Living Small

For our anniversary this weekend, we went to a bed and breakfast. We got to stay in a Texas Tiny House and oh it was so wonderful! I've been wanting to see inside one of those tiny homes for a long time. Saturday morning after breakfast, the owner gave us a tour of the other tiny homes as well as the other buildings they have on their property. He had done all the remodeling and building on the other homes (not the TTH ones) and S and he enjoyed talking woodworking for a while. It was way better than staying at a hotel!

We would absolutely love to live in one of these one day but....what to do with the children? Hmm. Details, details.

To the left when you walk in. 

Straight ahead when you walk in. 

To the right of that window. The ladder leads to the loft and bed.

A view of the whole living room from the loft. 

Looking back at the front door. 

To the very right when you walk in, is the kitchen. 

Looking up at the "bedroom."

The bath. River rock on the shower floor and ceiling tin on the walls. 

 One thing that sets the Texas Tiny Homes apart from other tiny homes is they use 90-something percent repurposed materials.

Salvaged sink.  When is the last time you saw 2 separate faucets?

Old windows saved from another house or building.

Old doors with doorknobs just like in my grandmother's house. 

All these antique details are really neat. 

And OH! the beautiful smell of all the wood! The hardwood floors were also antique. It was just beautifully made.

Good-bye Little House! We would love to live in you one day!

It's easy to imagine, while you are staying there, that you could actually live that small. Then you come home and walk abound your regular house and think HOW? Well, we don't need to go that radical with our simplifying right now, but I do wonder how much less we could live with.

I mean, instead shelves full of games, couldn't we just have a few decks of cards? You can play a lot of games with cards! Books are important, but you could get a Kindle or a Nook and do without shelves and shelves of books. (I don't want to, but you could.)

The bigger the area you live in, the more you fill it. If there is a shelf or mantle, you have to put things on them. We definitely do not live with just the necessities. And if we ever did get a tiny home, it would have to be bigger than the one we spent the night in. Still, I would love to go smaller. How about the Ingalls' home? That one would work just fine for me.

Except with A/C.

Hey, we're talking about simplifying, not losing our minds!

In Which I Have a Revelation

You know, there are 8 years between Little Bit and Baby Bee. And I knew from the get-go that I would NOT be saving hand-me-downs for Bee from Little Bit's closet. Please! Eight years is too long. Too much to store. It would be too out of style or old or with dry rotted elastic or whatever by the time Bee got to fitting it.

(There is one exception and that's clothes that my mom sewed. We keep those.)

But this morning I realized that I have kept nearly every single homeschool item we have ever owned. Why? Things I used with Sweetheart that I am not using with Little Bit--and who knows if I will use them with Bee--but I am keeping them because....because....why? I MIGHT want to use them? They MIGHT be a good fit for Bee when she gets into 6th grade? Do you know how far away that is?

The girls dressed up for Go Western day at co-op recently.

Just as I don't have the space to store 8 years of clothes, I certainly do not need to be keeping 8+ years of homeschool curriculum!

• But you will just have to re-buy it. What a waste of money!
• But you will regret it one day!
• What if it goes out of print and you can't find a copy anymore?
• Books don't take up THAT much room.

The thing is, S and I were reliving our first year of marriage last night with the girls at supper. We lived in a tiny one bedroom apartment. S said, "I would give anything to go back to that kind of simplicity!" Now I know he didn't mean get rid of the children. :) I remember when we moved in before the wedding. S moved everything he owned from his bedroom at home and started staying at the apartment. I was living at Mom and Dad's house but moved all my worldly possessions over one afternoon. 

It in no way filled up that apartment. Even when we added the wedding gifts! 

Bee was the only girl at library story time a while back. She doesn't mind. She plays great with boys!

I remember getting up on Saturday morning and cleaning--I mean really scrubbing--every inch of that apartment. It took less than an hour. 

Maybe we are just being nostalgic. But then I see pictures of this certain house online. I was going to post a link and in searching I happened upon a whole website devoted to complaining about this family. So....maybe there are some issues involved there and that's why their house looks so perfect. 

