Living The Quiet Life

Today I am sitting at my desk dreaming. Dreaming of a quiet life out in the country someplace where I can devote my time to writing and crafting and making our house a home. Is this a possibility right now? No. I can't have a home out in the country, not right now anyways, but that doesn't mean I can't bring that simple life to me and you can't do the same.

I have been thinking a lot lately and I have been trying to make my life as simple as possible. This past summer I planted  a small flower garden in the plot of land right next to my apartment. Now most of the flowers are starting to wilt and I need to do more work in it to make it ready for winter but I am looking forward to that work. To get everything ready for a beautiful spring I know I will enjoy this coming year. I have included a picture below of the little herb garden I had but now has been cut down for fall.

It really helped me feel more connected to the earth again, something I found I had been missing quiet badly since moving to the city and struggling with apartment life. However, this isn't the only step I have done to get that homesteading feel inside the city. I have started to buy little things to make our apartment move of a home. I brought in warm neutrals instead of the blue couches (slip covers at Target are a wonderful thing and much cheaper than most places) knitted some pillow covers and started clearing out the clutter. Our living room used to be a catch all for all my crafts and still is but I am getting better at making sure to store the projects I am not working on so that it keeps the space feeling more open and less hectic.

I have also been really trying to throw out a bunch of items that Michael and I really just don't need. I will admit it. I am a recovering Pack Rat. I will be the first to say but once you start liberating yourself from stuff you realize how much it was weighing you down. Now I am not saying you have to go completely minimalist because for most of us that is not possible but cut down on the stuff you haven't even touched in a year, or more. I know I was/still am guilty of having snippets of fabric and bits of cheap yarn from years ago that I finally threw away. If I need it, I can buy it again. No point in keeping it for the potential use I might have for it five years down the road. I faced the facts, I haven't used it in the three years that I moved out of my parents house, I am not going to need it five years from now. And if I do, then I will face that ship when it comes into dock.

Why am I sharing this? Because I know how hard it can be to see such a task in front of you. I want to live on a homestead out in the country but I can't because I can't afford land or a house, let alone to quit my job and move away. You probably can't either. However there are little things you can do to find time to adapt it into your life. To get small steps closer to your dream.

I, personally, have started doing more home projects and re-found my love for cooking. My next step is to spend a day a month making homemade bread and freezing the extras. This isn't possible for all people but think of other ways you can change your life in the small ways to find your dreams. Do you want to have a garden but live in an apartment? Buy some pots and have herbs for the winter in the kitchen. And trust me if you have never gardened before most likely they are all going to die (I have killed many a plant over my years and still do). Don't get discouraged, keep trying and do different things until you find what works for you.

Do you want to save money on food to help you save for the future? Try something which I am trying to do by making things from scratch. Not only does it help you save money but it also keeps all the gross chemicals and preservatives out of your food. It is a large grocery bill at first but you will notice how long those things last and how much money you are saving in the long run.

I love to knit. I have been trying to knit as many things for the house as possible. I have knitted tons of dishcloths and 90% of all the scarves I own. Knitting for me adds character to my home and also helps me keep busy instead of just sitting on my butt. Well okay, I sit on my butt when I knit but I think you know what I mean. It keeps me busy even on down time. It helps me relax and it makes beautiful things in the mean time.

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These are only a few things you can do. Try picking up sewing, or quilting or even painting. Try making some of your own jewelry. Try your hand at homemade bread, or trying to eat out less and make more at home.

I would love to hear about your progress and what you do to make your life filled with that quiet joy of simple living.

Sometimes Days Just Get Away From You

Do you ever have that happen? Where the day just seems to fly on past you and yet you got nothing accomplished? It is one of those kind of days for me. At least I got a few errands done. And by a few I mean I waited at Joann's for nearly 90 minutes just waiting for one cut of fabric. Wedding planning! Yay (insert sarcastic smile).

