Saying Good-Bye to Grampie

Just thought I would pop in for a little writing therapy and share some of the goings on around here. Excuse the lack of pics and anything fancy as I am away from home for a bit and didn't bring my cartel of office extras ..... just me, my laptop and a story.

We are currently in the Annapolis Valley visiting loved ones after a death in our family. My husband's father was diagnosed with leukemia in September of 2012. After fighting through the first round of Chemo, he returned home for Christmas with us and slowly regained strength. But just a few days ago we were informed the cancer had returned. The doctors did all that they could, but there was nothing else they could do to battle this horrible disease. We were packing our bags when we received the call that he had passed away on March 21, 2013.

So now we have gathered with our family and friends to mourn his passing, but also to celebrate his amazing life. A cherished husband, father to 3 boys, grandfather to 9 grandchildren, son, brother, uncle, cousin, coach, community member. He will be dearly missed.

This heartbreaking time for our family has been a true testament of strength. I find that with each passing day it becomes easier to recall fond memories of our time together without the sadness. Our hearts ache with loss while our minds make plans for the future. Dealing with the loss of a loved one helps you gain stronger appreciation for those who are still here with us on this journey.

We have lost a number of great grandparents, great aunts/uncles since my husband and I have come together as a family. Our children have suffered these losses with us, but being at such young age, they have very little understanding of the meaning of death. This is the first extremely close family member that they have lost, and are handling the news of Grampie's passing well so far. My husband and I have decided that they will all attend the funeral which will be their first. I am sure there will be plenty of questions and tears on this day and the days that follow.  

Informing the kids of their Grampie's death has by far been the most "grown-up" thing that we have had to do as parents. Letting them know the details, but not too much. Keeping the information simple for them to understand. Ensuring them everyone else they love is safe and healthy. Letting them know that it is ok to cry and to ask questions. Letting them know that they are not alone, that many other children, and even their Mommy and Daddy have lost loved ones at their age.

We have a few days to wait until the funeral as we wait for family members to return home. These days have been the hardest as we yearn for closure. Family, neighbours and friends have spent endless hours here with us sharing fond memories and stories, loading our bellies with delicious food and filling our hearts with love and prayers.

It is at times like this that I am so thankful we were raised in such a glorious community.  And even though we used to complain that there was nothing to do in this small town, I am proud that we still call this "home." There is a fine line between friends and family and everyone knows your name. We are starting to sound like a country song here, but I like it that way.

Thank you to everyone for your kind words and blessings. And please cherish those that are traveling through this life with you. Each day is a gift, live it to the fullest.

Dirty Little Secrets ..... Christmas Decorations in March!

Well, here we go. Another installment of Dirty Little Secrets. This one is just plain embarrassing, but I signed up for the job to share, so share I will.

Christmas decorations .....

displayed in my home .....

..... on the 12th of March! 

See, embarrassing right? Now I remember a few times in the past, discovering the odd decoration around the house; a reindeer-print hand towel in the guest bathroom, a few ornaments in a mantle vase or even a wreath on a side door ..... but that was in late January/early February! Never has it gone to March Break. And this is an entire Christmas village!

My Mom has renamed her village to be a "Winter Village", so that she has an excuse to leave it up longer (or is it procrastinate taking it down?) Ha! Lucky for her, she collects the Dickens Village, so with the exception of a few Christmas wreaths, it doesn't shout Christmas. Mine on the other hand, is the North Pole Series by Dept 56. And as the title states, it is Santa's Village ..... Christmas.

Now one of the problems with my village is that I never got it fully together this year. This was our first Christmas in our new house, so I wasn't quite sure where to set it up. I moved it a dozen times, but it ended up here in the library on top of the kid's book shelves. I purchased new trees and accents, received new pieces for gifts but they never got added in. They were just thrown on top of everything else, waiting to be stored away ..... and they waited ..... a very long time.

This is where my village began ..... LEGO ..... as most decisions are based on in our Lego obsessed home. I was shopping at one of my favorite local shops, The Abbey, and came across this piece for 30% off. How could I resist? If you can see, the red colour dispenser on the end lost it's colour grains. For me that was not a big deal. I figured once my children got their little hands on it, that would be the least of my worries!

From that point on, I collected pieces here and there, trying to find just the right pieces to compliment the Lego Workshop. Then one sad day, it was announced that The Abbey was going out of business. I ventured down to see what I could find. To say that I purchased a lot is an understatement (And all at clearance prices!) So my village became a mash of everything. It was all the North Pole Series, but there was a lot inconsistency and it didn't really work. So now I am back trying to fill in the gaps and make it flow properly.

