Day 2 of 91-Day De-cluttering: Pantry

Confession: I like the little shreds of shredded wheat at the bottom of the bag.

The pantry. Wow. I started at 9:40 with a goal to be done by noon. At 12:30 I quit looking at the clock as well as setting goals. To be fair, I had a fuzzy stuck in my contact that I had to get out. If I hadn't had that setback I'm sure I would have finished by noon.

I always wear socks and shoes (laced up and tied) when I clean; wearing shoes not only adds an extra bounce to my step, but also protects my feet from the stuff I drop. I have three pair of Nike running socks, each with different colors of embroidered Nike swooshes and designated foot symbols "R" and "L." I couldn't find a matching pair, so I picked out one pink and one blue--which is fine, but both were embroidered with a capital R which means Thou Shalt Wear Me On Your Right Foot. Feeling like my life might be in danger, I sifted through my sock drawer one more time to no avail. This is a scary situation because the packaging doesn't come with any warning of what might happen if you disobey your sock. Luckily, once my shoes were on, other than a little bit of mental discomfort I couldn't tell the difference.

I decided I wanted to completely empty my pantry. I always say I wish I could empty my whole house and only put back in it what we really need, so my pantry was the mini version of my wish. I didn't trash anything immediately because I wanted pictures of my piles to make my before and after pictures better.

Before

Before

Before--up high

Before--down low

2 shelves into the process...

Blue basket for "donate/sell"
White basket for "relocate"

My kitchen after the pantry is empty

Some of the stuff I trashed...

I'm pretty sure I brought these with me from Rexburg, Idaho, NINE YEARS AGO.

Just in case I ran out of my other 50 packets of hot chocolate mix I had. (I threw them all away!)

To quote Scott: you never know when you're gonna need sprinkles!

What if my neighbor calls and needs 1/2 tsp. of red crystals???

Everyone knows I love hot dogs. It's only fitting that I have this petrified relic.

11 bags of cereal.
The ones on the left are for those who like to strain their cereal through a colander in order to get one spoon full.

Next, I put everything into the pantry that I was keeping so I could trash, donate, or relocate the rest.

Keep

Trash

Organized trash

donate/sell

relocate


And this was my final product
 

I took the time to post all the items I want to sell on a Facebook garage sale page, and I relocated all the things that didn't belong in the pantry or on the table. It was quite the process, but it's all done! Ty came home and said: "Woah, MOM! The floor is empty so we can set mouse traps!" Calli said: "Wow. That's amazing. You know it's not gonna last?" Ha! I think it's time to add "organize pantry" to their weekly chores. And for the record, it was really nice to clean out the pantry without the purpose of cleaning up after mice! 

Insecurities and stuff

Confession: I have insecurities.

More than a year ago, someone made a comment about my blog that made me uncomfortable. So I stopped writing. I know they didn't intend to make me uncomfortable, but I let it stop me. Then, I met with some of my dearest friends a few months ago, and they helped me realize that I was letting the fear of negative response get in the way of one of the things I love most!

Over the course of the last year, I changed jobs, had a baby, and had to choose whether or not I wanted to continue working a job I really loved. The problem was my boss needed someone who could work more hours that I was willing to give with my new babe and my increasingly busy family schedule. Now, here I am, once again a stay-at-home mom and loving it. I'll write more later about my own progress, but in summary, I'm totally mature now! Ha!

Confession: I have stuff.

One of the things I'm excited and overwhelmed about is organizing my house. I've realized that when my house is cluttered, my mind feels cluttered. And STUFF! We have so much STUFF! I was browsing Pinterest for organization ideas and found this:

http://bit.ly/1emRX9k

I'm going to de-clutter my home in 91 days! I'm 2 weeks late according to her schedule, but I started today! If I post my progress, I'll be held accountable. I'll also be posting a lot of embarrassingly honest photos of my home--the parts I hide behind closed doors. I plan to be clutter free before Christmas. I'm also planning to sell some of my stuff as I go so I have money to buy more stuff for Christmas! :) Here goes...

Week 1, Day 1: Clean out fridge/freezer!

I decided to clean off the outside of my fridge, too. I went the extra mile today, but it's only day 1! I have two baskets: one for items to relocate, and one to sift through and decide whether I need it or can trash it. Can you see the cauldron on top? that's full of Halloween candy from last year! I haven't tackled the nook next to the fridge yet. That's another day. 

