OH: Week Three

Organize Your Home: Week 3

Fridge and Freezer

So I did not do too great with the before pictures again this week (I keep forgetting!) but here is a picture from when I did remember a few days after the challenge started.


It won't look too different from the after picture mostly because I believe our fridge/freezer is already pretty organized but just needed to be cleaned. This was taken at the end of the week so our fridge was really empty! 


Steps I completed in this weeks challenge:
1. Go through each shelf and drawer one at a time and first get rid of anything old, check expiration dates. 
2. Wash the area, pull out drawers, use a vacuum, do whatever you have to do to get every nook! 
3. Put everything back in, organized into like areas. 
4. Don't forget the outside, scrub that down, throw away old coupons, sort through art work and put away keepsakes. 

I went through our coupons, put the artwork from the kids at my schools into our keepsakes and organized the magnets. I placed kid friendly magnets on the bottom and others on top. (Best friend's kids like the letter magnets so we like to keep them at their level!)

Like I said, it doesn't look that different. Got rid of some old items in the door, in the cheese drawer and really cleaned the bottom drawers. We used to put the garden vegetables in there and there was dirt and random other goodies collecting at the bottom. I had to pull out the vacuum to help me out. 

Our freezer just needed a tiny bit of love. Wiped things down and reorganized a bit. Our freezer door has the tomatoes from our garden and the rhubarb we grew. Oh and of course some coffee! 

Here is a labeled look at the organizational aspect of our fridge and freezer. 

The tomatoes, green beans, strawberries were grown and picked by us! The pesto was made almost entirely with ingredients we grew (garlic, basil) or that were local. Cudighi is our favorite sausage from the UP, Vension from brother and Uncle Jake. Whiskey needed for Ben's bread pudding and whiskey sauce! Mm! The cool whip containers is vegetable broth Ben made with leftover veggies. 

The fridge not too exciting, but keeping it real here. :) Yes, our fridge really is this empty most of the time. . . 

And that is our fridge/freezer make-over. Not that most exciting but there it is! 

Connecting with Kinect

For Christmas my parents surprised us with a fun new toy, X-Box Kinect. It attaches to our X-Box and then using a little "webcam" type device to capture your movements. How you move changes how your character on the game moves and with this cool technology you can play interactive video games. We have one game as of right now but on this game there is fun games like an obstacle course, rafting, a game called rally ball and a few more. We often have people over and it is the perfect way to laugh, have fun and be silly with our friends and family. 

Here is a glimpse at all the fun we've had with all the friends/family that we've played with! 

Tia and Justin

Stevie and Justin

Dad and Mom (really intense playing happening here!)

Ben and Mikayla

Myself and Gramma Kathy

NMU Friends, Kelly and Kurt

High School friends, Lindsey and Jordan

This is the go to game we play! Ben and I are looking at getting a work out game and another fun group game to add to our collection! SO MUCH FUN!

Want to play? Come visit! 

52 Weeks to a More Organized Home

I mentioned in the last post I am participating in 52 Weeks to a More Organized Home. I'd like to invite you to go on the journey with me! :)


I will post each week about the area that I am focusing on and put up pictures to prove I accomplished them! This will help keep me accountable.


If you are interested in doing it yourself check out this website. You can join the challenge there as well. You will get a weekly e-mail describing the area you will work in.


I am on Week 2, organize pantry, spices and food storage areas. I kept forgetting to take pictures. 


Here is the before picture of our main food area in the kitchen (I already showed our pantry yesterday). Ben just went shopping so this was a good time to go through everything before putting in more items. Everything was just kind of shoved in. There was more food than space and half the time our bread, fruit and veggies took over the kitchen counters. 

The steps I took (with some assistance from Ben)...

1. Took everything off of each shelf, one at a time. 

2. Got rid of anything expired, we did not use or we have not eaten in a LONG time. 

3. Cleaned the shelves. 

4. Put the remaining goodies back on the shelves grouping them as much as possible. 

We were left with this. 

Here is a glimpse of how everything is organized. 

I also went through our spices with a similar process.

1. Emptied and cleaned the shelf.

2. Threw out anything expired or that we have not used in six months.

3. Put it back on the shelf grouped into herbs, baking, etc. and by sizes. 

I will get back to you next week with more organizational fun!

Jumping into 2012

The first few weeks of 2012 have been CRAZY! 
In hopes of keeping this blog going again.. I am going to cram everything into this post so I can get caught up!! 


We started the year like we start every year by writing all the bad things we want to leave behind in the past year on a piece of paper. We then burn the paper as to start the year fresh! This year our friends Lance and Lance joined us. 

We said goodbye to our Cavalier.. it was a bittersweet moment. So many memories were made in this car but we are excited to welcome a new car into our family. 

Meet Esmeralda, affectionately called Escape (say it like Dory from Nemo, Es-Cap-E!)

Justin and Tia visited and surprised Ben by bringing a Nerf gun. Justin moved the couch so he could dive out of our storage room and unto the couch. This is an action shot.. haha

Ben quickly found his Nerf gun and attacked Justin!

This continued for quite some time... 

Then a week later I threw a surprise birthday party for Tia and Ben while my parents were in town. Tia had an Angry Birds theme and Ben had an X-Box theme with a focus on his favorite game, Skyrim. 

Here is the main decorations. 

Justin and Tia bought Ben a new Nerf gun. This one shoots twenty rounds off in a few seconds and runs on a battery. Justin surprised Ben when he came home (again from the storage room)! 

