Inspiration

I absolutely love this blog on organizing. I was recently introduced to a really fun website where you can put together your own inspiration board to use to decorate different rooms in your house. Since we have been making numerous changes to our home in the last month, I decided I would put a few boards together.

Kitchen Inspiration

Living Room Inspiration

Bathroom Inspiration

I used items I already had, as well as new inspiration. We have since made some progress on creating these styles in our home and I will gradually share those updates.

Stay tuned to see how these rooms came together in real life.

The Beginnings of a Little Less Chaos

Sigh...today has been quite productive and quite exhausting. Last night I was up until after midnight inspiring myself (with the help of Pinterest and a couple blogs) to get my house organized! It is a new year and I need to feel like I have everything together before I start a new journey in my life - student teaching.

After getting motivated,  here is what I did:

Step one: PURGE
This is something that has always been so hard for me. I develop attachments for things. I have so many clothes that do not fit, or despite there cuteness - I do not wear. I literally got rid of about fifty items!

There is more in the garage! I put the clothes I did not want in three piles when cleaning out my closet/drawers; garbage, Goodwill, give away/resale. I have some clothing that is damaged or just plain worn out that I opted to re-home in the garbage - I wouldn't want to pass them on to ANYONE.

Step two: Organizational Items

My husband and I are on a budget since I will be spending the next six months Student Teaching and not getting paid (but I am still very excited for this new endeavor), and let's face it - a budget is always good regardless. My point is, I wanted to bargain shop for my storage items. I hit up Big Lots and Marshals (TJ Max/Home Goods). After getting ideas online, I had a pretty good list going of the items I would need. Both of these stores have the same types of storage containers you can find anywhere, but for half the price. Be careful buying storage items at the Dollar Tree, sometimes the lids do not actually snap on.

With these items, along with items we already had sitting around - I have everything I need to get started and make our house organized!

Step three: MY PANTRY

Here is my pantry before the makeover, and I will be honest...I recently cleaned and organized it (yikes)!

Some of you may think this is outrageous, but this is actually more organization than normal around here.

My beautiful pantry after I revamped it with my amazing organizational skills:

It is so much better, and I can actually find things. The item that created the greatest difference was my over the door shelving unit. I got it for under $20 and used it to house all my spices, pasta sauces, snacks and some of my breakfast foods (syrup, pancake mix, peanut butter, etc.). It really allowed me to utilize the shelves in my pantry a lot more efficiently. 

The top shelf has cereal, chips, a bin with Sampson's treats (he has quite the assortment - growing boy and all...), and a tub for all of my cookie decorating supplies along with cookie cutters.

The bottom shelf contains our plastic wrap, tin foil, etc., along with a bin filled with easy to make breakfast foods (peaches, oatmeal, breakfast bars). Next to that is a tub filled with all our snack foods, this will make it easy to choose. I try to fill it with semi-healthy items like popcorn and nuts, although, right now ours is filled with Rice Crispy Treats from Costco (shhh, don't tell).

The floor is home to items that don't fit nicely somewhere else; Tupperware lids, salad spinner, crock pot, V8 Splash (our favorite, and somewhat of a delicacy in this house).

The other two shelves are designated for baking supplies and canned food/pasta. I put all of my baking items in containers, rather than bags, on a Lazy Susan so I have easy access to each item. Everything fits so nicely and I can quickly tell what I need from the store and what I have to work with when it is time to plan meals (which for me is quite an intense process that I will tell you about later).

Next up...Kitchen drawers/cupboards, fridge and the dreaded closet! 

Anyone have any ideas to make organizing a little less daunting?

Fancy Dinner in Five Minutes

My husband and I absolutely love sushi. Sadly, it is not always in the budget and it is hard and somewhat costly to make at home. Luckily, we found a great (and incredibly inexpensive) compromise...Seared Tuna!

We purchased enough for both of us at Trader Joes for less than $4! It literally takes about five minutes to make, which makes it taste even better.

Heat Olive Oil in a saute pan
Coat tuna with sesame seeds
Place coated tuna in the pan and sear on each side for about a minute
If you want to do the edges, you can sear them as well using tongs to hold it in place (I did it)

When the tuna is seared, slice it into thin strips (kind of like Sashimi)

It's that easy folks! And it's so good. I mixed a little honey into the soy sauce and used that as a dipping sauce. We served it with brown rice (made in a rice cooker), steamed veggies and Edamame. My husband likes Siracha sauce on everything, so I can assure you, that was also present on the table.

Suggestions please!

Last weekend was an inspiring weekend! My Mom, Michael and I spent Saturday together exploring the fabulous  Monticello Antiques store on Stark followed by a trip to William Sonoma and Elephants. The antique store had so many interesting pretty things, it made me want a bigger house! I only ended up buying one thing; an old Edgar Allen Poe book which, I am going to use to make my Halloween Cards (I will explain in a later post). We found some very random things (that I would never want), one of which was a stuffed cat - with a fan blowing right on it causing it's fur blow. Can you say creepy?

The suggestions I am asking for are regarding my purchase from William Sonoma. Mike and I got a very generous gift card for our wedding and I went in with a plan. I was going to get a food processor, a cookie sheet, and a grill pan. My plan was quickly destroyed by my lovely Mother who had other things in mind. After showing her each thing I intended to purchase, she replied by saying, "You can buy that at Bed Bath and Beyond with a 20% off coupon." True. Then she convinced me to buy something I would never normally buy if I had not had a gift card. The end result was a beautiful slate colored, cast iron, enamel pot. I must admit, I have wanted one for quite some time but have always been to cheap to buy one (they are spendy). So now I have this amazing new addition to my kitchen and I don't quite know what to do with it. My mom has told me it's great for roasts, but does anyone have any other ideas?