I also scrubbed a door shelf of sticky soy sauce that spilled a long time ago and coated the bottoms of every container on the shelf. I've just ignored it until today. Boooooo. I also found a lot of ice cream toppings and I couldn't bring myself to throw them away! I guess we're having ice cream every night this week.

I owe a special shout out to my sweet neighbor girl who came over and helped me with Meg while I did this! I couldn't have done it without her. She even stayed and helped me after Meg went down for a nap. So sweet! Thank you!

Gone are the Days of Freudian Slip

Confession: "Damn You Auto Correct" happens in my head

(Thank you Michael Waters for coining that phrase for me!)

For those of you Android Swypers, does your swyper finger (formerly known as your pointer finger) lose direction and totally get out of control? You start to swype a word, then realize your key-location memory hightails when you try to navigate a keyboard with one finger instead of from Home Row Position? But you don't stop; you redirect and swype at least two or three letters more than you actually need to spell the intended word, and you end up with some funky word you've never heard of, or one that offers an entirely new connotation with its cutting-edge syntactic relationship.

I'm sure you had this happen pre-smartphone era, way back when we used T9 predictive text; remember how you'd key in the buttons containing the letters you needed and hoped the correct combination would magically appear? Pretty smart for a dumb phone that ended up in the sandbox. Next came the iPhone and Auto Correct. I don't think anyone predicted the hazards of Auto Correct. Auto Correct doesn't even wait for you to come close to finishing your word. It's like that friend who always finishes your sentences and is never correct and you just stop with your mouth still gaping open and you tilt you head and stare blankly at her and say, "Um, no." On the other hand, some of it's corrections are more revealing than incorrect--that's the reason you sometimes pee your pants from laughing so hard: because Auto Correct has just uncovered your deepest darkest secret! But you definitely don't laugh if you hit "send" before you notice the defaming information you just volunteered to the universe, hence the frenzied attempt to explain what you meant to say, only to realize that Auto Correct could care less about amending your embarrassment, resulting in a string of stupidity that lands you on the front page of "Damn You Auto Correct." Am I wrong to generalize that everyone who has ever texted has been on one end--if not both--of the Oh Crap! What Did I Just Say?? Composition?

Here's a small, not so incriminating example. I was texting with a friend trying to arrange a birthday surprise.

Me: Is there a time I could just show up and take her?

Friend: Do you want me to call her and see what she's doing?

Me: Sure, that would be great. I'll stand by trashy to go.

Friend: I'm not familiar with trashy to go.

Me: Oh gosh. That was supposed to say ready
Me: Ready to go.

I don't know about you, but I think this has happened so often that I no longer trust anything I swype or type. I have to reread every text to make sure I'm not sending an open door for future ridicule. Not only that, it seems to be happening inside my head. I have to double think before I speak or the giant finger swyping across all the (millions of) axons in my brain totally gets out of control and before I know it, it hits "send" and I say something completely amiss. One day at work I received a phone call from Jenny From Britain inquiring about an order she had placed in November. A coworker and I were looking everywhere and couldn't find the order; we guessed it had somehow been lost in the transition of our web site. We had her on speaker and I asked her to hold while I went to ask our shipper if he had any recollection of the order. (He remembers everything--Hollywood could make a movie about his Beautiful Mind.) He didn't remember the order. I got back to the phone and said: "Thank you so much for holding. I just spoke to my stripper" (at which point I gasped and burst into laughter so loud I couldn't even hear her reaction), "I MEAN MY SHIPPER!" I couldn't stop laughing for the rest of the conversation. I had tears.

We had a good laugh around the office. We feel lucky to work in a place of so much opportunity. :)

My coworker Mike said: "'Damn You Auto Correct' happens inside your head! You don't even need a phone!" So beware: after sending an undisclosed amount of text messages, your brain will begin to Auto Correct the words lingering on the tip of your tongue and you won't have time to fix them before they come spilling out and you've dubbed your coworker a stripper.

Look like you feel? Or feel like you look?

Confession: I feel better when I feel pretty

Remember in high school when we were getting ready to take AP tests (or regular tests...) and we'd groan and complain when our teachers told us to dress up for the tests? I definitely believe the way we prepare ourselves physically translates to how well we perform mentally. Anyhow, I love this conversation I had with my daughter Calli this morning.