We had a fun evening with family celebrating Tia and Ben. We played Kinnect, had an all out battle with hundreds of Nerf darts and a collection of five guns, ate homemade pizza and cake and ended the night with a sleep over at our place. 

The next morning Ben made breakfast while we all got ready for the day. Then while we were all getting ready Ben played with the angry bird faces I made. 

After our sleepover we went to Kalamazoo to spend the day together at Justin and Tia's. We went to an arcade/bowling/laser tag place. We played on two lanes, boys vs girls. 

 The ladies! (Tia is a strike and I am a spare!)

After a wonderful weekend with my family I spent Sunday preparing for the week. This is a common site at our home during the week. My work takes over my life sometimes... This pile is much smaller now! :)

I am taking part in a home organization challenge called 52 Weeks to a More Organized Home. I am on week 2. Week 1 was cleaning off the kitchen counters and reorganizing them. Week 2 is to clean and organize the pantry, spice cabinet and food storage areas. I took pictures but for some reason they are gone.. I'll show you progress as I make it through the weeks. Here is our pantry now clean and organized. 

This week ended quite tragically. We got a phone call from our friend Lauren on Thursday around 2pm. Her home got broken into while her family was gone. They busted down the door, took all their electronics (TV, X-Box, computer, etc.), took some other random belongings (blankets, shredder) and trashed areas of their home while they were ransacking the place. Ben and I went and picked up their two little girls and they spent the evening with Be-en and Ca. 

Then Ben and I brought the girls home for bed and helped out at the house. Ben and Eric put in a new door and Lauren and I began the long process of cleaning up after the robbers. They redecorated their kitchen/office area so we tackled that project first. 

Friday I rearranged my work schedule and took an early day. I spent the majority of the afternoon and evening there helping out Lauren along with her sister Meghan. Ben came after work and watched the girls so we could keep working. Praising God everyone is safe and praying for comfort for Lauren. 

That brings us to today! (Told you we've been busy!)

Goodbye 2011

2011 was a CRAZY year!

We started off in Marquette, Michigan..drove 11 hours to an apartment in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Five months later we packed up our belongings and moved in with Ben's parents in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Two months later we moved to our current apartment in Grand Rapids.

Here is a look at our year.. in pictures!

I have very few pictures from our time in Sioux Falls.. I lost most of the photos that were taken....

January

We rang in the new year in our new city!

Ben looked for jobs and I started student teaching.

February

I became famous! I was in a teacher in-service on a new literacy program and we were recorded. That person in the grey sweatshirt.. yeah that's me!

Ben got two jobs, one at a Boy's Ranch for troubled youth and another at a Science Kid's Museum.

March

I gave a grand tour of our Sioux Falls apartment, we celebrated Grandma Margaret's birthday from far away, and I was offered a job at the zoo working Admissions. I worked that for a little under two months. Was given a promotion but had to turn it down.

April

This photo was taken one of the many trips I took to the Kirby Science & Discovery Center. We took our friend Rich there and my parents!

We also decided to move back to Michigan.

May

We moved back to Grand Rapids, I graduated, Ben got an internship working at an organic farm, and moved in with Ben's parents.

June (more pictures now!)

Ben took this chair and made it into something wonderful (see August...)

We celebrated our first anniversary!

Visited Meijer Gardens

Discovered our favorite new restaurant, The Flat River Grill

Spent our "real" first anniversary at Aubree's and with a trip to IKEA

Visited the farm a lot to see the piggies!

July

I babysat these cuties!

We celebrated our first fourth of July downstate.

Being silly waiting for the fireworks to start.

We took advantage of being so close to family and went to our cousin's baseball games.

Took these beautiful girls for a day at the park with Be-en and Ca.

Raena and I got our first pair of Toms.

And learned how to ride a RipStik

I stood outside the funeral of Betty Ford and said my goodbyes.

We moved into our current apartment. 

Tia and Justin visited (and ate our popsicles!)

And we did touristy things together

Babysat some more..

and enjoyed all the time I had with them after being away for most of their lives!

Made a fun sponge toy for my cousin's birthday!

August

Ben made this chair for Addison!

Addison turned 2

We saw Harry Potter, the final movie

My parents visited and we made pizza!

And ribs!

We hiked up the Sand Dunes with cousin Lindsey from California.

Visited the cottage for a number of days.

Had many candle lit dinners next to hand picked bouquets of flowers that Ben grew.

We started canning, freezing and preserving the food we grew and started drinking healthier milk!

We went on a fancy date night with a seven course meal!

September

I started my job teaching a kindergarten extended learning program and managing a before and after school program. 

My friend's foot friend!

October

Ben, Rich and I visited Marquette. 

This is the tree where we took some wedding pictures next to it. 

Visiting Lil Presque, my favorite spot in the whole wide world!

We carved little pumpkins, that we grew! 

November

Came and went too quickly with no pictures to show for it! I was offered a new position, we visited my family for Thanksgiving and spent our free time really organizing and settling into our apartment.

December

We bought and decorated our first Christmas tree!

It was real, and perfect! 

Had a Harry Potter Marathon/Craft Day with the Haan ladies

Justin and Tia got engaged

Ben and I/Justin and Tia got Kinnects for Christmas!

We played with our new toy... a lot

A lot...

Ben bonded with his favorite dog

And we reconnected with friends from NMU, Kelly and Kurt

We ended the year with Lance and Lance at the ball drop downtown.

Ending the year with friends!!! 

Goodbye 2011!