OK I love my family. Not trying to be some other family. But goodness. I had a friend recently put her house on the market and it sold. All this happened within about a month. From her first talking about doing it to selling it. We might could do that within six months IF we suspended all schooling and life for those 6 months. 

We aren't exactly in prime shape around here. And I have excuses reasons! 

1. We had a baby. We still haven't recovered.
2. We started going somewhere on spring break every year where I used to stay home and clean closets and paint, etc.
3. My dad was in the hospital all summer so NOTHING happened at our house. Which means it's been well over a year since I did any really good cleaning out around here. 

But I think it's OK to start cleaning off those homeschool shelves. We don't have a homeschool room anymore anyway. We just store things on those shelves. Why am I storing so many things we won't need for 8+ more years?

When Mama says, "No, you cannot have that today, but let me take a picture of it in case I decide to get it another day." And you are not happy with her response.

Tell me it's OK to get rid of homeschool stuff. Someone? Anyone? 

And if anyone gets high off of decluttering, you're invited over, OK?

My Most Devoted Reader

Good ol' Anonymous Spam. He assures me I am a most excellent writer and always has a kind word to say about my blog, plus a little happy link for me to visit.

I just spend 15 minutes deleting spam comments from this blog.

You other commenters really need to step up your game. Why don't you give me helpful web tips like him? :) Never have I had such a devoted reader.

In other news, I spent over an hour throwing away 2 1/2 bags of trash out of Sweetheart's room yesterday. It's ok--she asked me to! Actually, she bargained for me to! (She knows how to bargain with me pretty well. She knows all my weak spots. Mama will do just about anything for foot rubs, or to have my hair brushed, etc. Yesterday she REALLY wanted help on her room b/c she gave me the full spa treatment.)

I love you Sweetheart--even if you have 50 socks on your bedroom floor.

Anyway, in the course of sweeping out from under all her furniture, and behind everything and just generally getting everything off the floor--I found 50 socks. FIFTY SOCKS folks. And she was still wearing some yesterday! Today we are going to attack the closet and drawers. Time to get rid of what doesn't fit and pass along or throw away toys. Sniff. Sniff.

I've been in no hurry on the toys because once you grow up, you don't ever get to go back. She's been telling me she doesn't want them all and I keep saying, "they aren't taking up any room in your closet, just leave them on the shelf in case you want to play with them one day." But after seeing the state of her room yesterday, I've decided it's time to seriously pare down what's in her room. If you don't own much, you can't junk the room up. Right? Right?

And I must resist the urge to keep everything for Bee later. There is far too big of a gap in ages to store clothes or toys for her for later. Maybe a few sentimental items that all the girls have loved and played with. But really--I've got to let go of some things. EVEN IF they are "perfectly good." (That was my mom's voice there in quotes. She can't throw anything away. Must. Fight. Genetics.)

Baby Bee--conqueror of the homeschool cabinet.

In other news, Bee learned to open the homeschool cabinet yesterday so that is now sporting a child lock. Far too much money invested in homeschool curriculum to risk that. I don't lock everything up, just the one kitchen cabinet that has a gas connection inside it. I don't mind telling her "no." But boy if she ripped up our homeschool stuff while I was out of the room--I might have what they call a coniption. So that's another inconvient addition to our school day. I would really, really, really like to have a homeschool room again. One with a bunch of built-in would be nice. And a play area on the other side for Bee. So if you know of anyone giving a house away--give me a holler!

OK--let the vague, general compliments about my blogging style begin!

Schooling All Over the House

So, we don't have a homeschool room anymore. I can hardly believe that it was just last school year we started in this room:

It was going to be our 2nd year in that nice, large room. But then, 2 months into the school year, I started feeling completely trapped. I blogged about it here.

By the way, that was the exact same week I found out I was expecting Baby Bee. Perhaps the hormones were helping in my decision?

Whatever the reason, this is what is now in that old homeschool room:

Little Bit sleeps here.

So that left us homeschooling around the house last year. Sweetheart worked at her desk a lot in her room. Little Bit and I worked on the couch a lot as Mama was pregnant and very tired. Our school year was not what I had planned.