But enough with my design dilemmas, let's get back to packing this stuff up!

So while the kids are home with me this week for March Break, I figured I would enlist some little helpers and be rid of the Holidays once and for all! (We wouldn't want Mr. Peter Cottontail getting his tail-all-in-a-tangle seeing Santa still displayed at our house.)

With most collector items, they come very well packaged. I find it very easy to pack away (once I finally get around to it!) I simply disassemble all cords and small parts. Lay the items on the box that they are to be packaged in and then call in the little elves for help. I prefer to store all the little packages in a tote to keep them together and the larger boxes go on the shelf beside them in the storage room.

It took about an hour in total (with little helper!) I only wish I had tackled this sooner. Nevertheless, I now have a Christmas-free home and a clear space to dress up for Spring!

Is anyone else guilty of leaving Christmas up too long? What are some of the items that you are finding lurking in corners or under the sofa? I'm hoping this is the last of it for our house, but I'm sure Spring Cleaning will turn up some tinsel somewhere.

Halfway Point for Lent Purge Project

So here we are, March 7th, halfway through Lent (for some denominations) and thought it would be a good time to check in and give a progress report. Progress has been made! Check this out!

Now I picked the front of our garage to stock pile the items we are getting rid of as I thought it would be easier to move at the end of this 40 day project. Open up the doors and have a garage sale, load up the truck for a garbage dump trip or donation drop off. We haven't quite decided at this point what will happen to it all, probably a combination of the three. But for now I am just happy to have it out of my house! (happy dance! happy dance!)

Filling a bag per day has been a challenge, but in the end it will all work out. To tell you the truth, some days are just too crazy around here. I definitely have to be in the right mood to plow through a closet and see results. On the other hand, there have been days when I can't stop! I've made it to the halfway point and so far I am ahead of the game, so I'm not going to fret too much ..... maybe on Day 39 when I'm riffling through my husband's underwear drawer praying to find a holey pair! But for now, we're good.

In this pic, you are seeing;

25 boxes

7 garbage bags

3 pcs. of furniture

odds & ends (not in boxes/bags)

and 3 bags (partially full)

We have also had 2 garbage days since Day 1, so I have also purged 3 bags of garbage and 6 bags of recycling! Feels good people, feels good!

So are you keeping up with me? Surpassing me? Right on target? There is still time!

We need to cut back on the excess in our lives and Spring is a great time to start. Even if you are reading this for the first time, join in and start your own purge project TODAY! So much stress, time and energy is soaked up by the clutter we keep in our homes. If it was all taken away, would it really matter? I'm sure that my children would say 'yes', and sacrifice themselves for the piles of Lego in their toyroom, but I know you would think differently.

Let's get ourselves and homes in order!

20 more days = 20 more bags to go!

You can do it!

Becca

What's On My Front Door

I am one of those people. The kind that is a bit nosey, and always interested in what celebs are doing in their "spare time." The kind of person who wants to see what my architects house looks like, how white my dentist's teeth are, and how current my stylist's hair is before she picks up her scissors. I am also a tad weary of the people out there giving advice when I have no idea what their credentials are and if they practice what they preach. Wouldn't your purchase decision be a lot easier if you knew the car salesman actually owned the same car he was trying to sell you?

As a wreath designer, shop owner, blogger, I would like customers to know that I stand behind every product in my shop. So I thought it would be a fun addition to my blog to show what I currently have hanging on my own front door.

Now please, don't be disappointed. I am a very busy Mom of five and work my tail off on a daily basis to ensure that your front doors look welcoming and amazing ..... so that leaves little time for my own decorating. 

Psst ..... I just took down this Christmas wreath off my side entrance ..... forgot all about it until it was wayyyyy too late! Oh my, what my neighbours must think! :)

Please be aware that I often design things for my own house that I don't have listed in my shop ..... usually because of price, time restraints or limited product. You see, when I am in my studio wearing my creative cap, I throw the price tags and shop talk out the window and just create. More often than not, that doesn't translate well into business terms. But please be assured, if you see something you like, send me a message and we can discuss designs and prices.

But enough with the long-winded introduction and let's get on to sharing!