I am glad to be getting some of this stuff done early but it ate up such a huge chunk of my day. But looking back I have done things today I haven't done in a very long time. I ran this morning. Boy, am I out of shape, but I did it. I made it 90% of the way without walking and I didn't stop once.  Ronnie (my wonderful Basenji mix, yes that is a dog breed) loved it. She has been dreaming of more exercise too. Both of us are getting sedentary in our old age. Oh wait, neither of us are old. Gosh darn it.

I read a lot of one of the most lovely blogs I have read in a long time. The Sitting Tree. It isn't like it is the most magical blog in the world but it really speaks to my heart and the way I want to live my life. Not saying her life is perfect because lets face it no one's is but it is something Michael and I have been talking about lately.

Last night we had a fire in the fireplace and had candles lit all around. We just spent time together. I reheated up left overs and we cuddled on the couch as I knit. It was a nice quiet night and something I greatly enjoyed. I am a home body through and through and on days where the rain is in the air and the clouds dampen the sunlight makes me want to stay inside, cuddle up on the couch with a good cup of tea and knit. Of course then real life steps in and reminds me I have an appointment I have to leave for in 30 minutes and my dreams get whisked away for another day.

Enjoy life everyone and sometimes those days just do slip away before you can appreciate how great they are.

A Lot Going On

It is that time of the year again. People always say summer is their busiest season, mine is when the weather starts cooling down and the leaves start changing colors. To top it off, this year I am also planning a wedding, mine. It is taking up a lot more time than I could have imagined. I hope it settles down soon but if it doesn't I will learn to adapt. Anyways, where was I? That is right, Autumn. Autumn for me is a time of great change. It too has been my favorite season since I was a little girl. You can smell it in the air, the ground smells damp and the leaves and ground cover starts to decay into new life for spring. Everything is going dormant, and you think I would be too? No, now is when I start to prepare for the cold months, the frigid months and the busiest time of year. The holidays.

Autumn for me is a time to start to cozy up on the couch and make all those knitting projects I have been putting off for way too long. It is for me to start making all my Yule time gifts, aka, Christmas. It is a time I think of redecorating and reorganizing.  It is a time of great progress for me.

This past weekend I went back to Wisconsin to visit my family and to do more planning for my wedding. I will sum it up that I didn't get as much done as I wanted to. Not enough time and way too much to catch up on. However, one really great thing about my trip was I found a great little yarn shop. I bought some great yarn and have already been putting it to good use. I finished a tan scarf

I am also working on the red scarf now. With the little bit of extra I had left over from the tan scarf I made a coffee cozy that I am planning on giving away for Yule. I am going to try to make everyone all homemade gifts this year with things that mean something. Frozen cookie dough, home made breads, coffee cozy's, just a gift basket full of goodies.

Back to crafting and cleaning I go. The house is a mess from being away for 5 days and having two guys living in it thinking "It's clean." Mhmmm, sure honey. I love you but it isn't.

Until next time and our next adventure.

The Shoe Maddess

Shoes. Everyone has them and hardly anyone I know has a good place to actually store their shoes. I tried mine in the front hall with the hopes that everyone will take off their shoes at the door instead of dragging in dirt from outside and god knows where. This did not help. Instead, we mostly come in through our sliding glass door (especially when we have already been home) thus leaving the dirt to be trailed through our apartment anyways. Oh well have to give me props for trying at least, right?

So the problem. I have attempted this in the past, as I said. I have two shoe shelves. I wouldn't call them exactly nice but they suit their purpose. I mean they are only for shoes who have dirt usually caked all over the soles. (We like to be outside)

My Goals:

To clean up the front entry instead of using it as a shoe play ground and move most of them into the master bedroom closet. Get hanging baskets for the front entry for gardening tools, slipper socks for guests. Also want a bench with area underneath to put shoes we regularly wear. Get coat rack to hang purses on (since I like to change mine out a lot).

