, now that I have went of in a different direction than what I had planned, I need to go back to my original plan to find ways to organize my office and desk. Hope you have a great day.

Some new pretties....

I was wanting a new shower curtain because I was so tired of a plain blue. My bathroom wall paper is rose pink, sage green and blue. So I set out in search of something that would go with my color scheme and my flower wallpaper. I finally found one on line at a place called Problem Solvers. In search of the perfect shower curtain, I wanted something vintage looking from back in the floral craze. But I also wanted chenille incorporated into it somehow. I couldn't believe that all my Googling let me to that site. And the best part was it was only $9.99 and $6.00 for shipping. I think it met all my requirements. I am loving it. I think I will incorporate some sage green in my rugs and towel selection.

I have had this little thing hanging in my bathroom (oops it needs straightened) for over 12 years. And I still love it. It goes really good with all the colors in the shower curtain don't you think?

I received my Thirty-One order today and I am in love with the Christmas pouches. I wanted this one to keep sales ads in when I start my Christmas shopping. It will fit in my tote so it will be perfect to keep the ads in. 

This one is to keep any coupons I get like the 20% off and 40% off coupons that so many stores run on their websites.

But my favorite is one I got is this one. I carry a mini zipper all the time. I call it my care kit. It has nail clippers and a file, Visine, bandaids, Aleve, a Tide pen, GermX and a few other essentials for emergencies. So this will be one I will carry during the snowy season.

It's the little things that thrill.

A little witch humor...

Happy birthday to the world's best sister....

My sister turns 60 today. That's right the big 60. And the most wonderful part about her being 60 is that I have been with her for 58 years and 10 months of that time. We are only 13 1/2 months apart and have been inseparable our whole life. We live 5 1/2 hours away from each other, but are still as close today as we have been for the last almost 59 years. 

This is one of my favorite pictures of me (L) and Rachel (R) with Daddy. Look at our long curls. They were natural. 

As the years went by, we shared our toys. We shared our room. We shared our friends. We shared our secrets. 

We have always been best friends and will always be. 

We have taken trips together to the beach. But my favorite trip with her was when we went to watch our nephew Jake graduate from the USMC.

Here we are at her daughter Amy's baby shower. (L-R) Rachel, Amy, Mom and me. We had a great time.

She is always there for me and I know that I can call her any time. I love you Rachel and hope that your 60th birthday is the best birthday ever. I love you for your heart, your kindness, your sense of humor. But I also love you because no matter how old I get, you will always be older than me. Just kidding. Have a very, very, very Happy Birthday.

Weekend Wrap Up

This weekend was just full of surprises. I started off with a friend of mine showing up unexpectedly at my office with a goody basket. I was so glad to see her and not just because of the goodies. 

I love my new notebook and pen. 

And what a beautiful box of tissues. That is such a pretty scene.

She knows me so well. I love hot chocolate and Believe is one of my favorite words. 

With fall arriving, I have been wearing my new socks all weekend. My feet have stayed warm and toasty. I always tell anybody that the way to my heart is warm socks. 

As you have probably noticed, I love to monogram everything with B (my nickname). Now I have a note pad in the shape of a B and a new box of Junior Mints. The Junior Mints didn't make it through the weekend.

Another friend brought me over a box of yarn. I love the fall colors. I will use it for some of my plastic canvas projects. 

My sister came to town this weekend and she bought me this lovely Women's Devotional and a new cook book, which also has some crafts. I love them both. 

A year or more ago, my sister had a yard sale. She sent me pics of the display tables and I shopped by phone letting her know what I wanted. We haven't been able to get together since then. So when she came down this weekend, she brought me what I had bought. I am so happy with it all. The mermaid pic is going in the beach bathroom. 

A nice warm afghan for my blanket basket. I love having different blankies and afghans to choose from. 

A beautiful beach picture. This may go in my home office. 

A cute little primitive pillow for my bedroom.

I loved this vase but don't know where I might put it. 

And this wonderful craft basket. I have wanted one of these to set at the end of the couch to hold whatever current project I am working on for my yarn crafts. 

Sunday we had a little "carnival style" party for the kids at Children's Church. These were the games I created for them.



Don't you just love the spiders and brooms. Made them up myself with no instructions. Kind of proud of them.



Came home from church and had lunch. Then I just vegged out the rest of the day. Felt great.

Sunday Song

Loving Laundry

After over 20 years of having a small stackable washer and dryer, I bit the bullet and bought a new set of normal size. I am in love. They are LG brand with all kinds of bells and whistles. I couldn't wait to get home yesterday just so I could do laundry. Me, who hates laundry, actually went around the house trying to find things to wash after I finished the last load.

My laundry room is just a small hallway type room that heads to the back door. Right now, the dryer sets out too far because the hose on the back is too long and they didn't have anything to cut it off to shorten it. I will get it fixed in the next day or two so it can scoot back even with the washer. 

I am thrilled to have gotten rid of the stand up freezer and stackable w/d and now my laundry area actually is beginning to feel like a laundry room. 

I had a lot of stuff stacked on top the freezer so I had to rearrange some things to find a place to store stuff. So I used this little shelf we had to put my detergent and softener on. 

I moved our jackets to the spare closet and used this to put my clothes on the hangar when I take them out of the dryer. I never had room to do this before. It made doing laundry so much easier. Once I was done, I just carried them to the closet. Talk about simplifying things. 

And my poor ironing board has been stuck in closets, behind doors, tons of places that I didn't like having it. So now it has a new home. 

The only down side is that the new washer dryer does not buzz when it is done like the old models. It plays a little tune that sounds just like the ice cream truck is coming around the neighborhood. So every time a load gets done, my body knows to go fold clothes but my mind says "Hmmm. Think I'll have some ice cream."