"Wall of Fame"

With all of this time spent at home, I have been in project mode!  Some cleaning and organizing, some de-cluttering, some makeovers...  While cleaning out my big storage closet and coming across high school band concert posters and play programs I got an idea -- why let them collect dust in the closet, why not hang them?  My two girls have been involved in a lot of things in school - bands, honors ensembles, plays, musicals, film fests, etc.  We are always proud of their hard work, effort and achievements so why not show them?  We have a staircase with bare walls and I have not known what to decorate that with.  We purchased very inexpensive black frames from Walmart and we used the Command strips to hang everything -- so my husband didn't have to hammer a ton of nails into the wall (he was thrilled!!)!  This is one of my favorite projects that we have done in the house - I love seeing it everyday and these important moments are on display to be remembered instead of cluttered in a closet.  But the best part of all is that the girls love seeing their hard work on display!

Brag Book for Child's Schoolwork

We are in the midst of the last week of school before summer vacation, and the girls (and teachers!) are cleaning out their desks and lockers and bringing home all of that great end of the year stuff!  All of that stuff that I look through and then think, "What do I do with all of this?"  Most years I put it into the girls' "special boxes" aka 20 gallon plastic tubs that are now stored in my big storage closet (because our new house doesn't have a basement).  I always think that I should pull those tubs out to make more room -- at the rate that I am going, by the time these girls are in their 20's they will each have no less than TEN "special tubs!" 

My littlest girlie came home with the most wonderful thing that her 2nd grade teacher - bless his heart - put together!  It's called a "brag book" and it's a 1" 3-ring view binder with plastic sleeve protectors inside and inside the plastic sleeve protectors are various things that my daughter did in school throughout the year!!  A few pieces of artwork, a few pieces of writing, a memory booklet that she made to remember 2nd grade, a birthday book filled with handwritten letters from her classmates -- those were wonderful!  What a FABULOUS idea!!  Anyone who worked with me at my former job knows how much I ADORE view binders!!  I had a floor to ceiling bookshelf filled with them -- all white, all with labels on the spine in the same style font -- a sight to behold!  I think this is a great solution to my schoolwork storage issue!  I can put together snapshots of my girls' schoolwork for each grade - nice and neat!  And I should be able to get all of their binders in ONE tub -- woo hoo!  An even less expensive, greater space-saving idea would be to put the work into 10" x 13" envelopes - one for each year.

If I were starting this with them when they were in Kindergarten or Preschool (because I have TONS of preschool stuff too...), using the view binders I would have had my girls draw a picture to slide in the front of the binder and write their own name and age -- what a sweet keepsake I think this will be!  I'm late to the party (as my 13-year-old would say), but I can still have the girls do that from here on out.  For the early binders I'll just find a piece of their artwork from each year that I can use.  If you use the envelope idea, you can do the same thing, having the child draw on the front of the envelope. 

Can't wait -- great summer project for us!

What do you do with all of the school stuff that your kids bring home at the end of the year?

Chalkboard Reminders

How cute is this??  It's actually a chalkboard cheese tray that my  friend Jeanine thoughtfully brought me when she came to a party at our house.  I absolutely love it, and will use it when I entertain, but we really don't entertain as often as we used to -- so I came up with an alternative every day use for it!  I had an extra plate holder (about $4 from Hobby Lobby) and I have it on the kitchen counter near the sink.  It is GREAT for writing notes on -- like yesterday's, "Last lesson!  Don't forget your clarinet!"  And things like that...  It will also come in handy to leave notes for my dad when he's watching the girls -- I'm always looking for paper and a pen to leave him reminders.  And when I want to use it for a party, I can wash it and it will be all ready!

I LOVE things like this -- multi-purpose, and super stylish!

