Minimalist Thanksgiving

So today is Thanksgiving. How does one keep one's cool among family, friends, and the pressure of entertaining? First of all, I have divided the two groups. We are having an intimate meal with just family at 1:00 and then have invited a variety of friends and neighbors to come over at 4:00 for horsdorves which will be sort of a Thanksgiving antipasti with turkey, crostini, and a variety of stuffed olives, and the sort. So by the time the friends arrive, Thanksgiving dinner is completely cleaned up and restructured into antipasti trays. For me it's the best of both worlds. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Primary Storage, Secondary Storage, Long Term Storage

My dear friends just recently moved from a big country house into a rather small city house. They had to move rather quickly though so their things were packed in a hurry and just put down basically anywhere in the new house. So when I walked in there were boxes piled everywhere and with my friend's husband at work, she decided to just try to set up the living room. We did this pretty easily once we go started by just removing what didn't belong. After a rest and a chat, we were motivated to attack the kitchen. Here's where some real decisions had to be made. Since my friend's husband is a professional chef, he has tons of pots and pans, serving platters, and kitchen gadgets - and I mean all of them! Well this is a tiny kitchen.

So we started making decisions using the three storage categories that I am sure every professional organizer knows: primary storage, secondary storage and long term storage.

Primary storage is for the items you use every day and should be stored right where you use them: cutting board on the counter, glassware near the dishwasher, etc.

Secondary storage is for things you use once a week or so. They can be stored in higher cupboards like crock pots, serving platters, etc.

Long term storage is for things you use once or twice a year such as holiday decorations, certain tools. etc. these things can go into the garage or somewhere where it may take time to get them out.

Back to my friend's kitchen - the amount of secondary storage items in this situation would never fit into this kitchen. So I thought where would you store all of this stuff if you were in a big house? A butler's pantry!

So we took a big shelf and put it in the garage which is right off the kitchen and created a place for all of these over sized bean pots, steamers, mixers, etc. There's even an outlet if he wants to plug one in right there to do some slow cooking without taking up space in the pantry.

So he has his butler's pantry. With the two main rooms done, the others are quickly being organized and I know they'll be happy back in their little city house - especially because they're my neighbors!

Drip System Heaven

Now that I am back in downtown Portland in my townhouse again, I spent some time revamping my drip system. If you've never used one, I must say they are so worth the initial set up. Mine's on a timer and connects to two misters for my small front flower garden and then goes around the yard and up to the second deck to water my flower baskets. It's really hot up there, and I know from experience that they would soon be dead without being watered every morning. 

The most expensive part of the system is the timer, which pays for itself in saved water costs. The rest is just 1/4 inch tubing that you puncture with an awl- like tool and little connectors that go into wherever you punch into the tubing. 

I had a lot of fun putting it together. I bought a small kit and was on my way to saving time, money, and the planet - my favorite things!

An Easy Way to Free Up a Kitchen Drawer

Here's what my kitchen utensil drawer used to look like. Lots of junk and with so few drawers in my kitchen I knew I needed to put something up on the counter, even though I have zero tolerance for clutter.

I realized that most of the utensils are stainless steel. Some of them have black handles so I just hid the handles in the bottom of this canister that I already had on the counter. I think it looks great, I have everything I need right at hand and I freed up a crowded drawer!

Still Digging Out!

I am still digging out from this move. Our last renter finally moved all of his stuff out on Friday, but unfortunately we still have lots of extra furniture that won't fit in this smaller house. One would think I'd have everything put away by now, but I of course, consider each thing I have and weather or not I really need it. 

We also decided to repaint in a new light chocolate shade that looks very contemporary. Being as busy as we are right now, my husband spends about an hour a day painting and it's really coming along. 

I've always had the attitude that any big job can be done a bit at a time. So I try to unpack one box each night when I get home from work and do one load of laundry. We'll get there. 

If you're facing a big dig out from clutter or any kind of disorganization, check out the Fly Lady's site. No matter where you are in your process of getting it together she has figured out systems to keep you progressing. Her basic philosophy is the same as mine, and I'm a big fan of hers.

Downsize, Downsize, Downsize...

Well, now that we finally got everything out of the big house and the new renter has moved in, it's time to unpack. Of course, some things will be put right back where they were, but I am taking a fresh look at the house one room at a time. My sister was saying she should move so she would be forced to get rid of stuff. Believe me, that's not the easiest way to do it! However, starting with an empty place, does let you see it afresh.  

Even living out of a suitcase for a week got me focused on what I really need on a daily basis. They say we only wear 20% of our clothes 80% of the time. If we could just know which ones we are going to need on a regular basis, imagine how much money and closet space we could save? I am afraid that I'll have to leave that one  left up to the fashion gods, as it will always remain a mystery to me! But when you have to choose the essentials to wear for a week or so, it jumps out at you.

So I'll be paring down as I unpack and will be changing some of my minimalist organization. I hope you'll follow me on my journey!

A Shocking Thing Happened on My Way to Minimalism

So here I am, back in my minimalist's row house but, a shocking thing happened on my way to minimalism.... Apparently, while in the huge flip house we accumulated more stuff! I am shocked at just how much stuff! Much of it is attributed to remodeling left overs and stuff left there by our son and his crew who lived there while they remodeled. I knew it was there and we cleared out a lot but, my mistake was not clearing out enough on a weekly basis. I was so busy keeping the house looking showroom perfect, that I neglected to keep up my minimalist habits! 

Now that I'm unpacking, I'm thinking.... what was I thinking? Why do I have this much stuff? Believe me, it's not because I buy it! My sister loves to send my serving dishes for Christmas for some reason, enough that I could start a catering business! My mother in law likes to send my husband food home with him when he stops in to visit. So, those dishes and Tupperware pile up. We have all of these odd mismatched glasses... remember the gas station glasses? We inherited some of those and remember the Flintstones jelly jars people reused as juice glasses? Well, at least I didn't have any of those!

Luckily, unpacking is a great time to recognize what hasn't been used in the past year and all of those empty boxes make it easy to cart things off to charity too. So with: trash, donate, relocate, and sell boxes at the ready, we unpacked our kitchen last night and purged a good fourth of it!

Our kitchen was second only to the garage mess in sheer bulk that we had to move. Of course, the row house kitchen is about a fourth the size of the flip house kitchen. I guess we really spread out there!

So, it's back to my good habits which are: going through drawers and closets on a regular basis, keeping a box handy for items to go to charity, and going through one kitchen cupboard and one refrigerator shelf a week. If I had done more of this the six months before I moved, it would have been much easier on us!