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It's time for the results of the 30-Day Organizational Challenge... I chose to reorganize the room I'm in now, our computer/ toy room. First, let me answer the questions that Laura posted:
1. What was the hardest part of the challenge for you and were you able to overcome it? The hardest part was finding time to do it. I would have loved to have a day or an afternoon to myself to really tackle this, but with two small children, that just isn't possible in my world. So I had to do things in small blocks of time... but it worked.
2. Tell us what kind of changes/habits you have put into place in order for your area/room to maintain its new order? I added baskets across the top of the desk area, and that system is working great for us... see #4.
3. What did you do with the "stuff" you were able to purge out of your newly organized space? Two bags of trash went out, one bag is ready for Goodwill, some books were relocated to the family room, and some toys went to the basement playroom.
4. What was the biggest lesson you learned from this experience? It made more sense for me to go with our current tendencies, rather than to try to stick to a "file everything" rule like I've done in the past. We're not filers, and expecting us to go from piling everything on the desk to keeping perfect files was unrealistic. We tended to pile any/all paperwork in the house either on the desk or the kitchen counter. We were forever hunting for papers. Finally, I came up with a solution that I thought would work... and so far, so good! I designated a basket for DH and one for myself, and now we can still do quick clean-ups and just "pile" the papers somewhere, but, it's a temporary holding ground... the baskets only hold so many papers before we have to deal with them and clean them out.
5. Now that you have completed the PROCESS, do you think having and keeping your space organized will make a difference in your life? Yes. I won't be embarassed if someone walks into this room, and DH and I are already having great success with the basket system.
For me, this was also a frugal change... which is not usually the case. I made myself stick to sorting, purging, and working with what we already had, with only one exception-- the set of 3 baskets that I bought for $10. In the past I would have gone out and bought a bunch of "organizers" and then tried to make them fit. This time, I made do with what I had, printed off some free labels, and I'm pretty pleased with the results.
Still to do? DH and I have discussed putting a small bookcase in this room, and we still plan to do that, but it's just not in our budget right now. Oh, and when I took out some of the toys, I noticed that some of the walls could use some touch-up paint... I need to do that soon.
Well, unfortunately since I lost everything on my hard drive a week or so ago, I don't have the "before" pics to share. I've tried to give you some idea of what the before looked like in the photos below.
I do have this one of DD mid-way through the toy-sorting process- what a mess! It didn't always look like this, but while we were sorting things out it was certainly a mess.
And here are the rest: (The desk "before" was recreated  just to give you some idea of what I started with!)
Like I said, my "befores" got deleted, but trust me, this desk looked like a landfill!
AFTER: The desk is organized and neat. That basket holding some 3-ring binders was salvaged from the garage, and the baskets hold paperwork and desk supplies that have to be kept up high, out of reach of my 4 year-old.
OK, it's a sickness.... but the matching labels made me happy.
In case you're wondering, behind from where I took this picture, this room opens up into our living room. There isn't a wall behind me. This room should really be a formal dining room, but we've made it our computer room.
So, there you have it. The room feels bigger and definitely much cleaner! I enjoyed doing this challenge, as it gave me a definite target date to finish the projects. I have one last pile of toys to carry downstairs, and then I'll be done. Whew! 
Head on over toI'm An Organizing Junkie to see how others did! | 