Girl Scout Leader Supply Kit

So as I mentioned, I'm totally immersed in Girl Scouts right now, and I love it! We are having our second meeting tomorrow afternoon. The first meeting was at my house, because our troop was so new that we had not received confirmation for a meeting site. Now we are all approved to meet at one of the nearby elementary schools -- which is great -- they have a large "all-purpose room" (cafe-gym-atorium, is what my sister-in-law Susan calls them -- you know, lunch, gym and assemblies all occur in one place!), bathrooms, playground -- perfect! And, it's free! But, since it is not at my house where I am prepared for all sorts of activities and emergencies, I decided to make a travel kit for my Girl Scout supplies. I grabbed an empty Rubbermaid tub from the basement (practically everything we own is in Rubbermaid tubs in the basement -- my husband's record collection, mementos of my children's early years, pictures, clothes, holiday decorations, china...) and I gathered some things from around the house. We also stopped at the dollar store and I picked up a few other things that I might need. Here's what I have so far:

- paper towels
- plastic bags
- band-aids (I need to get a first aid kit)
- hand sanitizer
- scissors, tape, glue sticks, crayons
- pipe cleaners
- wooden craft sticks
- acrylic paints, paint brushes, paper plates for "palettes"
- wipes (I LOVE wipes -- my kids are both out of diapers, I will never stop buying wipes...)
- construction paper
- scrap paper
- coloring pages
- yarn
- brown paper lunch bags
- napkins

I need a couple more things from the store tomorrow -- I thought I would grab a box of small paper cups to keep in there for snack time. To help save the troop some money (and my co-leader and myself), we are going to have a sign-up sheet for snack. This way one person won't be in charge of it for the whole year, and as we learned from doing this in preschool, the kids seem to enjoy getting to have their own choice of what they want to share with their friends.

I also have to organize my binder -- I learned in training that I need to carry the girls' health forms with me to meetings, field trips, etc. I bought a binder to keep all of those forms in, my training info, a copy of the handbook (I'm buying one, but it's on back-order until December!), attendance forms, meeting schedule, etc. (Ask anyone I work with -- I am the binder queen of America -- love them...)

Trying to stay organized and being prepared will probably go a long way to helping me be a good leader. And, having everything in one place will make it easy to leave my kit in the back of my van and I'll be all ready for my Girl Scout meetings.

Repurposing A Child's Dresser

Do you remember this adorable little dresser? Well, as much as I loved it in my littlest girlie's room, as she is growing, so are her clothes -- it was time to move up to a larger dresser! We moved this dresser into her closet to try and give her some more drawer space, without taking up precious floor space in her (smaller than her sister's) room! That was a nice idea in theory, but we have built-in shoe shelves on the bottoms of our closets and the dresser was more cumbersome in there than helpful. I already have three other dressers that I am using for storage between the basement and the garage, and I liked the shape of this little dresser, so I decided to spruce it up and use it in the living room.

After dropping my daughter off at Princess Dance Camp one morning last week, my husband pulled out the painting stuff including a can of black paint that we had in the basement. I painted the dresser in no time, of course leaving the sweet baby drawer liners in place! I finished painting and left it to dry while we went back to pick my girl up (9:00 - 12:00 -- not bad!) and conveniently, her dance school is located just minutes from Hobby Lobby (my favorite store)!! I found some adorable vintage-y looking knobs for the dresser -- I was THRILLED to get them for 50% off! When we got home I put the new knobs on and voila, I have a lovely "new" piece of furniture that I am proud to use in my living room. Having the paint on hand and getting the sale price on the knobs allowed me to make this dresser over for only $17! Not bad for a new piece of furniture that I will use and love for years to come.

A Clean Start for the New Year

We had a wonderful trip to Long Island to visit our family over the holiday! We stayed at my mother-in-laws and intended to visit from 12/23 - 12/27, however the weather had other plans! Two days later than expected, we arrived at home -- weary travelers, unpacking what felt like a caravan's worth of belongings from our over packed minivan! While my husband spent this morning braving the supermarket, Target (for a return) and the liquor store for some bubbly (for he and I!) for tonight, I braved the "garbage cupboard"... I wish I had taken a before photo -- you can't quite appreciate my hard work without the before photo... For anyone who has spent any time at all at our house, you know that the garbage cupboard is a major hub of activity. Obviously, the garbage is kept in there. Also, cleaning supplies (there is an eye hook latch at the top to keep little hands out of the cleaning supplies!), and on the top shelves we store art supplies, etc. for the kids. In our effort to put away all of the things that the girls got for Christmas (Santa and the family were all very generous!), I decided that this morning would be a good time to clean out the garbage cupboard. I had piles of papers, buckets of markers, crayons, paint sets -- and Playdoh GALORE! I took the opportunity to clear out all of the things that my girls no longer use and organize the things that they do use. I now have neatly labeled containers -- one for each girl, and one for all of the Playdoh "utensils". My cleaning and organizing spree carried over to our 2-drawer lateral file. The top drawer holds all of my 4-year-old's books, while the bottom drawer holds all of the puzzles and things for car trips (auto bingo, Leapster, Story Reader...). I love when I have time to sort through everything and organize and pull out broken toys or dried out art supplies. This is a great time of year to do that, too -- when you are making room for new toys and craft items. Now I feel like I earned a relaxing evening at home with my family, ringing in the New Year!