Preface: Calli was her class alternate for today's school spelling bee. We didn't study AT ALL. Yesterday she came home and told me that one of the boy contestants said he might not be able to make it. Of course we were freaking out, but we still didn't have time to study. We decided we would study this morning before school. But I accidentally stayed in bed until 8:05.

This conversation takes place at 8:15 this morning:

Calli: How do I look?

Me: You look super cute!

Calli: Thanks! I have to look cute if I'm going to be in the spelling bee, especially if I get out on the first word!

Years later I finally understand that all those times our teachers told us to dress up for our tests, they knew that once the test was over, all we would say in complete exhaustion was: "I'm so glad that's over. I don't even care if I failed. At least I looked good!"

ORAL HERPES

Confession: I have Oral Herpes and I'm not afraid to say it

It may sound disgusting and like I should be ostracized like a leper, but try saying it out loud. But don't just say it--say it slowly and with seduction in your voice. There. Now I bet you wish you had it too. If you already have it, congratulations.

A week ago Saturday, I felt the small tingly on my lip--the indicator that Oral Herpes would be stopping by for a visit. I spent almost an hour googling home remedies for Oral Herpes. Every single spot I read and watched concluded that Abreva was my best option. One of the videos even reassured me that I'm not alone in my leperous disease. Thank goodness because I felt so alone. I just didn't feel like going to Walmart at 11 p.m. to spend $18 on a tube the size of my ear canal. Thankfully, my hubby encouraged me to go, so I owe my sweet victory to him.

One of the videos I watched suggested applying witch hazel before the Abreva, so I grabbed some of that as well. When I was home applying, I pulled out the rubbing alcohol and figured I would use that too because its container was identical to the witch hazel and a long time ago I learned that fish in identical tanks can live safely together and that was sound logic to me in my situation. Maybe it would dry it up a bit quicker. Anyhow, I don't know if it really helped, but it stung like a Witch-hazel-imposter! That's the last time I used that. Perhaps I should have considered that the dalmation fish bullied and killed the mollies. I continued applying witch hazel before the Abreva every day, and my Oral Herpes stayed confined to the guest bedroom. No one ever even saw it! It was gone by Thursday.

Then, I ran into one of my friends at volleyball. When she walked in, she had a huge cold sore on her lip. I couldn't brag about my successful bout with the disease, that would have just been rude. So I told her I'd bought some Abreva and started applying it as soon as I saw the sign. (This is where I break into Ace of Base song and dance.) She opened up her hand and looked dismally down at her own miniscule $18 tube. I should have told her the girl on youtube promised she's not alone.

Moral of this short story: Use witch hazel and possibly rubbing alcohol on your face.

The End.

The Art of Being Exceptional

Confession: I hate to shower and will only shower twice a week if I can get away with it

My husband has told me on occasion that I am a disgusting human being. That was mostly back when I used to crawl into bed without showering after playing late-night basketball. To my defense, I'd stayed and chatted with the ladies for a couple hours, I'd totally cooled off and I wasn't sweaty anymore! I didn't want to go to bed with wet hair because I'd be cold all night, and I didn't want to wake everyone with the blow dryer. I did find a solution, however. He was always zonked out when I got home, so one time I just went into the bathroom and turned on the shower while I changed into pajamas and brushed my teeth. I left the shower running long enough for him to slightly wake up to the sound of the water so he wouldn't question me when I got into bed. He used to ask me every day if I'd showered, and if I had, his reaction was comparable to the excitement for a 3 year old's successful use of the toilet.

Only we have the power to make ourselves Exceptional, and I've figured out how to do it. The greatest thing about my theory is that it's applicable in the workplace or at home.

The Art of Becoming Exceptional has really fallen into place since I've started working. I've noticed that occasionally my coworkers will compliment me; not just the female coworkers--we females always have compliments for hair, clothes, shoes, makeup, etc.--but some of the male coworkers specifically. They'd say something like, "You look nice today" and I would find myself responding with overwhelming disclosure: "Thanks, I showered." And then they'd laugh and not notice I was serious.

The thing is, I hate showering. Yes, I feel good afterword, but I can think of a gazillion other things I would rather be doing with my time. Think about it. Once you commit to the shower, you also by default commit to picking out an outfit (from the pile of clean but not yet folded laundry on the floor in front of the dryer downstairs), getting dressed (and realizing you need to make one more trip to the clothes pile), brushing your hair (and usually getting tricked into drying and styling it), applying a little makeup (because there's no point in doing your hair if you're not going to complete the facade), and applying lotions, perfumes, deodorant, or whatever floats your boat. And you might as well brush your teeth because there's no time for breakfast now that you've wasted the entire morning showering.