As I get ready for this new year, with even LESS space as we have added a new blessing to our home, I am really having to wrap my head around this "no homeschool space" thing. I would love to have a room again. I would love to have a room big enough for homeschooling and playing. It sure sounds nice.

I've never planned a year without a designated space!

We got some new living room furniture recently and I'm thankful for the new coffee table in the living room. Little Bit and I can work there as well as the dining room table. That will be nice. I am fitting all our homeschool stuff in the old sewing room so at least our storage is in one place and not all over the house.

I've got the cabinet in there, but the floor is now full of piles and stacks of stuff. Must finish organizing! Still, I'm thankful to have a small space to PUT everything at the end of the day. I'll give that tour when I'm finished. It's not pretty right now.

Sweetheart will be working at her desk again this year. For her birthday (next month), we are fixing up her desk area. I hope it will be really nice and "grown up." I'll share that when I'm done as well.

So basically:

1. I don't really like not having a school room. Humph. But I'm trying to be content.
2. I'm going to do some things.
3. I'll show you pictures when I get those things done.

Now you may return to your (infinitely, for sure) more exciting school planning!

Let's Just Call It Progress Anyway, OK?

Little Bit does NOT like the mess I've made. She told me so. "I don't like it when things are everywhere."

Neither do I dear, but it has to get worse before it gets better.

The contents of our homeschool cabinet, ladies and gentlemen. In the first room you see when you walk in our house. The room with no door, mind you.

But I cleaned out that sewing room!

In progress...

And fit that homeschool cabinet in there!

All my sewing stuff and scrapbook stuff fit into that curtained closet on the right. 

Otherwise known as: Things I Will Get to in Another 6 or 10 Years

I'm pretty proud of that big move, but now I have to re-organize the inside of the cabinet and it's making me twitch a bit. Now that we use Sonlight, our organizational needs have changed. And I also need to get rid of a lot of stuff!

I'll be listing things for sale this week. HOPING to make some cash and clear some space. Some things I'll want to hang onto for Baby Bee but honestly...it will be at least 5 years before she uses any of it. You can't just keep everything for that long. 

Which brings me to thinking about curriculum. Pretty sure I've nailed down all my choices for the year so I'll be blogging about those soon. 

But first I need to whimper a bit. Wander around some. And then finally get this finished. 

In that order. 

Fitting

**I told you I'd share our 4th of July journal pages today, but I didn't get any pictures made. Here is what we did. 


I've said it before: floor plan matters more than square footage. I still believe that. This house we live in is small compared to today's new houses, but much bigger than many houses in this world. Still, we know that a family of 5 once lived here and fit all their belongings.

Of course, they eventually moved.

So, adding Baby Bee did squish us up a bit more. I know she's just a tiny baby, but even tiny babies have to have a place to live. I know that large families fit WAY more kids into their square footage than I am dealing with. Our girls have been allowed to keep more personal belongings than large family kids are allowed to keep--simply because they could.

Bee sleeps in our room right now and I'm pretty proud of figuring out a way to fit all that.

Bee's bed beside ours. The dresser is used as a changing table.

We'll keep her in there with us until that doesn't work anymore. Then she'll move in with Little Bit. (That would be in our old homeschool room. It's the bigger room.)

This is now Little Bit's bedroom. 

When that happens, Little Bit will need to get rid of some things. And some furniture will have to go out of her room.

But the bedrooms are not the problem.

Our front room (the first homeschool room we ever had...and former playroom)

now houses books. I like to call it the "library" like we are so rich we have a library. Also the pet birds are in there, a chair, and the armoire that holds our homeschool stuff.

There isn't room for a table in there anymore so it really isn't a "homeschool room". In fact, it's not good for much of anything except storing things. Besides the chair, there isn't any way to "use" that room.

And then there is the sewing room.

Wow. Things sure were neat then. See the curtained closet to the right?

I also made a bill paying nook in that room. There's the curtained closet again.

Well. I'm thinking. Still thinking. 

See, S needs a place to sit and study. 

