Laboring on Labor Day...Well Kind Of

For the past couple of days and nights Rondell and I have worked really hard to get our basement clean and organized. There was a lot of sweat, sneezing, jumping (from the spiders) and laughter. We are so happy to have it done overall, even though there are a few things that need to be tweaked.

Beware...picture overload!

Here's the before. There was stuff EVERYWHERE! Since we've lived in this house the basement has just kind of become a dumping ground. It was out of control and a major tackle.

Here's an after (for the most part) picture. You can actually see the floor! It is amazing.

First we tackled this section under the stairs. There was all kinds of stuff under here...light bulbs, floor tile, boxes... We cleaned it out and decided to put boxes that we want to keep in this space. Right above it is Rondell's shelf. I love my husband, but man does he have a lot of stuff. So, this allows him to have a space for his stuff (notice, it's a limited space...hee, hee).

This is what will eventually be my beautiful craft area. We basically just put all things craft on this table and Rondell moved a bookshelf next to it so that I can have space for my growing hobby. It's not my dream space, but it's mine! Wait, maybe it's me that has a lot of stuff and not Rondell...nah!

This is stuff that we're going to donate (you can also see the shelf that Rondell moved next to my craft table). We put more stuff there after I took this picture but basically we needed an area to put this kind of stuff. The toys will most likely go to our church's nursery and we'll donate the clothes and household items to charity...then this space will be empty!!!!

We combined some coolers (there are a couple of smaller coolers inside this big cooler) and put them in the garage.

This is when we started to get excited because we could see the floor.

Here are my shelves under the stairs...all organized. This is my holiday stuff. The bottom shelf has all things Christmas. The shelf above that has a Fall container, a Halloween container (because they're different you know), and my Valentine's Day and Easter decorations.

On the shelf above it I put a container with all of my gift bags and party decorations and wrapping paper. I spent the other day trying to find a gift bag and couldn't because they weren't in a designated space, but I won't have that problem anymore!

Even the laundry area got a face lift. Rondell had all of his painting stuff over here and it had to go. I just need to scrub the sink and maybe get a fun sign.

Rondell vacuumed each and every shelf. You can kind of see the wrapping paper, etc. shelf.

Here are the other shelves. The bottom shelf has all things painting. Just above that I have serving dishes that I don't use on a regular basis. To the left of the shelves is a bunch of stuff that needs to be thrown away but our trash can is full, so that has to wait.

Continuing with the shelves...this shelf has my cookie tins (in the blue bin) and cake and pie items.

So there you have it...our major tackle. There is still a list of things to do, like clean the sink, organize my craft stuff, donate...but overall this is a HUGE accomplishment.

For more tackles, check out 5 Minutes for Mom