a bit of before and after ...

so, spring is coming and so is spring cleaning. does anyone really only clean in the spring? where did that term come from anyhow? even the thought of cleaning big just once a year seems rather strange - maybe it's just me? the truth is, our house is messy. often. if I actually want our house to look decent, I have to declutter constantly, pick up toys constantly, and wash constantly. I don't. you can pretty much expect to find clutter in our house. I'm more focused on the actual cleaning (as in, ridding of germs, vacuuming, dishes, etc.) to worry too much about the stuff that matters less (to be clear, that's: matters less to me) ... and there are spots where even the cleaning is suffering! shocking - I know! I am not too proud to share with you just how bad a few rooms get ... we're speaking of the upstairs rooms! Our room is currently "storage" to boxes of both items to be sold at our next yard sale and items that have shifted from box, to bucket, back to box to somehow - someday, find a home here! I'm not sharing pics of our room because the only real change was that I picked up all the shopping bags off our floor and put all the purchases away - finally! and shifted a couple things from our room to Annicka's - our second "storage" area! yah, that's sort of a punishment - her room is now for sleeping/reading only (and caring for her hamster) as it's gotten to it's worse and I've had it. I took all the toys away from upstairs rooms - it's in buckets, bins, whatever - sitting in Annicka's room, waiting to be sorted. I just couldn't take the constant mess any more, desperate times call for desperate measures, after all! Zoey's room was mostly only to blame on me. i got lazy about putting her clothes away (that lovely dresser, is a lovely pain in my rear-end when it comes to opening drawers) and still hadn't really picked it up ... her room has still never been officially "done". such is me. I'd say "that's just how I am", but according to the book I'm currently reading I can't say that - because all things are possible, even me changing! that's right folks, you heard it here first - Sasha can change, but not through her own strength. only with the strength from God will that happen. anyways ... I do have challenges that I've yet to overcome, laziness being a big one. but last week, I was able to do a little bit to shift things around and get them looking loads better. trouble spots remain, I'm focusing on the positive though: you can see the floors, clothes are put away, there's no toys. and it's stayed this way - for nearly a week. ok, ok - Annicka's room has had issues (how is that possible, given her restrictions?) but I've taken care of that too. so, now that I've written the longest ever non-paragraph bunch of odd sentences just strewn together, we'll get to the pics ...

be sure you click on these, I'm not sure how to make them bigger ON the blog!

first up - the boys room
there's one there of the hall "before" too

Annicka's room

and Zoey's room

when you click on this, take special not of the middle pic ...
and the doorway - I did indeed laugh out loud when I first saw this
pic, I didn't even notice when I took it!