How do you like to prepare for the New Year?

What Do I Do With All Of Those School Calendars?

I have two children, who are both in school – two separate ones (middle and pre) to be exact. We have SO many important papers that we have to refer to on an almost daily basis for each girl. We have the school lunch calendar, the calendar that tells us when gym day is and when library books are due, the school calendar that lists days off and testing dates, the preschool assisting calendar, the preschool lesson plan calendar, the instrumental music lesson calendar – and the list goes on! We also have school illness guidelines (when to keep your child home), the religious education calendar, and phone lists from the schools for scheduling play dates. It’s overwhelming! Since these are things that we refer to often, I don’t want to get them mixed in with all of the other paperwork – mail, homework, flyers from school – so a few years ago I started to tape everything up on the inside of our kitchen cabinets. This works out great for us – when the cabinets are closed – no mess! But we are in a routine – myself, my husband, and even our 9-year-old – and we check the schedules inside the cupboard every night to prepare the girls for school the next day. This has worked out great for us!

What is one of your favorite organizational tips for keeping all of the kid’s school info accessible?

"What Do I Do With All of This Stuff??" New Series!

I thought I would do a little series of posts based on the theme, "What Do I Do With All of This Stuff?" This theme encompasses a wide variety of topics and I thought I could share some of my ideas with you and I hope that you will comment and share some of your ideas with me as well! It's Halloween weekend, so let's start with the kids' holiday crafts! (For those of you keeping track, this falls under the larger category of "Kids' Schoolwork" and the sub-category of "Kids' School Artwork...") I am a sentimental saver by nature. I mostly owe this to genetics and my grandmother (my dad's mother). Since Gram, each generation has tried their best to break out of the "Sentimental Saver" (aka hoarder...) mode. I'm getting better and better with each passing year! I do not want to find myself on an afternoon talk show in an intervention situation... ;)

Anyway, the kids do SO many projects around the house and at school and it really adds up over the years (even months!) if you don't stay on top of it. I cherish their little projects and I love to display them, but sometimes it gets to be too much. This little witch is something that my niece colored about 4 years ago. I thought it was so cute that I put it in with my Halloween decorations and I have pulled it out and set it on the window in my kitchen every year for Halloween.

This little white, clay pumpkin is something that my eldest daughter made out of Play-doh a couple of years ago (when she was 6 or 7?). She left it out to dry and I have kept it along with my niece's witch. This little pumpkin actually reminds me of a something that my husband made when he was a little boy. I remember him showing me this little, brown, clay log-like thing that his mother had on display in the guest room. He had made it when he was very young and she had kept it all those years. It was, in fact, intended to be a log, but I have to tell you -- it looked like something else... But, he made it with love for his mother and she has kept it for over 30 years! I think if we can restrain ourselves and not keep EVERYTHING that our children make for us, but still keep some special things, it really shows the kids how precious they are to us. I think it fills a child with pride to see their parents showing off their artwork.

The great thing about holiday or seasonal artwork is that you can save a few pieces and pack them away with your holiday decorations and bring them out to display once a year. It saves on trying to find a space for everything all year long and its like a walk down memory lane for you and your kids -- seeing their special projects from years past! I will definitely be adding this cute, finger-painted pumpkin that my littlest girlie made at preschool to the annual Halloween decorations!

What do you do with the holiday projects that your kids bring home? Anything particularly special that you cherish? I'd love to hear about it!