I've been busy

Over the two weeks I was off, I cleaned and organized a couple areas of my house and two areas of a friend's house. I did not get as much done as I would have liked, but being the pro-simplicity mother that I am, I choose to spend more time with the family and less time organizing. To be honest at some points I was really aching to get back to organizing but the egg nog next to the fire kept calling my name. Which means that you are going to get even more posts with before and after pictures.

Here is what I did so far.....

Children's bookshelf BEFORE and AFTER

The tea and baking cabinet at my house BEFORE and AFTER

Toy Corner at my friends house BEFORE and AFTER

After I completed the toy corner at my friends house her daughter asked me a few questions.

How long did it take? It was actually pretty quick, I got the children involved and had them make all the descions since it was their stuff. We had three of us working on it and one of us (me) was frequently saying let's see how fast we can get this done, so with less then 10 seconds to decide we were done in less than 45 minutes.

What did you do with all the stuff? We had four piles; keep, donate, toss, and bring toy to Dad's house to match with the rest of set or give to so and so. The we bagged them up and put them next to the door so that Mom could take them to the Goodwill or where ever.

Wasn't it hard? Not really because we found out that most of the stuff was outdated and needed to go. Also underneath the intial clutter there was some good organization that Grandma had going. Most of the art stuff was in one basket, the games were all in one area, and so on. It was just getting the top layer of things that had not been put away placed in the correct area.
These same answers went for the areas of my house that I decluttered. It is just getting up and doing to it that is the problem.

Keep a look out for more pics to follow as I continue to declutter.