Perfection is Overrated

Yay! Every project I finish, no matter how small, is a success! There are quite a few things that have been hanging around my office, just waiting for me to hurry up and finish them.

This little box was the perfect size to hold the pieces of small projects sitting on my desk, cluttering up the place. The original design was not so perfect though.

Basic little wood box

Painted black

After painting it black, it sat in my office mocking me. I was thinking of decoupaging it with something from The Graphics Fairy, or painting it with some decorative words, or something. Nothing seemed to be the right way to go, which means I did nothing.

Today, I was sitting at my desk and looking at the little bits and pieces scattered all over my desk. It would be nice to have it all collected in my box, in the corner of my desk, where I could see it but not have to move it to work on something else.

Stalled project...

Do not adjust your screens, this is my desk AND my project box in its corner...sitting on top of what should be sitting IN it

Well, who did I think was going to finish this project?? I realized I was suffering from project freeze. It had to be THE perfect decorative box and because nothing seemed perfect, it couldn't be done. Anyone else feel like that? As soon as I realized the problem was me, the solution seemed easy.

The box didn't need to be fancy; it needed to be cute and useful. Out came my paint pen, and I thought about stenciling something, but in the end just free-handed the wording.

If it gets crazy, I'll turn this side to face me to remind me nothing is that bad ;)

Ahhh...all those little pieces corralled neatly in one cute box!

Pay no attention to the crowded shelves and floor beyond my desk...

Sometimes, you just have to do it. It's only paint, right? What projects are you stalled on?

A Makeover? Yes, Please!

An awesome (or crazy, depending on how you look at it) woman named Mandi who writes a fantastic blog about craptastic stuff called Vintage Revivals is offering herself up as a sacrifice makeover guru to one deserving person.

I. Need. This. 

Look at my office, inherited from my Gator husband

c'mon - orange and white with a blue stripe??

no storage to speak of

an attempt at decorating...epic fail

my work (?) area

a normal day in the life of my office

work lights, light boxes, mailing boxes, and a cat perch - everyone sing "one of these things is not like the other, one of these things, doesn't belong..."

the stuff is now 2 rows deep

yep, this is really how it looked this morning - inspiring, right?

I'm trying, really.

The pictures say it all. I have no room to work, to blog, to create. I have orange, blue and white walls. I'm not sure there's a primer invented that will cancel those colors out. I've inherited his 'executive' desk, which is also where the CFO of the family (me) has to pay bills, file bills, shred bills. I would be open to ANY idea to make it more functional. It's depressing just looking at the pictures.

Thank you if you do vote for me. My eyes especially thank you.

Mason Jar Memory Jars

This is a quick and easy, and FUN, way to showcase some of those little travel mementos that everyone has stashed away. Some people scrapbook them, but if you're too lazy not a scrapper, try this idea from Young House Love.

First: gather all your little coins, paper money that was too pretty to exchange, ticket stubs, maps, etc. from your trips.

Beijing trip 2009 (see the Pizza Hut receipt? - yeah, we're adventurous eaters)

Second: either find or buy some mason jars, enough for all your trips. I got mine at my local Ace Hardware, with a coupon.

Third: fill the jars (yep, it's that easy). If you're particularly futzy, go ahead and arrange the items for optimal display. Guess what I did…

Finally: label the jars. I tried a few ideas, and ended up with handwritten tape labels. I may change them at one point, but it'll have to be transparent - for me, what's in the jars are more interesting than where they came from.

It's that easy! 

For my display, the desk in my office has an empty space in the front. I bought a nice hardwood board (it looks prettier when stained), sanded, stained to match, and poly'ed it. I drilled holes in the desk (and only one went all the way thru - oops!) and put those shelf ledge pins in the holes. The board sits on top of those, and the vacation memory jars sit on the shelf and voila! mason jar scrapbooks!

I'm linking this to Saturday Night Special (SNS) #76 at Funky Junk Interiors - there's a fab link party with mason jar ideas! It's quite unbelievable what people come up with to do with simple mason jars - you really should go take a look...

Best Laid Plans...

I tried, I really did. The plan was to get the office painted while my husband was out of town. There was going to be this great 'Before and After' moment and oh, the sense of accomplishment! Unfortunately, the Office Make Over turned into the office clean up. First rule of project management is to under-promise and over-deliver. Second rule is never forget first rule. 

What happened? Opportunity knocked, but Reality got to the door first. 

Seriously, I get distracted easily. Multi-tasking is an art form I am constantly striving to master. Getting an office painted doesn't seem all that hard, but there was a blog to configure, a Facebook page to set up, writing posts for said blog, editing photos, eating, sleeping…the list was endless. Did you read the kidding between those lines? I have it pretty easy, but I need a little perspective on this whole undertaking. 

So, here are the pictures of my office as it looks today. 


Update: I realized 'before' shots would be helpful instead of having to find the original pics in this post . Bear with me while I figure this out!

Office from doorway-before. Piles everywhere!

Desks and floor decluttered

Corner clutter

Look! There was a heat register behind all that!

My art supplies corner...and pegboard stand and paint can storage

Art supplies arranged

Wine crates make great display shelves, if you have enough of them

Wine crate shelving stocked (added 5 new crates)

Filing to be done, painting projects stacked up, tools, books, stuff not put away

Filing whittled down and projects nicely organized

Maybe getting distracted is all part of the process and I'm being a little impatient. This clean up is progress and having all my 'junk' visible makes it easier to see what's there to work with.


Maybe it won't take until my husband leaves town again to slap some paint on those crazy orange and blue walls! What I can promise you is that when that happens, I'll be posting those 'After' pics right away. 


Until then, 

My Office Does Need a Makeover

In my first post ever -  Welcome to JunkyVagabond!, I stated there wouldn't be many posts about my own home projects. Well, here is my first flip-flop…probably the first of many. 

My office started it's life as my husband's home office. Since he worked from home for several years, he got the third bedroom as a dedicated office. About 6 months ago, he got a new job that requires him to actually go to an office outside the home. He graciously gave me the office for my own dedicated space! Woo-Hoo! Who was super excited? Me, that's who!!

I spent probably about a week getting it so that it worked as a craft room. I bought a storage unit from IKEA, rearranged the furniture that was in there - desk, computer cart, file cabinet. It's my craft room, but is also the home office for the family CFO (that would be me).



My Creative (?) Space

It's also used for Christmas storage, a cat hangout, and was starting to look like a storage room. Here are a few pictures of what it looks like 4 months after I moved in: 



stuff accumulating in corners



more corner stuff





wine crates work as storage shelving,
but I seriously need about 10 more 



projects in progress and filing piling up



At one point, my husband jokingly referred to me as Fred Sanford. I seriously need to work on this, but need to take it one project at a time. More to come…