It's clear I need to go back to work. I'm getting a little stir-crazy in the house (hence two blog entries in as many days) and this afternoon I tackled a few small projects that I have been putting off. Thought I would share, because seeing how these little projects made such big improvements makes me want to (gasp) do more small projects and thought it might inspire you to do the same.
Disaster area #1: the cookbook area. As I shared in a recent post, I'm trying to implement new recipes into our daily lineup. One of the problems is the disorganization of the recipes. Yes, there are cookbooks in a general area, but I also find recipes that I think I'll try in magazines and on the back of boxes and in the newspaper. I clip them out and put them in a pile. A disorganized, messy pile. Time to organize. I put the recipes in sheet protectors and in a binder, and attempted to group them by type of dish (main course, dessert, drinks, etc)--nothing fancy but at least better. Didn't take too long, and I was surprised by the number of recipes I have in that binder. I transferred all the scraps of paper with recipes on them onto cards and put them in the recipe box. I also packed away the cords and thermometers that we were storing thin this area--they just added to the clutter. It looks so much better and is so much more organized!
During this process I also realized I have a different (but good) dilemma--I have a lot of cookbooks! So not only do I want to try a new recipe every week, but I also want to branch out and try recipes in all of the cookbooks, not just my new Taste of Home book. I'll have to come up with some sort of rotation system. Update on my goal--last week I tried a new beef stroganoff recipe and tonight we had chicken cordon bleu wrap ups. Both recipes were keepers and a nice change of pace!
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| Cookbook area before.... |
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| and after! |
Disaster area #2: the mudroom. We have a nice area for our coats and shoes with a bench for us to sit on to put on our shoes. Lately, we haven't been able to sit on the bench to tie our shoes. With the warm weather, we never really put away our lighter jackets and never got out the gloves and scarves. Rick has dozens of caps that were taking up the hat and glove basket, so I asked him to pick a few that he would wear in the colder weather and put up the rest for now. We prioritized coats that we wear frequently, moved the others to the front hall closet, and I moved the scarves that were decorative and not really warm to my closet upstairs. Again, a small project that made a big difference in the appearance of the house and made me feel really productive.
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| Coat/shoe area before |
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| After! |
Here's to small changes making a big difference!
1 comment:
Looks great!! I was meant to do similar things around the house considering I had break until the 10th (well, the 6th we had training in the city but it was a relaxed affair where we, the non-Japanese teachers, mostly just caught up with what everyone did for break) but I ended up sleeping (JET LAG) and playing with Finn. All I managed to do was unpack and wash a bunch of stuff. I guess I did put Motoaki's hats in a hat rack...
Also, we made good use of the New Year Sales and got a conventional oven (one that is an oven/microwave combo) so please post details on some of these recipes. Maybe that isn't the direction you want your blog to go in, but I would love to hear about some of the better ones. So far all I have made is baked chicken and scalped potatoes.... Which turned out well but not sensational (in my defense I am getting used to all of the Japanese buttons and what not and didn't want to try something too hard...).
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