This time of year, between Valentines and Easter, I always like to play it a bit nature-inspired, late winter/early spring, birds returning to nest ..... kind of vibe. I leave my greenery and birch branches from Holiday decorating in planters and window boxes all winter. I just remove the lights and Christmas ornaments in early January and it lasts until spring thaw ..... however, now that I am looking at this pic, my greenery is looking pretty worn!

So I picked up the hues from the surrounding 'treehouse' scenery and created this woodchip wreath. I incorporated pinecones, birch bark, a cute ornamental bird and a bit of sparkle to add life to the dreary days of late winter. It doesn't scream any season, just a nice filler before I burst into Spring and Easter colours.

So there you have it! What I currently have displayed on my front door for this in between season. I would like the tangled treehouse customers to feel confident that they are buying quality, handmade wreaths,  and the designer herself proudly hangs them on her own front door.

Spring is in the air! For those of you who follow me on Facebook and Twitter, you have already seen some pics of my new creations that will be hitting my Etsy shop very soon. I'm very excited to get these in the shop as I know you will love them! Sign up to follow along so you don't miss out! 

Hope you all have a great day!

Becca

Dirty Little Secrets ..... Ribbon

Well, here we are starting off another week. Mondays seem to come around so quickly, or is it that the weekends pass to quickly? Whatever the case, we have a busy schedule ahead as we tackle more purging projects for Lent, squeeze in workouts for our February Pledge to Run, and prepare for company arriving on the weekend. Let's hope for good health and sunshine to get us through.

The purging process has been hugely successful around here. I have been getting through a lot of dark, dreary spaces that otherwise I would have been avoiding. Sadly, one of those spaces is my craft room. It is in the basement, shared with seasonal storage and a lazy cat. But I have plans to create something special down there ..... once I find the floor. Boxes and boxes have already left for the donation pile in the garage, but there is still so much to go.

Although I have been trying to leave organizational projects until the purge project is complete, there is something that needed my immediate attention. 

So I guess it is now time for another installment of my Dirty Little Secrets.

Pssst! ..... I have a secret ..... a dirty, little secret .....

RIBBON! RIBBON! RIBBON! RIBBON! RIBBON!

I seriously looooovvve ribbon. As you can see, there is quite an assortment but most are Christmas themed. I love to decorate my holiday trees with ribbon, and I usually change my colours/theme each year, so that leaves a lot of discards. Plus, making wreaths for a living lends itself very easily to developing a slight ribbon addiction. Enough said, I have a problem. 

So again, I'm in the basement, so sorry for the poor lighting/pictures, but this gives you an idea of what I'm dealing with.

I took out all the full rolls and stored them on this metal rack for now. Then I grabbed a container for all the bits and pieces left over from projects. I just can't get rid of them, so I'll need to address that later on. Then I started untangling the huge balls of beautiful ribbons and wound them onto left over spools.

A few years ago, I had made these giant bows for my family room Christmas tree ..... Yikes! I have since moved on, but there are at least a dozen of them with approximately 3 yards of ribbon each.  I'm sure I can find another project for this ribbon, so I decided to disassemble them.

Instead of adding to the odds and ends pile, I ironed the ribbon and rolled it onto scraps of cardboard. I marked the end with the measurements for quick reference. It makes the ribbon more useful, neater and easier to store.

So for now, I have it all sorted and up on a shelf rather than scattered and tangled in bins. But I will have to revisit my ribbon section for deeper organization at a later date. I have visions of something like this that I found on Sew Woodsy.

http://sewwoodsy.com/2012/11/craft-room-tour.html

But right now, it's crazy busy wreath season around here, so it will have to go on my dream list.

Does anyone else get slightly giddy when strolling the ribbon aisles? Do you have a super-duper idea for storing tidbits and ends of ribbon? Let me know!

Have a great day!

Purging Pointers to Get You Started!

I like to talk myself through things, literally. If you were to walk into my house at any point during the day, you would think I was entertaining a few people. Nope, just me, myself and I.  It's like getting psyched-up before the big game, adrenaline pumping, crowd cheering you on!  Some of my best ideas have been discovered while talking with myself ..... So, whatever works!

Well, this morning I needed a good pep talk as it was Day 1 of Lent and my household purge. It is always hard for me to get started on big projects. So I thought I would share a couple of pointers that I discovered during this process to help you get started as well. 