My Accomplishments:

I removed all the shoes and put them neatly in the master bedroom closet. I also threw out the broken lamp (yes that is what it was) and the boxes that I was just too lazy to throw away. Instead of getting baskets to hang on the wall, since I did such a great job cleaning out the front coat closet. I decided to instead get hooks to hang purses and bags on above the bench. The bench has room underneath for the shoes we use the most often and also a place where we can kick off our shoes without feeling like we have to go all the way to the bedroom.

I also want to make/get a rug for the front hall that has a little more traction to it. I want to be able to collect a lot of the dirt and grim before it tracks out onto the carpet. I was thinking of knitting one out of twine but we will see how my projects line up. If I have time I don't, if I do, GREAT!

I know this isn't the master bedroom closet but I swear I will get to that!

Until next time.

The Front Coat Closet - Oh The Nightmare

Oh the nightmare is right. This closet is a mess. Coats flung in there in no neat organized matter, the top shelf just cluttered with anything that will fit up there that doesn't have a home. And the floor? I didn't know the floor could get so cluttered either. Good thing it has been summer and I haven't had to go in there for anything.

See what I mean? It is a mess. Oh big pile of mess on top of mess. 

Goals:

Have the closet a nice organized place where gloves, hats, scarves are in easy, organized access. Coats organized by person and on nice hangers. See what needs to be dry cleaned and have it done. 

Plans to Achieve Goals:

Take all coats out of the closet. What do we still use? What can be donated to a family that actually needs it? Take everything out of the closet. Sort out what is closet items and what are not. Make pile of dry clean items to be brought in to be cleaned. Find baskets to hold mittens, scarves, and hats (basket for each). Figure out something to do with the extra shoes in the closet (donate, store, etc)

End Result:

Wow. What a difference! 

I have yet to dry clean the coats or put them in a different pile even but the difference is amazing. I cleaned all the crap, and lets face it most of it was crap, out from the closet and put it on my stack of "Need To Sort Out." I then took the box that was hats and mittens and went through them and sorted them out by if they were hats, scarves and mittens/gloves. I then neatly folded them all and put them in a corresponding bins. I then cleaned out all the clutter and threw most of it away because it was just that clutter. Something things I forgot I had and most things I went "Why the hell did I keep that?" I much happier with this current closet and so much more organized. I have things to donate and I have things still that I need to sort through but my closet is looking much better.

Next task, master bedroom closet. At least it doesn't look at bad as this closet started out. 

Organizing The Game Closet

So I have this closet. It is a closet that had become so ridden with junk and debris I couldn't even really call it a closet. I shudder every time I had to open the door because I know it is so cluttered and full of stuff we never use that I just don't want to even go there. However, we love games. And our games are forced to be stored in this closet but so does everything else. So my mission was to clean it out and make it into a useful space and hopefully free up some space in other parts of our apartment too.

I suck by the way at taking before and after pictures. I completed this just last week but because I forgot to take before pictures you can't see its glorious make over. I do promise for the next project I will take before pictures.

Like I describe before it was a mess. Movies we never watched cluttered the shelves. Computer and Video games we haven't played in years shoved so close together that I swear some of the disks were close to breaking. But that wasn't all that stood in the way of our game closet and organization. No, not even close. I had a bin. I will admit it was my bin and not anyone else's of complete crap. I do mean that. I tend to be a pack rat who likes to keep everything (working on it) and store it places I think I will use it again. Broken alarm clock? Really? Papers that were old receipt of useless items I no longer even cared I had (might have even thrown some of those items out.) It was bad. Bad might be even an understatement.

My plan:

To remove said movies and games and clean out bin and not have it anywhere close to that closet and use the bin for actually organization instead of cluttered junk.

The Outcome:

I removed all the movies and put them in some extra Tupperware containers we had. The huge storage kind. Moved all the CD's, games, movies, everything related to media in there. I kept out the few blue rays we have and some movies we actually do watch quite often. (remind self to actually go through those bins sometime and throw out cases with no movies left in them.). Removing the movies gave me four shelves to do with what I will.

