Organizing the closet

Here is a quick closet update. When I unpacked I mainly threw things that had been in our tiny hall closet at the old house into this closet. No real ryhme or reason. The top shelf has decor items without a home currently but that I would like to keep. We sold nearly all of our furniture prior move so end table lamps are now homeless. The bottom has our bed linens which will be going on the bed after the frame is assembled. Nothing like a little motivation right?



I plowed through the DVDs and made a nice kids movie resale pile. All without scratches and cases intact. I went through a kick 1.5yrs ago buying Disney lots off eBay and these are mainly the duplicates or rejects from the lots. Another pile is empty DVD cases. I found another 5 after the picture was taken. The last pile is a nice stack of Christmas CDs. I removed them and will add them to the attic Christmas box. Score was quite a few CDs are unopened so I plan on incorporating them with gifts this year.



A quick orangize and purge and we are left with more empty space. I don't have any plans of running off to fill the voids just enjoying the back wall ;)

Going for more joy

I always thought I had just a handful of shoes and a couple purses. Moving and finding homes for our belonging has really put things in perspective for me. While there are somethings we have bought, we have also been very fortunate to be gifted several relatives seconds aka things that were headed to the thrift store otherwise.

Since moving it has been an experience unpacking all the boxes. Our belonging had been in storage for nearly a year. That journey made me see how little we really needed. The kids even seemed to enjoying playing with their toys with less options available.

Most things we bought were second hand be it a thrift store or a garage sale. It has always been rare for us to buy brand new with power tools being the exception. We had one mishap with a craigslist deal and I swore never to buy power tools used again. We have also been very fortunate to be gifted several relatives seconds aka things that were headed to the thrift store otherwise. Things like gorgeous pottery barn curtains for our bare windows, or marine artwork. I actually love the story of the marine art. Justin's grandfather is a former marine and Justin had found some gorgeous marine art that he framed for him. Years later his grandfather remarried and in the process of blending homes no longer had space for it so he mailed it out to us when Justin was in Afghanistan. Our other house had no room for it but our newest house does in his office. How fun is that story? :-)

Getting back on target those facts combined with my reselling on the side had accumulated to alot of crap, very nice crap. At our old house we would borderline freak out if people were coming over shoving stuff in drawers, the abundance of kids stuff in their rooms, it was ridiculous. I vowed while going through boxes to not get like that again and to buy napkins (HA)!

My mission is to go through each day and focus on two categories and pare down the quantity if possible. Today I focused on purses and shoes. Even though this was done during nap time so no one, not even the kids saw me, I felt so embarrassed. I always just thought I had maybe 5 at most pairs of shoes, maybe 6-7 purses which is still over kill but my numbers were way off.

I HAD 24 PURSES and 19 PAIRS OF FOOTWEAR!






Most of which I never wore or used. I felt like I should be on hoarders. Seriously how had I not noticed all that going on? Alot of my purses had been gifted to me at one point or another. My fake LV and fake Gucci I had kept because of the embarrassing amount I had spent on them in high school. I have not even used them since high school. I had to give myself a strong dose of tough love because since many had been gifted I felt guilty getting rid of them. Does anyone else ever feel bad about letting go of gifts that are not your style?

My shoes were easier to sort through since I had bought them myself. No guilt to be had. I took out ones I didn't like immediately then inspected the bottoms of the rest weeding out three more. My beloved J. Jill boots and L.L. bean flats will be going in my fall tub. My work out sneakers, Nine West red flats and no name animal flats will be going in my shoe cubby by the door. The rest of the keepers and purses are going in a tub in my closet. My plan is as I use the item it will be placed on my closet shelf then in one year what is leftover will be craigslisted or donated.

My purge went well, I now have 11 purses



12 pairs of shoes



Still excessive in my opinion and I plan to let the numbers get smaller. I had a hard time letting somethings go due to sentiment so I think the one year tub idea will be brilliant for me.

P.s. Mom, if you happen to read this I do still have my seat belt bag and it was included in my keep numbers. A nameless toddler was using it as her doll carrier at the time. :-)

Mississippi Ranger

This fluffy guy is our new dog. We call him Ranger :-)

He likes bones, ear rubs and sleeping all day if we let him. Dislikes long walks without nap breaks ;)



Our kids love this sweet guy. He lets them cuddle on him when they get to watch a movie, keeps eyes on both of them always.



My husband rescued him from a shelter down in Mississippi and surprised the kids with Ranger on the 21st. Best $10 ever spent :-)

Curb Appeal

Our first house had gorgeous curb appeal. Rose bush by the big living room window, green bushes that stayed green year round sprouting daffodils four times a year. This giant tree that would have hot pink flowers 9 months out of the year. It was gorgeous. So you can say this time we fell in love with the house not the yard. Lol

Our weed haven is all ours though and we can't wait to transform it.





First things first was to rake up the yard, the garden beds and prune the over grown flowers in the back.



What you see above is 5 leaf bags and 1 trash bag full of garden bed debris. Yuck. I went over this a few days later yielding 2 more big leaf bags of gunk.