----- Pick a really overflowing spot that has been driving you crazy!  Something easy in content, like plastic shopping bags or that mountain of towels in your linen closet. You want to fill a bag quickly to get you revved up and eager to do more. Don't start with something sentimental, like photos or kids possessions,  or anything time consuming like office papers.

For example, I started in our library as it is the drop-all spot of our home. It lies between the common area and bedroom area of our home, so it piles up with things going to either zone.  Such as laundry, odds and ends from reno projects and this ......

Those are two blow-up mattresses that have been in the corner of my library for a few weeks now. We had family visiting so the little ones used them to bunk in with their cousins. However, we discovered that both mattresses had slow leaks when the kids woke up flat on the floor in the morning. Oops!  I grabbed two more beds for the next evening but these two damaged ones ended up here ..... and never moved.  I kept telling myself that I was going to patch them when I had some extra time ..... yeah right! That's not going to happen ..... So they were the first items in the garbage bag. Good-Bye! And they were sizable, so the two of them took up more than half of the bag.

----- Check your local waste collection bylaws. Halfway through my morning of purging, I realized that I was putting a lot of recyclables and garbage in with my donations. I figure the last thing we want to do at the end of this project is to backtrack through 40 bags and separate it all!

 

So I grabbed a clear bag for  garbage,  blue for recycling and black for donation (as that is what our local waste management requires.) And I don't know about you, but our collection laws are strict. We have officers that do random spot checks curbside, tag bags that do not pass inspection and even fine homeowners. So not only do we want to avoid these penalties, but we also want to help the charity workers who sort through our donations and of course our environment.

----- Make lists as you go. I have been using an exercise book to keep my purge project halfway organized. It keeps me on track and although I don't follow it strictly, it is nice to have guidelines when your mojo starts to dwindle.

I made a list of target areas in the house that I need to tackle and I continually add to it as I go along.

I am a procrastinator and find lists keep me on target. I would be tempted to stop purging and paint my linen closet if I thought it needed a fresh coat. But now I just write it down in the margins for a later time. Also,  when I purge an item that I want to sell instead of donate, I'll take note of the item, plus a price and certain details such as it comes with a manual or extra parts. These side notes help immensely later on.

----- Keep a tally of how many bags of garbage and recycling you send to the road each week from this purge project. The paper and packaging is all stuff that has been kicked out of the house. But I cannot hang on to garbage for end results! So a tally will do just fine.

I hope everyone is having as much success as I am through this process. It has been so rewarding to see that donation pile grow each and every day! Let me know how you are making out!

Cheers!

40 Days to Cut the Clutter!

Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, and I am preparing our family for 40 days of purging clutter from our home.

I am always filling bags of random things and dropping them off at our local charities. But our home is now in need of a major overhaul and thought this would be the perfect time of year to do so. It's a good experiment (especially for the kids) to see how much stuff accumulates in our home that we don't really need. 

As most modern day families, we live in excess. I am struggling on a day to day basis to keep the house tidy, but am always defeated by piles of clutter. We have moved numerous times in our 10 years together, and with each move comes more stuff. We also have five children, and with each child comes even more stuff. Toys, clothes, books, school work, gifts, decorative pieces, dishes, sports equipment, seasonal decor ..... the list goes on and on and on .....

Well, today is the beginning of the end to that nonsense! 

I have compiled a chart of target areas throughout the house that need a good cleaning out.  

Each day our goal is one bag. One bag to donate, sell, toss ..... just out of the house!

By the end of the 40 days, we will have a total of 40 bags of STUFF out of our home. Hooray!

I have cleared a large area in our garage to house the bags until the end of Lent. I hope this visual will benefit our entire family and serve as a reminder to keep our future purchases to a minimum. Learning to live with less is something that I preach constantly to our children. Now I will have proof that it can be done!

Is anyone up for this challenge? 

Now I understand that we are all busy and a big project like this takes time. However, I truly believe that if we dedicate the time now, it will save us time in the future with everyday life. Clutter is stagnant, wasteful and stressful. This cleanse is needed in most homes to allow more airflow, creativity and happiness.

Let's get our homes in order and shed the burden of clutter!

So, get yourself to Walmart and grab a box of heavy duty garbage bags ..... how convenient that they come in boxes of 40!!!   Pick a spot and start!  It does take time to get in a rhythm, but once you do, it is empowering! And if you get on a roll, don't stop because your bag is full, open a new one and keep going!!!

Spring cleaning will be so much easier this year!

Happy Bag-Filling! 

Check in and let me know how you are doing!

Cheers!