Hi to all of the lovely people following this blog as I try and make my little space more useful, more organised and more 'me'.  I have to say a HUGE thank you for all of the amazing ideas you are all sharing via the blog post comments and via email - I've had so many wonderfully generous people take time out to send me photos and suggestions, I'm totally overwhelmed by it (this means I've had a few tears as a result of reading your emails - but in a good way lol!

I noticed I have yet to reveal what I've done so far - apart from writing blog posts and surfing the net and looking at FAR too many sites with drool worthy ideas!  Well I'm currently in the 'good grief it's a horrible mess' phase of my clean up, I have stuff all over the floor, desk, cupboard and spare room.  As I sort through my supplies, I'm making piles (yes more piles) of stuff to sell or give away or throw away.  I haven't really sold much as I have it in my head I'd like to do the purging all at once - maybe not the best plan, but boy taking photos and writing up info takes forever, so does sorting through your paper stash by the way. I spent 3 days over Easter sorting papers - no crafting and 3 days of sorting papers.  This tells me I had waaaay too many!  Now onto the next area to cull - I'm beginning by looking at my flowers - I just need to locate them all first - he he he.

Now as I knew would happen, the minute I committed to buy something, one of my lovely on-line friends sent me a better idea - isn't that always the way!  This is also one of the reasons I'm going at a snails pace with this - I want to buy one or 2 things at a time, see where they fit into my room and then what I can fit around them - yes it's slow going, but I've done the rush-in thing (that's why I have so many green drawers) - they seemed like a good idea at the time, and this time I will make a difference!

What have I bought so far:

• I mentioned I bought some ribbon rings (will see how these go with the cats), the intent is for these to hang on the back of my double doors.  I bought some removable adhesive hooks to hang them by (in case I change my mind) - I looked at pretty hook units - but there will be something else behind the doors as well and I didn't know if those larger hooks would fit.  The day I bought these I had a lovely email from Mary PS  mentioning that if you have a Cricut you can cut your own ribbon tag hanger templates, and she listed this link for info: Shimmy Bean Creations  and this one My Crafty Spot for the ribbon tag cut file .  Luckily I don't own a Cricut or I would REALLY have been kicking myself lol - but I bet some of you have one!
• I bought a rather nifty Kaisercraft drawer unit - which I intend to decorate and store small items inside - I've had some excellent suggestions about what to put in there by the way.  I also seem not to be the only person who 'had-to-have' one - he he he.
• I have bought 3 new Legacy brand 'Page in Progress' 12 x 12 folders - the purple kind with page protector sleeves, so I can sort my paper stash into 1 folder per colour (I already own a few) I really don't need a shop full of paper - so I've been ruthless with my culling!  Will show you when it's all done - I like that these are smallish and won't hold tonnes - this way I can't overload them and they won't be too heavy for me to lift.
• I have recovered some 'scrap' MDF - you could try looking for this at the local recycling centre, local trade school/high school or sometimes even the local dump - mine collects the good stuff and sells it at the dump entrance (I'm using a large ex-office shelf, or it might have been part of a cupboard which was thrown out).  I prevailed (begged for weeks) one of the very handy men I know to cut it for me and I now have the building blocks to create some open style boxes, which I am planning to use on my desk top to create something like a hutch - again will post pics and more details when done - so far it's just bits of rectangular MDF which I (eek yes Me!) have to put together - preferably so that they are square and sits flat on a desk.  Will see how this goes.... might ask hubby to help.   I did follow EVERY link people sent me looking at hutches - sadly they were either too big, too small or the shipping cost more than the actual hutch - so a cobbled together recycled unit it will be :O)  It was cheap though - I just need to buy the screws and some glue.
• I bought that Acrylic Copic storage unit I was looking at - a bit pricey but PERFECT for what I needed - it has a really small footprint on my desk (will do a seperate post on this later).  This was my most expensive purchase to date - but made a huge difference already on my desk - even hubby approved.

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• I also bought some surface prep and some enamel paint (satin white) and I'm going to paint my ugly brown desk.  I'm also thinking about putting some fresh laminate over the top.  I don't want to part with the desk (and don't want to spend $$ on a new one when this one is just fine), but this beaten up brown desk with bits of laminate coming off, which is seriously scratched and has chipped corners, really could use a face lift!

As you can see, I haven't gone nuts with buying stuff, I'm going slow, but I am making some progress.  I think once I have the base of my hutch/desktop storage put together,  then I can really begin making some sort of decisions and I suspect figuring out what I need to do from there.

May your day sparkle,