The old study area I made for S. Baby Bee sleeps here now. :)

We need our homeschool stuff closer to the dining room. So I'm thinking (and this is just still in the thinking stage...) of moving that armoire to the sewing room. Which would mean all the sewing stuff has to go in the curtained closet. And a LOT of junk has to go. Then...there would be room in the library for a desk or table for S. 

Hmm. This is not about my rearranging problem (Hello. My name is Brenda and I'm a chronic re-arranger.) This is about making our house work for us. This is what we have. There HAS to be a way to make it work! 

And if it doesn't work, well...at least I will have cleaned out a lot of junk in the process, right? 

Zombie Mothering

That's what I've been doing. Stumbling around like a sleep-deprived zombie teaching my children and doing housework. Somehow, we've gotten some stuff done and somehow, they are learning.

The girls are SO helpful around the house too. We've really gotten to a point when I can ask them to do something and they just bang it out. "Can y'all pick up the living room?" 4 minutes later....done. No complaining. They do everything fast so they can go play and that may not be the best thing but at this point in my life it works for me. I asked them to both help me clean up the very nasty kitchen last night and we were done really quickly. At 12 and 8 they can just do SO much.

Sweetheart made us blueberry pancakes last week for breakfast!

By the way, I re-read this last night. I just love Auntie Leila posts. I love how she talks. This one is great too.

But it makes me think of what all they could do that Mama won't/can't/doesn't-care-to-try to do right now. Like baseboards, for example. That's the kind of job I pay for. Keeping their room and their stuff picked up is a non-issue. I will not pay you for that. It's your job. But other jobs that Mama doesn't want to do herself but sure would be nice if someone would do them....that I'll pay for. (I do it all in 25 cent denominations--small jobs=.25 Medium jobs=.50-.75 Big jobs=$1.00) Wiping those baseboards down around the house is no big deal for their young selves. But for a 5 months pregnant 41 year old mom? Well it's going to take a lot more than some quarters to motivate me!

Little Bit helping cook at our Keepers at Home meeting.

And little bitty jobs like that really add up! Usually when I say "pick up the living room" I just mean get the stuff out of the middle of the floor and clean the couch off. But the details make a real difference. Twenty-five cents for someone to re-fold all the blankets that are currently piled in the blanket box in a mountainesque fashion. Fifty cents for someone to take the vacuum attachment around the edge of the room. These things matter. They really make the room look different. And the kids can get these little jobs done so fast and earn quarters right away. Instant loveliness and instant gratification. Win-win.

As for school, we did that in my bed yesterday. It was a nice change of pace. Reading, writing, and math is  mostly what I'm worrying about right now. If we get other stuff done--great! (and we do--several times a week but NOT every day) I realize we have about 3 months more of real school. I imagine in May nothing is going to happen so we're just plugging along trying to get what we can done.

Part of bed-school yesterday we spent finishing their plastic canvas bookmarks. 

Meals have been the worst. I haven't been to the grocery store yet this week because I've had other errands/things to do every day and I only have so much energy. Grocery shopping is one of those THIS IS JUST ABOUT THE ONLY THING YOU WILL GET DONE TODAY kind of things. Anyway, I ran to the store yesterday during our errands and bought ingredients for supper but when we got home, had no energy to cook. So, we went out again. Sigh. I don't even want to think about how much money we have wasted at restaurants since I've been pregnant, but at the same time I'm grateful. Still, this is one area I plan to do better in.

I don't know, reading Auntie Leila's posts has made me realize it's time to worry about basics and quit trying to live life like we did before I was pregnant. It's a season and things need to be different right now.

Meals
Laundry
School

These things matter and need to be at the top of the list. My girls need to continue helping more than they usually do. And I need to plan ahead and pace myself.

Any suggestions on making life simpler while you are pregnant?

Home

Yesterday we did school from 9-11:30 and were VERY productive. Then, from 11:30-3:30 we made no fewer than SEVEN stops around town (well, several towns actually) before we landed back at home. At which time I started printing inserts for the invitations and counting out envelopes and stamps. Then I may have fallen asleep on the floor only to have a friend come over to pick up a crib we were giving away (it didn't fit in our space). She totally caught me napping. Then I cooked supper and sister came over to get half the invites to address last night and then we ate supper and we ran out the door to church.

