Organizing Challenge

I decided to do this organizing challenge I found on Pinterest. It is the Bowl Full of Lemons 14 Week Organizing Challenge.

I did Week 1: Kitchen challenge, though I didn't clean out all the cabinets and wash them like she asks us to. I did go though our pantry and redid that.  Below are the AFTER pictures.

I also wanted to work on our tea cabinet which was a disaster in my opinion. There was tea behind tea, behind tea. Not to mention all the different strainers we have that don't stack well.
Here is the BEFORE:

'

Here is the AFTER:

I found the best thing for all the boxes of tea!  It is the YouCopia Tea Stand.  You can see it on the bottom right. It helped a lot.

I still have another cabinet I want to go through. Hopefully I can do it this weekend, since it is a long weekend. it is our corner cabinet located right next to the tea cabinet. We will see how that goes.

Week 2: Laundry room.  I worked on the Laundry room last summer and have maintained it rather well. So I focused on the metal shelves that were in the laundry room. I hate having them in there, but they are there for the foreseeable future and I need to make them work for me. 

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Still have some stuff to work on, but it is better.  The top 3 shelves still really need some help.

 I really want to install base cabinets and some more upper cabinets. But I know Jason and I will differ on that. He will want to make them, and  I want them before I move out (which isn't going to be anytime soon).  

I have ideas on ways to decorate the room, and need to start doing little things down there.  

In this process I also found a great Facebook Page that is tied to this challenge. It is a great place to go for support, encouragement, decor and cleaning questions, along with other things.

Cats can be Difficult...well 2 of ours are at least

You would think that 3 months after getting a new animal, that everyone would at least tolerate each other right?  Abner and Cauchy are still extremely uptight around Casper, to the point where Cauchy runs whenever she hears him, and Abner still kind of slinks across the floor.

Jason and I were home for almost 2 weeks at Christmas due to the Universities being closed-that is a really nice perk.  So we left the basement door open 24/7 while my parents were here visiting. Then we decided to try switching the cats for a day. So the two grumps (Abner and Cauchy) got brought upstairs, while Casper got to stay downstairs.  

It took hours before Abner and Cauchy would even come up the stairs! They seem to think we seriously traumatized them by getting Casper.  Fast forward a couple of hours and we finally decide to open the basement door and let Casper out.  Never seen animals move that fast! Cauchy and Abner couldn't get away fast enough, though they didn't have a lot of places to go. We closed all the doors upstairs, as well as took the chairs away from the dining table so they couldn't hide under there. 

We had some very rough moments with Cauchy, and she got to spend some time in a pet carrier outside because she wouldn't calm down. She got so worked up in that there I had to wash it since it was fabric. So then she got put in the plastic crate we have, and stuck outside several more times. 

We mentioned when we headed back to work in January that we would just shut the door to the carrier and keep Cauchy separate, but upstairs. We haven't had to shut the door, because she kennels herself and normally only comes out if I am in the kitchen or if I feed her.  I know she moves around a little bit more than that, but it isn't much. 

Abner and Casper seem to be doing slightly better, I mean ever so slightly better. There is still hissing from Abner if Casper comes to close, but they can at least sleep on our bed together at night even if they are on opposite corners. 

I came home from work one night this week and I saw Casper and Cauchy touch noses. I mean they TOUCHED NOSES!!!!!!!  Not in an aggressive way either. Cauchy then promptly went running back to her crate as fast as her fat little legs could carry her. 

Not sure if Cauchy will ever come around to be honest. She was a feral cat to begin with and didn't have much social interaction with people until she walked into our condo one day.  

But at least everyone is now upstairs, that is progress-small- but progress. Hopefully as time goes on, they at least become more comfortable with the whirlwind that is called Casper.