I especially hate showering in the winter time. It already takes me 19 minutes, but during the winter there's always the inevitable onslaught of goose bumps which requires an additional 2-3 minutes of scorching water in order to temper the tiny invaders. The key is to tap the heat up little by little throughout the routine, and save the final turn of the faucet till you're ready to get out. You have to make sure the final burst of hot water is enough to turn your skin red and make you begin to sweat a little so the cold air actually feels a little nice when you step out. It's really the only way to do it.

Anyhow, back to my theory. Simply put, it is this: what makes a good song great? A really bad song. What makes a child well-behaved? Somebody else's hellion. What makes a "C" student intelligent? Their "D" student friend. What makes a good smell good? A vomit-inducing stink. What makes a good book good? This poorly written blog. Make sense? Opposition in all things. What makes me "look nice today"? Deliberate changes in personal hygiene and appearance. These are some of my go-to solutions which can easily be mixed and matched on a daily basis: sweats; glasses; no makeup or yesterday's smeared eye makeup; pony tail or hat; hair parted to expose the most gray; ankle socks with dress shoes. We can't depend on other people to recognize our greatness on their own. We must provide a comparison; we must be our own opposition.

When I first started working at Stroops nearly a year ago, I got nervous every time the phone rang because I knew they would ask me something I had no idea about. I quickly figured out that all I had to say was "I'm new, and I don't know anything. Let me go see what I can find out!" Masterfully, I demolished every expectation and, thereby, set myself up for success when I returned with the slightest bit of information, even if it had nothing to do with their inquiry.

Every Tuesday we run an accounts summary report for the company (excluding me) meeting. I used to hurry to run all the credit cards and apply payments before the Big Dogs reviewed the report so they could see there were no accounts to worry about. However, I figured out that I could make the report look even better by making them worry initially. Now I get to work, print the report, send it into Company-Excluding-Me Meeting, then I apply all the payments. I slip into the conference room--embarrassed to interrupt--with a new report that calms all their worries. Bazinga.

I'm sorry for my family because I really dislike cooking. I tell them I'm preparing every one of us to be contestants on Survivor. I try to like it but I just can't. Also a gazillion other things I'd rather be doing than spending time preparing food to dump down the disposal. My son said something that really proved to me that he has no expectations. We had called the kids to dinner and Ty asked, "What day is it?" Tuesday. "But we don't eat dinner on Tuesdays!" The great thing is, I've again set myself up to be Exceptional: My husband walked in from work one day and I was making dinner. His eyes popped out of his head, he dropped his bags, ran to me, dipped me over his knee and kissed me passionately. Would this happen if I cooked every night? Absolutely not!

Even though I hate cooking, I really do believe in family meal time. I love sitting with my family around the kitchen table and talking about our day and laughing at our lack of table manners--or manners in general (we always tell the kids to make sure they never do that at anyone else's house). I used to feel really bad every time I heard about the importance of family meal time, but then I realized that no one defined what the meal had to be. We often sit around the table and eat cold cereal, hot dogs, pancakes, Wendy's or Little Caesar's "Butt Pizza"; but no matter whether I've prepared a gourmet meal or not, we're still together as a family around the table, and that's what's most Exceptional in today's world.

A Timeline

Confession: I love to work because I love the validation

I used to feel guilty for loving to work. I didn't expect the internal struggle I'd have when I had a baby. I worked up until the day I went into labor, and the Personnel Office (My First Real Job) left my position open just in case I wanted to come back. I didn't think it would be a tough decision to stay home. I had always known that once you were a mother you stayed home and that working mothers definitely only worked because they had to. I felt sad about not going back to work, and then I felt like there was something wrong with me for not jumping for joy at the opportunity to stay home with my little girl. Don't get me wrong, I was excited to have a baby and loved being with her. I just found myself missing work.

I still had school to finish, Calli was 18 months old when I graduated with my BS. We were surrounded by other couples doing the same thing, so we traded kids and finished school. Looking back, I wonder how we did it. Scott was finishing his degree in Elementary Education, so he was teaching all day and working as a custodian from 10:00 p.m. to 4:00 a.m. every day. He only slept from 4:00-6:00 a.m. then tried to nap after school if he didn't have homework and lesson plans to write before dinner.

