Tubs Galore!

I so wish I had taken a before shot. But those of you who know me and who have been here will understand. This is my kitchen table. I just can't believe it. I had stuff piled on top, unorganized stuff beneath. Some bins, labeled but not the right things inside. Not organized in a way that made sense to the kids. So, I hired someone to help me fix it up. Before there was not a single inch of space on these two tables, now it is a vast open space, a clean slate for the kids to work on.

That's the rabbits' dinner on the floor, by the way. They have been really excited to have the company of the kids as they create shrinky dinks, color, sketch and generally use the table for it's intended purpose. The project took two of us four hours to complete. That's what bad shape it was in.

And then there is this masterpiece of organization! Our learning bookshelf. All our homeschooling materials, or at least those that are school-y are here. Each child has a shelf, library books go here, composition books, writing projects, manipulatives. You name it. My girl's is the fullest shelf, we went to the library last night to stock it. We plan to put all the magazine files on top, once we find them. And I'm sure we haven't gathered up all the resources we have strewn throughout the house for our homeschooling adventure. The top used to be home to whatever was on the dining room table when dinner was served - games, puzzles, etc. that were soon forgotten because of their high placement.

And look at all those extra plastic tubs, waiting to be filled and put in other places in the house! I'm on a roll here, with help. I can't believe this is my house, can't believe we can find things we have been looking for and that we haven't trashed the system in the past five days.

I think the clutter in the house has been a real stress on me, on my family. The kids have responded magically to these two very small changes. They've been more relaxed, more creative, more helpful and a wee bit nicer to each other. It brings me such peace to walk into the kitchen now and not be greeted by a pile of stuff with no proper home. I feel so much calmer with these two projects done, it's motivating me to do others, a little bit at a time.