Justin went to Lowe's and bought Irish Cypress. They according to him do not get large but I figured if they do we can always replant them in the back. I had already bought two hydrangea bushes and a bag of wild flowers that is supposed to cover 1000 sq ft according to the bag. We planted those along the front by the door and I gave the side covered in ugly bushes a good dosing of wild flower seed.

Justin laid down all the top soil and surprised me with walkway lights. Those had been on my shopping list so one less thing for me to decide and brownie points to the hubby. :-)



We still need to get a welcome mat, a wreath on the door and hang my welcome sign my Mom passed down to me.

New House, New State. FINALLY!!!!

It has been months since my last post for many reasons. Mainly because my laptop had a certain incident with a sweet 3yr old and we have been moving. We spent over two months in a hotel but I am happy to say our 5yr anniversary is just around the corner. We made it all threw together and closer as a family. Now on to the fun stuff. All our house hunting and arguing with the banks has paid off. Our other house is refinanced for nearly $400 less a month and our our new house is gorgeous.

It's a little intimidating. Neither my husband or I ever thought we would have such a large home. It is 5bd, 3ba. I know many people out there have larger homes but to us this is big. When we first got married we lived in a 230 sqft studio on the back of a split level house and months later welcomed our first baby into our tiny home. Life is wild and we feel so thankful to God for what he is doing in our life.

Stay tune for photo tour. We have lots of upgrades, projects and things in the work so I hope you stick around.

Becoming a Follower of Jesus and all our Blessings

An Amazing Day
Life has been blessing us so much lately. I recently found my path was with Christ. I’ve spent most of my life searching for what I needed. I thought I had found that in Judaism until I met my husband. He opened me up to a whole new way of thinking and always accepted me for how I am. Over the past 4 ½ yrs the pressing light has come more clear to me that Jesus had my heart and I needed to turn my life over to him and his good graces.
On April 6th 2011 I made my confession to my husband Justin to become a follower of Jesus. Now I must admit I’m a head strong person and had been so adamant that I would probably never become a Christian that I was nervous has heck to tell him. Took me two months. Ha
Justin being the patient and loving husband that he is took this in great pride and was so happy about my confession. I really don’t know what I was worried about haha just me being my worry wart self. I guess I figured he would laugh and think I was just joking. He took me seriously though and helped lead me my way.
That evening we were traveling and stopped in a hotel. He said he need to go get something and when he came back he had a gift for me. It was a beautiful rhinestone cross. Justin helped me put it on and I haven’t taken it off at all yet. I love this necklace so much! I love everything it represents, how beautiful it is and it’s made all that much more special that my husband gifted me something so perfect and beautiful.
This coming Sunday, I’m to be publicly baptized at the Enon Baptist Church. We’re not sure if we’re going to stay with the Baptist denomination as we move. But we LOVE this church. They are so welcoming (TO ALL), the sermons are amazing and the Sunday school rocks! We will be moving in a few weeks and our main goal is to find a church just like this one wherever we move. No church is perfect but this one is the right for us being able to say that about a church is a blessing in itself.
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The kids are doing so well. Charlie is smart ass a whip, we think she’ll be doing laps around us soon. Jake is loving his marble track and configuring all the different ways to make the marbles go through. Justin and I recently celebrated 4 wonderful years of marriage. We may have our ups and downs but through it all we are always at each others side. I could never have asked for a man as understanding and perfect in everyway for me. God really knew what he was doing when he made me into a match just for Justin. MacGyver has been shedding like a wild man enjoying the warm sunny days that North Carolina has blessed us with. That’s all for now. I’m going to go grab a tall glass of sweet tea and enjoy playing in the yard with the kiddos

One stop Garage Sale

Good garage sales get my blood pumping. There is nothing more I love than going out at 1030 for garage sale hunts. You that point where people are wondering about hauling all the left overs and that dread starts to sink in? That point is when I swoop in and snag all my amazing deals. I know I may miss some great finds but I'm always happy with what I do find so it's well worth it.


This sale was fun, it was my last one before my sister in law went back home. She found quite a few good finds herself. The guy kept saying a $1 a $1 a $1 so I just started shoving everything I could find into a big box of boy clothes I decided to buy that was $10, then work out a price after.

People truly get excited when things like this happen cause they know a bunch of their "junk" is leaving and they won't have to haul it in. Perfect time to negioate.

Now this $10 box was HUGE filled up more than half way with boy clothes. I popped in spare fabric. I'm trying to teach myself how to sew so I just need stuff to mess up without losing tons of cash. An Anne Taylor polo, a Gap cardigan, Banana Republic top, Nine West shoes in new condition (YAY), Nine West White Bag, Leap Frog Toy abc toy, elephanti shoes for Charlie and a crystal dish! Then my sister in law stuffed in a huge pile of books, a wreath, a couple clothes and a basket full of golf balls.

They started going through all of it doing the $1, $2 game and before they got far I was like how about just $20 for it all? They quickly agreed. I think the heat just helped and they wanted it gone. We got it loaded up and were off. My sister in law gave me $5 for her items so everything you see is my deals for $15 :) woohoo

Check out my crystal dish swoooooooon ;)

Not a bad sale at all