I remember nearly having a nervous breakdown minutes before my group was supposed to present in one of my public relations classes. I was out in the hall heaving and hyperventilate trying to pull myself together. I had stayed up almost all night merging and rewriting portions of our project. Calli was sick so I had to bring her with me, and I lost it. It freaked me out because that had never happened to me before. I wasn't the nervous breakdown type. Group projects. Blah. I'm sure they are nice people.

I didn't work after I graduated. Scott got a job in Layton, so we bought a home in Syracuse and lived off of $40 per week. That's when I became The Budget Nazi. All of the other teachers at Scott's school wondered how we did it? It was easy. We used cash only and didn't eat very much. (When I say "much" I don't mean "often," we ate every meal, but very meager portions. Kind of like Survivor. We could dominate that game.) We never bought produce because we couldn't afford it. It would have been wise to eat only produce, but I hated--and still hate--cutting up fruits and vegetables so it probably would have all gone to waste anyway. I used to feel my heart beat rise rapidly at the grocery store as I would add up the cost of groceries I was putting in my cart.

Whenever I am stressed about money, I hide it from Scott. If he knows I'm worried he immediately jumps to the extreme and says he'll quit teaching and find another job. (He denies being an extremist, but whatever.) I hate it when he says that because it means he thinks he's not providing enough for our family. The truth is, I feel like I have failed him by not bugeting well enough. So, I don't tell him. I just smile and say "that's fine" when he approaches me with a purchase he wants to make. Then I go spend hours on Quicken juggling numbers around until I can make it work. I am happy that he is doing what he loves. He wanted to be a teacher from the time he was in 5th grade. I never want him to think I'm not supportive. Sticking to the budget is my way of showing support; I never want him to think I feel we don't have enough. And for the most part, we make it work!

Four months after we moved into our house, my parents arranged with Scott to have one of their pianos moved up to our house as a birthday gift to me. I'll never forget walking into the house and seeing the piano there in the living room! I think I immediately lost all ability to stand on my own because I was instantly on my knees and sobbing. I couldn't believe I had a piano! I was pregnant with Ty at the time, so I started on my plans to teach piano. I passed out more than 500 flyers. I was dreaming big, but the reality was I only got one student from those flyers. The other two were from Scott's school who heard by word of mouth. I was disappointed and realized it was going to take more time to build my studio. (I like to call it a studio even though it's my living room. Maybe someday I'll have a real studio!)

Scott applied for his Master's Degree two years in a row but wasn't accepted; he needed more years of teaching experience.

After we realized that money wasn't going to start pouring in, we did what every sane couple would do, we certified to ref soccer. It was actually pretty good money, but really hard on my emotions. Scott could care less if people yelled at him, but I was like a mama bear ready to attack anyone who complained about his calls. I also felt bad that we had to leave our kids with neighbors or family members when we'd go. We reffed for a couple of years until Scott got head-butted by an assistant coach. To make a long story short, I didn't really like reffing after that. Then I tore my ACL so I had a legitimate reason to quit! Yea ACL!

More than six years have passed since I started teaching and I've built my studio up to 23 and back down to 16 students. I wish I could take on that many students again, but it's time when my family is home. As much as I love teaching, it's really hard when my kids need me and I can't be there for them, and it's really hard for them to understand because they're staring right at me. That's the hardest part of the job. I'm pretty sure my family gets sick of hearing the piano constantly on Mondays and Tuesdays. I'm also pretty sure that that's the underlying reason behind Scott's recent offer to buy me a digital piano!


I started working at Stroops almost a year ago. Stroops is a manufacturer of athletic training equipment and have some really cool patented products! We ship stuff all over the world and to really cool places like The Biggest Loser ranch and professional sports teams. The most recent line is Stroops MMA. (Once they asked if I would fight if they sponsored me. I haven't watched Cinderella Man because I can't even watch Hollywood fights without my stomach churning. There's no way!) Anyway, I really enjoy it there; the people I work with are great, the job is more flexible than I could have hoped for, and I'm getting opportunities to help the company improve. I've worked primarily in Accounts Receivable and built really great relationships with a lot of our customers who now send us money like they're under a spell! I've also had the chance to proofread and write product descriptions for the company's newly marketed athletic products. It's rewarding to be a part of innovation and growth. And we have birthday cake once a month. What's not to love?