Getting Organized

We have a baby coming soon.  75 days to be exact.  They say the second trimester is when you’re feeling great and start “nesting”…but not me.  I’ve procrastinated the nesting to the third trimester.  I feel like at this time when I was pregnant with Hannah we had a name pretty much picked out, a nursery done, a drawer full of diapers, and a closet full of clothes.  Well, with this baby, it’s a totally different story.  We have not settled on a name (nor even have a top 3 list), I have ZERO boy nursery things, I have a drawer full of size 4 diapers – not newborn, and thanks to my cousin Julie, I do have some clothes, but it’s a storage container full of clothes, not closet…because Hannah’s stuff is still in the closet.  Don’t get me wrong – we’re very excited for this baby to come.  I feel like I get more and more excited each day to meet this little guy, it’s just different.  The pregnancy has gone by much faster, our New York Trip and the holidays took up a lot of time shortly after we told people, and Hannah is a big distraction.  But, I’ve got a bee in my bonnet and I feel like I’m in the nesting phase now.  Unfortunately, before I can truly “nest”, I first have to organize and make room for this baby.  Ever since we moved in, we’ve had one room that we haven’t done ANYTHING to.  It’s the ONLY room we have painted or touched up and it’s become a giant storage closet for all our (read - my) random (read – school) stuff. 

When I stopped teaching almost 2 years ago everything got moved from my classroom to my front room.

I went through it all, got rid of a lot of stuff, incorporated some stuff into our home, and the rest got stored in that “one room” that we haven’t done anything to.  Over time, that room has filled up with random stuff – computer parts, boxes, old desks and chairs, etc. 

Well, that’s the room Hannah will move into when Baby Brother arrives so it was high time we cleaned that room out.  A LOT of what was in there was school supply stuff (crayons, markers, glue, etc).  The first item of business was getting those things organized in a place where we might actually use them. 

This cupboard above the desk in our kitchen just makes me feel peaceful inside.  Why didn’t I do this 2 years ago?

I also have a large amount of plastic storage drawers that I used at school.  I have quite a bit of money invested in these puppies and surely I could put them to use.  I cleaned out under our stairs (which we really didn’t have THAT much stuff in it – but it was all unorganized and just thrown in there when I needed a place to put something), and moved all my drawers under the stairs and filled them with all sorts of goodies – mostly paper.

NOTE – Everything that was already under the stairs is still under there or thrown away.

I filled the awkward sloped part with our 10 gallon food buckets, front entry holiday decorations (in the bags with labels) and 3 storage containers.  Get this, the ones with blue lids are EMPTY!  I love it.  Also, the above drawers with blank labels are also empty.

Finally, we added a few shelves for a few other things

and under the stairs is organized!  I love that there’s plenty of room to actually walk in to the stuff. We just need to add a couple of hooks for bags and we’re all done.

Now that the room is cleaned out, I just need to paint, buy bunk beds, bedding, dresser, bookshelf, and décor, decorate that room, move all of Hannah’s stuff over, get Hannah used to sleeping in a big bed, buy boy nursery bedding, decorate that room, and get his stuff put away.  I can do that before he’s born…right? 

Oh – and if anyone has suggestions on how to decorate a gender neutral room that will eventually be shared by Hannah and Little Brother please send them my way.  I’m really struggling to get inspired.