Because I thought the day had been kind of boring up until then, I decided it would be a good idea to lock the car keys in the trunk of the car after church.

SIGH.

Today, we are HOME. And I don't want to run any errands. I have enough to do here to occupy me for 3 straight days! And I am very thankful to just be here. I can assure you school will not start on time. We are all still in our pajamas and the girls are playing. I still need to stuff some envelopes and get everything out to the mailbox before school starts anyway.

There are a lot of should do's on my list today like laundry and finding the kitchen sink and school and things like that. Those will get done. But there are also some want to do's on my list and they are calling my name.

We worked in the girls' rooms Monday evening and haven't touched them since. Completely half-done and a terrible mess. I would like to work in their rooms today. I would like to start seam-ripping ribbon off of their curtains so I can re-decorate the curtains for their "new" rooms. If I have 100 things to do, taking the ribbon off of those curtains comes in #99 in importance. Maybe that's why it appeals to me.

I guess I'll share some before pics of the girls' rooms:

Sweetheart's desk area and part of her bed. And always stuff on the floor. 

Little Bit's museum of too much stuff!

While we spent several days in November organizing and labeling everything in Sweetheart's room, it occurred to me that her arrangement wasn't very organized. Now she has zones--the desk is actually beside the locker and bookshelf, etc. But oh there is much more to be done.

And Little Bit's room has to start transforming into a room for 2. I cleaned out the closet the other day and it's all good now. We got rid of her desk and a lot of toys and now I have to figure out where to put the rest of her furniture. She probably has a year before her roommate will move in, so we can worry about getting rid of more furniture later.

And I've decided to call off that mini-vacation I wanted to go on before baby gets here. We are just too busy right now and I think I will be tired of all that walking, etc. I will probably feel better going in the fall with a 5 or 6 month old in tow. I may regret that. Not sure yet.

I'm off to be productive and enjoy my house and all the improvements which will surely happen around here today!

Abundant Blessings and The Room Schizo

First of all, the blessings. A friend said she had some baby clothes to hand down to me. Great! Thanks! We sure need 'em. So I met her at McDonald's for lunch and came home with 3 large garbage bags and a huge tub of clothes. Oh my goodness!

I spent all weekend washing them up. Her house is cleaner than mine but something was making me sneeze. Their dog? The laundry soap? Not sure. Plus I know some had been stored for awhile. AND washing baby clothes and getting them all ready is one of my very favorite things to do! After sorting and washing and weeding out some with stains, (very, very few. These clothes were in GREAT shape!), this is what we were left with:

Wow!! These are mostly 0-18 months!

The striped bag is full of crib sheets and blankets that we already had. The grey tub is full of a few toys, shoes, socks, bibs, burp rags, a baby monitor, etc. Just stuff. What a blessing! This baby won't need a THING in the way of clothing for a really long time. God is good!!

Now, about The Room Schizo. New readers, I am that schizo.

My name is Brenda and I am a room re-arranger. 

But this time I have a really good reason!! 

We aren't really going to have a nursery for this little one. For Christmas I asked S to paint our room (where the baby will be sleeping for a long time). So he's going to do that next week. I can't exactly help with that room too much, so I'm turning my attention to the girls' rooms. Two reasons:

1. To show them that we love them and care about how their rooms look. That we aren't JUST getting things nice for the baby. 

2. Sweetheart asked for her room to "match better" a few weeks ago. 

3. The baby will eventually share a room with Little Bit (our former homeschool room) so some changes need to be made in there to make space. 

So, yesterday I made a plan for each room. It's not going to be an expensive project by any means. The biggest expense will be new rugs for their rooms. The ones they have in there are 5 years old and pretty gross. Other than that, it will just be sewing, hanging things on the walls, and rearranging. Oh, and a dresser for Little Bit. Gotta visit the thrift stores!

Oh, and organizing Little Bit's closet to make room for baby. (And all these tubs that are stacked in the hall!) Her closet is really big so there should be plenty of room. Once I get rid of a lot of crap. 

