My system

I get teased. It's a problem but also an amusement. I am an organizer. I love to be organized. My brain requires I be organized. Friends recently commented that they wanted to know where 'my stuff' was. Where is 'my stash' and 'my piles'. I have systems, not stashes! I answered questions which got them going on teasing me more about how their brain hurt from all the info. It made me realize that I should probably show you instead of tell you because it is NOT that complicated. I think it is really simple. Cut and Dry. Black and White. If you have systems, there's only a few places where you need to put things.

So, Follow me through a day!

Here's my plan. I am going to be out of town all weekend. I leave Friday morning. So I will come home to several days of mail, paperwork from school, magazines, sales flyers, etc. I will show you my "process". I will photograph and list what I had to work through on Monday and publish this sometime on Tuesday! And you will see that it is not only SIMPLE but also PRETTY and NEAT! I promise, no headaches . . .

Stacked Laundry Area

One functional decision we made when building our home was to put a washer and dryer in our master bedroom, in addition to a set in the upstairs laundry room. Anyone with a master on the 1st floor and kids rooms on the 2nd floor knows the frustration of having laundry on only one of those floors. We had this in our last home and I loathed carrying the laundry up and down the stairs. This was an easy decision for us!

When you walk into the closet, those stacked machines are the first thing you see. We custom build a hamper in a lower cabinet and then had the surround built around the machines to maximize storage. People have asked if you can stack this type of machine. They are so large that you can't imagine how tall they will be and picture it huge! You can see that they are a bit shorter than a standard closet cabinet which is to their left and is not as bad as you would perhaps have pictured. My 9 year old can reach the top controls just fine, though my 7 year old can't. There are other chores he can do so that's okay! It works great for us and I think it's easier on your back too! If you have a tight space and want to maximize your storage, this is a great solution.

I didn't love that you see the side of the machines when you walk in. Building our surround storage deep enough to cover the sides would have taken up too much space and I felt it would have been more of a "wall" than I wanted so we opted to leave it open and set the storage back. This storage, though large, would have also been too deep to function well, sometimes "less is more". I found this fun decal through Uppercase Living and I think adding this turned something boring into something fun with a bit of whimsy! I smile when I walk into my high functioning closet and what else could a girl want really?

Pulling Together A New Office

I was asked to help pull together a small medical office. This was for a Chiropractor that will see patients in a Pediatrician's office once a week as both doctors are working toward integrating standard medicine with fields that focus first on wellness, which as a parent I love the idea of. I feel odd mentioning names but if you are in Central Florida and are interested in this type of partnership between doctors, email me as I'd love to recommend them to you!

He has a waiting room and a room next to it for his adjusting area that was not private nor defined from the other. He brought his green table into an office with baby blue walls and red chairs and I must say, I was a little perplexed how I would make this space feel cohesive when I first walked in!

The Challenge:

Make a curtain that could provide privacy for the adjusting room. Warm up the space. Provide something for kids and siblings to do while waiting. If possible, try to make the curtain tie into the green table and blue walls and red chairs. (Um, okay!)

Before: waiting room area

After: waiting room area

Before: adjusting room.

(This also clearly shows the colors that I was working with)

After: adjusting room

Once I saw the small window, I had to complete a valance for that as well!


Here is a closer look at the fabric I found! You can't see the red well in the pictures but it does stand on its own in the space. It softens the room up and ties the colors together!

Fabric really is amazing isn't it?

Flat Screens, Game Systems and Cords, Oh My!

Cords are an inevitable problem whenever you have a flat screen and/or game systems. There are very expensive solutions to this and anyone can figure that out, however, I'd like to show you a trick to 'fix' this without hiring a framer, electrician, drywall guy and painter!

Here is an example of a flat screen mounted on the wall with the cords hidden in a tunnel in the wall. Once the tv is installed, it is very hard to add a cord so once the Wii was purchased, there's still a visible cord! As with any system, lots of games and remotes were added to the pile. And LOOK at the cords on the floor! There's not a lot of room to tuck in cords at the tv so all the excess ends up on the floor.

Here are some simple solutions! The cord was run to the right of the tv (taped underneath!) and two plants were put there to make it disappear. Two coordinating baskets were added to the area--the smaller one holds games and the everyday remotes and the large one on the floor holds the larger accessories. A simple frame or canvas print works perfectly to disguise the mound of cords--this one was around $15 at Old Time Pottery. The pot of flowers just adds an extra element to balance the basket. It became a beautiful area with just a few accessories!

There is a phrase in the design business--"Decorate Around It". This is a perfect example of when this rule can be used successfully!

If you are mounting a flat screen in your existing home, it is a tricky project to get it right but you can do it! First, determine where it needs to be mounted based on your framing and the height you want. Before you get the tv up, determine where the available space for cords will fall on the wall and then find an area between the framing to poke a hole through. Cover it with an outlet plate that has a large hole in it. Make sure that space does not have electrical on the floor. Do not saw but 'poke' so that you don't cute any wires if they are. Determine the best spot behind your console/table and poke through again. First get the cords up to the tv by dropping a long wire and then pull it all up--be patient here! Attach it all from there and enjoy your gorgeous new tv!

FYI, If you are building a home, you should have your framer make a solid area in the spot where you plan to hang your tv. You should have an idea of the size you plan to put on the wall as well as the height. The 'rule' is eye level when you are sitting but I think if you live like my family does that it should be closer to eye level when standing. Anywhere within that range works, in my opinion and if you are in a large area where you walk around often, like watching TV from your kitchen island in the attached family room, go higher! It has never bothered me to look up from my couch but it would certainly bother me if I couldn't see the TV from the kitchen because it was being blocked by heads on the couch! Then have them make a 'tunnel' from the very bottom of where the tv will be (look at the back for the cord space) to an area within the first 2 feet on the floor where you can run all the cords up to the tv. Plan ahead--if you think you are going to add something, get the cord in the tunnel!