my version of organization 101...

After being inspired by the latest issue of Real Simple, I decided to de-clutter my house. We started this process in August and had an unsuccessful yard sale in early September. We sold some stuff but ended up making our basement seem even more cluttered because we took everything out and now had it stacked in one room. After a few attempts of trying to squeeze things in the coat closet and throwing things away that I'll probably regret doing, I still find myself with a cluttered house.

So I made a goal to start with one space at a time so that this time I'll remember where I put that lint remover that I've kept and never used because I couldn't find D batteries.

I focused on our coat closet. It is so small and inconveniently located on the second floor of our house. So we're always trying to open it as quietly as possible so we don't wake up our son. My husband immediately started to panic because last time I tried to de-clutter, I was pregnant and was going through my "nesting" stage and made him rearrange our furniture every other week.

I assured him that this time I would just need his assistance in figuring out what coats to keep and to throw away. The man has a million jackets!!! Ok, definitely more than me so that's just abnormal.

After 1 and 1/2 hr of balancing boxes and rediscovering some treasures (my black Mexx blazer that I haven't seen in 2 years), I was pretty pleased with my first attempt.

Before:

After!