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Organizing Life {one step at a time} LUNCH KITS

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Amy

I am already appreciating this little OCD kick I am on. Primarily because these “Lunch Kits” I came up with have really made my life SO much easier.

I am not much of a morning person, and people who know me might say that is an understatement! I attempt to get up before my kids each day and have some quiet time as it makes a tremendous difference in my day. However, I sometimes find that the earlier I get up, the earlier everyone else gets up and things aren’t quiet for long.

Since I have to get my boys on the bus at the ridiculous hour of 7:20 AM (!) having all their lunch ‘fixins’ together just makes so much sense. Really, why did I not think of it before?

This was one the first ideas that occurred to me when I was making my list for this series on small steps to making life more organized {View introduction HERE}. It requires so much less thinking before I have my coffee! Instead of running around the kitchen gathering all sorts of things–the bread from the fridge, the plastic bags from one drawer, the peanut butter from the pantry, the circle sandwich cutter my daughter insists on–you get the picture–now I just pull one basket out of my pantry,

And one basket out of the refrigerator, and make their lunches.

Another huge advantage is with everything together its easy to see what I am out of. No more “Surprise! we are out of bread!” mornings. I keep a shopping list on my pantry door, along with their lunch boxes and water bottles so everything is now right there together. Less effort and thinking on my part, and more time to actually drink my coffee.

Assembly was a snap, it was easy to pull all the things my kids like/need together, plus items like sandwich holders, plastic spoons or snack bags, into a basket or a fridge-friendly bin.

I also included some blank cards and a sharpie right in the basket so I can send them little lunchbox notes, something I always wished I had my act together in the morning to actually do!

On another note–I just LOVE all the ideas that have come in for this series, keep them coming! And, I am so glad to know I am not the only one feeling the crazy need to get better organized!

OK, how do you all organize lunch? What did I miss?

{sources: chalkboard labels HERE | basket TJ Maxx {years ago} | Bin Target | Mini-chalkboard French Garden House (I have also seen them on Wuslu) }

Thanks for stopping by~

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Posted in Organization | Tagged basket, Kids, lunch, morning, organizing life | 3 Comments

Things are “Looking Up” in my Dining Room

Posted on April 15, 2012 by Amy

In our recent HOME TOUR post, I showed this picture of my dining room.

I just felt like the room needed some jazzing up so this weekend, despite the gorgeous sunny weekend weather we finally have here, so I decided I needed to paint the ceiling blue.

I think it adds a lot, don’t you?

We wanted to pull the blue from the lake outside but still keep the room clean and simple so as not to distract too much from the view.

And, I wanted to give this chandelier a little more impact.

While we are in the Dining Room, I will say that this china cabinet is probably my favorite piece of furniture. I have taken a paint brush and white paint to most of my dark wood furniture, but this I will never change. My Dad found it many years ago in a barn on his grandparents’ property and scraped dark green paint off it and made it gorgeous. I coveted it for years; my parents passed it down to my husband and me when we got married. I am even attached to the circa 1970′s brass hardware (yes, even the one that has been missing since our move!).

As I have mentioned, we don’t use this room much for a traditional dining room, it’s really too small to hold more then a few people. But it’s the perfect spot for coffee.

And, it has one of the best views in the house.

The warm weather has brought out all sorts of visitors to our community, just moments ago I glanced outside and saw a guy riding his bike on the bike path using a kite to propel him, while passing by in the water was a dad in a kayak pulling 2 little girls in a raft behind him. Its never dull around here on a beautiful day…and so on that note, now I am going to head outside too!

Hope it’s a beautiful Sunday for you as well.

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Posted in Home Inspiration, Real Spaces | Tagged basket, ceiling, chandelier, Dining Room, french, lake, view | 9 Comments

French Inspired Basket

Posted on November 5, 2011 by Amy

My new "French Inspired" basket

I am not really a “Francophile” by any stretch of the imagination, but my decorating these days seems to be inspired by many similar French themes…like burlap, white distressed furniture, galvanized metal, linen and lots of light.

With that in mind, I am trying to eliminate some of the “dark” things that followed me from my previous home. There we had a huge stone fireplace (you can see it HERE) that dominated the room, and had coordinated dark leather couches with it. In my new home, I have white walls and dark floors so in an effort to try to bring in some lighter elements I was inspired to re-do this formerly boring brown basket. Honestly, someone has a beautiful legitimate french basket on top of an Armoire on a blog I was drooling over recently, which was responsible for my inspiration, and if its you please let me know! I can’t remember where I saw it, but it was just lovely.

So, to start I took this basket that I got awhile back at JoAnn’s– probably for about $7 — and took some Heirloom White spray paint very lightly to it.

The boring before...

After deciding I didn’t need to spend the money on new numbered stencils at Michael’s, I improvised a way to add the numbers I wanted to feature. I bought the small wood numbers for less then $1 and glued them on before I spray painted it. I sprayed it very lightly so the previous wood tones would show through, which actually saved me from needing to distress it later.

Here is the during...

Everything was going great until I pulled off the letters (I probably waited too long?)

As you can see the glue pulled off some of the original color, and I started to wonder if this was going to turn into a "fail" project!

But, I had purchased some gray craft paint to distress the basket (I didn’t wind up doing that) so I used it to touch up the letters and it worked great.

This paint saved the day...

And, all in all it came out just as I imagined! I like it quite a bit, I just need to track down some dried hydrangeas to fill it and will have to add a picture then, but for now its filled with all sorts of things.

In case you were wondering, I chose the numbers 6-1-2 as June 12th is my wedding anniversary. I am waiting to see if my husband ever notices? {Doubtful}

Its nice to have a quick, easy and most importantly– successful –project!

By the time you read this, I will be getting ready to host an Engagement Party –200 miles away! Here is what my dining table “staging area” looks like and I still have loads to gather to pack in the car. I will report back on the party next week! Have a great weekend.