Well M, my partner in crime and fiance, is studying in the IT field. He has lots, and I do mean lots of IT books. School books, hobby books, text books, Cert Studying books, the whole nine yards. Before this drastic make over they were scattered throughout the entire apartment. There were computer books in our bedroom on our bookshelf, in the storage closet, in the dining room bookshelves. They were in nearly every room of the house. So I came up with the great idea to use those shelves for those books that didn't have a home but yet were still in easy access of him using them and finding them.

Now the shelves are lined with his computer books. But wait there is more. M also loves chess so naturally in our book fiendish ways he has tons of chess books. Those also found a home in the closet. So now the closet is half computer books, partially chess books and our games. The games are not in a neat stack by any means yet but I don't know if they ever will. When you have huge board games it is hard to find a place to organize them perfectly, especially in an apartment.

See how lovely it looks?  My next project is the front coat closet. I promise I will take pictures.

Anyone else have any similar projects they have done or wish to do? Let me know! I would love to see the before and after pictures!

My Cleaning Secret

Now I cannot claim to say this secret is just my own or that I have been using it forever. My secret is Vinegar. There I said it. I told you the great and powerful secret. Honestly though it is one of the best things I have ever used. And I want to tell you the reasons why I love it.

1. It is vinegar, you ingest it. It is safe for anyone, it is safe for around pets, it is safe around kids, it is perfectly and wonderfully safe
2. It is so darrrrrrn cheap. And when I mean cheap I mean you can get a gallon of it for less than $5 dollars and it lasts you close to forever. 
3. You only need a little bit and some love to make it go a long way. 1 part vinegar to 3 parts water is my solution. I have heard you can use less you can use more, depending on what you are cleaning. Use what you find works the best for you. I even put a few drops of essential oil in mine so that when I am cleaning it doesn't have such a strong vinegar smell. But honestly you get used to it so quickly, on your second bottle you probably won't even need to use the essential oil. 
4. It cleans everything! And I do mean everything. Counters, bathrooms, sinks, grime, soap scum. I use it for everything except windows. I am still trying to find a solution for windows because Vinegar can be a little harsh on glass. But that same thing that makes it bad for glass makes it great for everything else. It's acid. The acid kills the mold and fungal bacteria because of its high acid content. 
5. The smell disappears when it dries. Truly. I didn't believe it when I first tired it either but when it dries it really doesn't smell at all. And much much better for you than bleach or ammonia or whatever other horrible chemicals are in the standard cleaning solutions.

I literally do use vinegar on almost everything (besides my windows.) And honestly I will never go back to harsh chemicals ever again for my basic cleaning. It was the best secret find that I have ever come across.

Try it and tell me what you think. I would love to hear from you about your cleaning secrets or your first attempts at using vinegar!

This Is Me, or Rather What I Want To Be

I would love to say I am the most perfectly organized person in the entire world. I would love to even say that everything inside my apartment is in its perfect place and nothing is ever without a home. I would even love to say I have just enough stuff to manage and I never feel at all stressed about trying to figure out what to clean and what to organize first. But I cannot say any of those things.

I would love to say I allow no chemicals into my home and I never eat processed foods and I only grow my own vegetables. I would love to say I make every single one of my and my families meals completely and fully by scratch. I would love to say I do this all very inexpensively. But I cannot say any of those things either.

What I can say is that I try and I am trying to get better. You see I am on a mission. I am on a mission to have a  healthier life. I am on a mission to have my entire apartment organized and to do all of the things I have stated above. But honestly it is hard work. It is hard going from a life of almost the complete opposite and changing yourself and all your habits to match the perfect pictures you see all over the web. It is down right impossible at time. However, this is what I am attempting to do.

This is my journey. This is my frustrations, my excitement and my tips at how I accomplished my organizing nightmare and how I try to do it naturally and environmentally friendly. I will also share tips on crafts, recipes and other things along the way that I find very useful in life.

So come join me along this bumping ride because lets be honest it is going to be just that.