After I shared the plan with Sweetheart, she immediately got up from her bed where we were sitting and started cleaning her room. Fifteen minutes later she was done. THAT, my friends, is a world record. So...I'm thinking she liked the plan!

I threw supper in the crock pot this morning so I can work uninterrupted in the closet today. 

If I get stuck, I'll send a distress signal or something. 

Our Pinterest Christmas and Progress

I actually did several of the things I pinned this year! I also used my Pinterest board at Little Bit's birthday party so that means my time on Pinterest has not been a waste of time! 


We had these for breakfast Christmas eve morning (via Pinterest):

And I made these gifts from ideas found on Pinterest or pinned by me from other places:

The frames just contain scrapbook paper and made nice erasable boards for my sisters. The red and white ornaments were hand-stitched and we used them as gift tags on every one's gifts.

These canvases were covered in buttons in my sister-in-laws' last initials and hung from ribbon. The inexplicable piece of bacon ornament was to fulfill the "ugly ornament" we get for my oldest sister each year. This one was kinda cute, but very weird!!

Decided to make one for my parents too. And the cans with flowers in them are cans covered in craft sticks and painted. They were already wrapped at this point. The flowers are those flower pens you can make. Those were from the girls to their aunts and grandma.

So that was my Pinterest Christmas.

Yesterday I worked on the "office" area of our house. If you recall, it's a tiny area where we stack things pay bills. Here's what it's supposed to look like.  And oh look! The whole room used to be clean!  Right now, I'm boxing up all the 2011 paperwork (and OK--2010 too. Apparently I didn't do it last year.) I will feel very relieved when I get all this done today. I've already filled 2 bags with trash from the sewing room and laundry room and office area. TWO BAGS!

I also plan to take down Christmas decorations today. We'll see how that goes.

And look! We got a water cooler!

All the cool people hang out by the water cooler around here.

 All part of our plan to be healthier. We don't really drink anything but water, S drinks coffee some, and Little Bit likes juice. Sweetheart is all water, all the time. It came with a hot water spout, which I know from my sister's house is the perfect temperature for instant oatmeal or hot chocolate. But, really, we don't eat/drink that stuff all that often. So I was really doubting if the hot water spout had any merit and then I discovered this morning it was the perfect temperature for making Little Bit's magical drink! So, right there? Totally worth it.

Tomorrow I will be starting to think about school. But for today, I'll just focus on the house. That still sounds better to me.

Did You Know?

That we own over 30 pillowcases?

Can you even imagine why a family of four would need more than 30 pillowcases?

(Especially if you take into account how often the sheets get changed around here.)

I know this because we have this huge cedar chest that used to be in my grandmother's house. We use it for a coffee table sometimes.

That's the cedar chest there. 

But it used to be at the foot of our bed and we store our sheets in it.

It fits a LOT of sheets.

And pillowcases.

I haven't even counted the sheets.

Needless to say, I will be weeding out a bit this week. 'Cause now the TV and electronic stuff is on top of it so sheets must be stored elsewhere.

Good grief. 30 pillowcases.

One Little Area at a Time

Enough talk.

Enough dreaming.

Enough planning.

Enough pinning!!!

Yesterday, I got up and DID something!

Before. Cookbooks, loose recipes, broken pig bookend, Christmas wrapping paper....

Underneath our antique china cabinet. Yikes. An explosion.

And....after!!! "Pretty" cookbooks up top. Diabetic cookbooks in the middle. Utilitarian cookbooks and magazines on the bottom. I got rid of a few cookbooks I have never used. Christmas wrapping paper removed. And loose recipes in my binder (which is standing up there.)

Some stuff removed. Everything else straightened up.

How I could have been even more radical:
I know there are only 2 recipes I use out of one really thick cookbook. Why not scan them in to the computer or make copies of them and stick 'em in a binder? I mainly go to the internet for recipes, but I'm not ready to get rid of all cookbooks just yet.

Progress!

And you know why I started in the dining room right? It's little. That's my kind of room.