Money Saving Mom: 4 Weeks to a More Organized Home - Day 6

 

Week 2 has begun of Money Saving Mom's challenge:  4 weeks to a more organized home!  Today's assignment was to quickly clean out your car and vacuum it if you had time.

 

My car is cleaned out, but definitely no time to vacuum it out - it gets dark so early!  I will say, I really only had to remove 1 water bottle because my husband was kind enough to take the other stuff out of my car this weekend.

 

My car tends to get messy fast, but I've been doing a great job lately of keeping it picked up.  What did my husband have to bring in this weekend?  A pink feather boa and a pair of Dorothy (Wizard of Oz) red sparkle shoes - ah, life with a 4-year-old girl! 

 

Front seat - those are my sneakers and socks, left in my car in the hopes that I'll take a walk at work.  Didn't happen today - I was swamped!

 

Back seat - see, it really could use some vacuuming... maybe this weekend :)

 

Have you followed Crystal at Money Saving Mom yet?  It's not too late to start!

Money Saving Mom: 4 Weeks to a More Organized Home - Day 3 (I'm behind!)

 

I am totally behind in this challenge thanks to a freaky snowstorm that had our lights flickering and some sick kids.  But I'm catching up!

 

Day 3's challenge was to pick up your bedroom and to clean out your freezer.  I accomplished both of these quickly this morning.  It really is amazing that once you time an annoying task, it's not as bad as you thought because it doesn't take as long as you had built it up to be!

 

First the bedroom:

Not too bad, just some laundry to put away and the bed to make (look at that adorable little helper).

 

 

After:

 

Look, I gained a helper!  And I even opened the windows today - we may have a foot of snow on the ground, but it's 60 today - that's normal, right?

 

 

Next up, the freezer:

 

Our fridge is relatively new and I really do love the bottom freezer - I didn't have all those little compartments to clean out like with a side-by-side freezer.  Just two drawers at the bottom.

 

 

After:

Looks a lot different, huh?  I just moved a few things around and cleaned out the bottom drawers and voila - a clean freezer!

 

These tasks really aren't taking much time at all, and I really will be happy to have these places cleaned up as we get in to the swing of the holidays!

Money Saving Mom: 4 Weeks to a More Organized Home - Day 2

Did you follow along today with Crystal at Money Saving Mom?  Today's big tasks were to set your timer for 10 minutes and clean up your kitchen and then set the timer again for 10 minutes and clean out your fridge quickly.

 

I knew I had to empty the dishwasher and clean bottles, so instead of setting the timer, I just timed myself, because washing bottles can be tedious!

Before - dirty bottles and a few cups to go in to the dishwasher

 

 

I always dread cleaning bottles.  There's so many little parts to clean and I always feel like it takes so much time.  But honestly, emptying the dishwasher, filling it again and washing all the dirty bottles only took 15 minutes.  That's not bad at all! 

After - bottles cleaned and dishwasher emptied then filled again!

 

 

Then it was time to tackle the fridge.  I did set my timer for this.  We don't keep a packed fridge to begin with, so it's not too bad to clean out.

 

Nothing too exciting in my fridge :)

 

I quickly emptied everything out of the fridge, then I grabbed a paper towel with warm water and washed down all of the shelves and sides of the inside of the fridge.  I'll be honest, there was a little more to clean off than I thought there would be!  But overall, it wasn't that bad.  I then went through the items as I put them back in the fridge and threw out anything expired (only 2 items).  All in all, I was done with the fridge before the 10 minute timer went off - I even had 40 seconds to spare!

 

Fridge after - big difference, huh?  It really is much cleaner though!

 

I'll tell you, this challenge that Crystal is hosting is great (I say this 2 days in)!  She has made the challenges do-able in under 30 minutes.  I love that my fridge is clean going in to the holiday season, where it's bound to be a little more full (full of yummy baked goods and other fun holiday foods!).

 

If you haven't started following along yet, it's not too late!  Anything you do now to get organized will pay off once you're really in the hustle and bustle of the holiday season!

Money Saving Mom: 4 Weeks to a More Organized Home - Day 1

 

Did anyone else follow along with Money Saving Mom's 4 Weeks to a More Organized Home challenge today? 

Today wasn't too bad - it was cleaning out your purse.  My purse was in sad shape though, I couldn't even really close it properly. 

Scary!

 

I took everything out and put it in piles - garbage, receipts/coupons, stuff to go back in, stuff to be put away. 

 

Those are organized piles, I swear :)

 

 

Then I put back what needs to be in my purse and threw out/put away the items that aren't supposed to be in there. 

 

A clean slate!

 

None of this made the cut

 

It closes again!

 

While I was going through my purse, I took a few minutes to go through my wallet to take inventory of any gift cards or store credits I had in there.  I will try my best to purchase holiday gifts or necessities with these credits, when I can. 

 

I found money to:

• Macy's
• The Children's Place
• Kohls
• iParty

 

If you weren't able to follow along today, that's OK!  I would encourage you to go through your purse/wallet before Thanksgiving to see if you have any gift cards or store credits hiding in there that you can use while shopping!