Let's Craft Something!

I've been kind of reflective of why this whole organization spree begun.  Once or twice a year, I do get into the habit of organizing, but it's usually on a small scale.  I normally end up tackling only one area, such as my dresser.  This time, though, I've started purging and organizing nearly everything in my room -- and it's starting to spread to the rest of the house.

Why has this happened?  Why is this so much different than the other times?  One theory I have is that I finally realized how terribly bad my closet was, which made me realize how bad my room was, and so on.  My second theory is that I realized it would make for some decent blog posts; although I like to think that isn't truly the case, I do realize that I have made several small projects from one large one.  A third theory I toyed around with was that maybe, just maybe, I was finally making the transition to adulthood.  I mean, you never really see adults with totally junky rooms, do you?  The last theory I thought of was that maybe I realized that I'm going to be leaving home soon and it would be easier on me then if I went through my stuff now.

Is it any one of these?  Maybe.  Who knows?  I've never been a terribly organized person when it comes to my living space.  As long as I can get around and know where things are, I've been okay with it in the past.  It could be any combination of these theories, or even something I hadn't thought of.

Whatever the reasoning, psychological or not, I've decided that this June is going to be "Junk-Free June!"  I realize we're halfway through it the month already, but so far I've spent my month going through my old things, de-cluttering and organizing.  "Junk-Free June" just seems to make sense.  Oh dear, I hope this doesn't turn into the "Summer of Storage"...

So far in June I have:

1. Cleaned out my closet and installed new shelves. (I promise, I'll stop talking about it soon...)
2. Rearranged the contents of my drawers, including emptying my nail polish, perfumes, and lotions from one drawer for clothing use.  (Now they're just sitting in two shoe boxes on my floor...)
3. Cleaned out from underneath my bed.  (So much dust!)
4. Rearranged my bathroom storage -- though I still don't have wall storage, I make do with what I can. (Coming up on Freebie Friday.)
5. Emptied and restocked my nightstand.





Nana made me cute rice bags with tea in them. The owl has cloves and the cat has peppermint!


6. Made a chicken wire picture frame jewelery organizer for use in my closet.
7. Begun working on a nail polish rack.
8. Gone through a "junk drawer" in my desk -- which pretty much consisted of throwing away old guides for anime conventions.
9. Gone through a "junk drawer" in the kitchen.
10. Gone through our DVD collection (around 260 of them) and organized by genre; intend on putting them in a binder in the living room.
11. Compiled a large pile of donation items -- mostly clothing.

Considering that we are only at the halfway point of the month, I feel like I've gotten a lot done.  By the looks of my room, you may not believe it, but I feel like it's been pretty productive.  There are times when I feel like I've bitten off more than I could chew as one pile shifts from one thing to another, but I'm finally starting to see progress.

In my going through my room, I've noticed that it's not an overabundance of clothes that is causing the clutter -- it's an overabundance of stuff.  Yeah, the clutter in my closet was mostly shoes and clothes, but outside of that, it's just stuff.  Just to give you an example, I've found three pairs of craft scissors in my bedroom alone and a ridiculous amount of pens.  I had several notebooks beside my bed that I would use to jot things down when I couldn't sleep and things were on my mind.  Each of these notebooks has maybe ten or less pages in them before they are empty.  I'm removing all but one in hopes to actually empty a few notebooks.


It's hard for me to come to terms with not needing some things anymore.  I hate to admit that because it's like the first step to admitting to being a hoarder, but it's true.  There are things I like to hold on to for what once was sentimental value (for example, the convention guides from five years ago...) or for thinking that I could use it for something (like an old foundation container or this random pile of floppy disks on my desk).

I've been having a hard time sleeping this past week, but I think it's due to knowing there have been large piles on my bed.  If I do somehow manage to forget, I'm reminded when I try to adjust in my sleep and can't due to piles of yarn or clothes.  Maybe it's just knowing that there are piles of things that need to be put away, or simply that there is something that I could be getting done.  Whatever it is, it's annoying and needs to stop.  I was still awake and going when the sun came up several days.

Now I'm going back through my organization spree posts and tagging them with "Junk-Free June" and adding the nice banner to the top.  I wish I had taken "before" shots of my room so that you would be able to tell how much of a difference my organization has made, but, again, I didn't expect it to turn into the month-long project that it has.

Alright girls, how many of you have an old pair of plain heels that you loved at one time, got on sale, or you never wear because they're plain and boring?  Well, I don't even know how I came across it, but Maegan over at Love Maegan has a great tutorial for how to revamp those heels using those heels, fabric, and Mod Podge.


She turned her boring black heels into this:


Of course, yours don't have to be hounds tooth or have the little pom pom at the toe, but it's a wonderful idea, in my opinion.  And you probably have all of these materials at home already if you're a crafter.  Here is her tutorial for this super shoe makeover.

She also has a tutorial for making cute lace socks to wear with your heels, which I think is another great way to spice up your shoes.  This is also a good idea if you're afraid of messing up a pair with Mod Podge!
What girl doesn't have nail polish laying around, too?  She also has tutorials for adding color to your shoes with nail polish!












Of course, she does have more than just shoe tutorials, but I stumbled into the shoe section and fell in love with her neat ideas!  Before you throw your heels away, be sure to check how you can revamp them and fall in love with them all over again!  Visit Love Maegan for all of her great tutorials.

*All of the photos in this post were from Love Maegan.  I did not create any of these; all credit belongs to her.