CAMPER UPDATE:
Matt brought the camper home this weekend to start working on it since the weather was so nice. He went through and got all the junk that had been left in it out. He pulled up the carpeting and got rid of that mess. He then cleaned and repacked the tire bearings and checked the brakes, which are good thankfully. He's going to have to rewire everything though. He started tearing out the cabinets. It's a good thing we planned a total tear out because the ceiling is rotted and water has gotten behind the walls and rotted it also. Nothing we weren't expecting though for a camper over 20 years old.
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| Our new remodeling adventure |
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| water damage in back corner |
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| Ugly orange shag carpet he pulled out |
SPRING CLEAN:
The warm weather has triggered my spring cleaning gene so this weekend I started on that major project. I've been needing to get some cabinets in the kitchen cleaned out and sorted so I knocked two of the upper cabinets out and a large pantry cabinet that I store overflow and all the pet treats and food in. I washed the shelves as I emptied them but did not wash the doors as I will do all the cabinets in the kitchen at the same time. And yes I know I have an issue with Mason jars, Matt tells me all the time I need to get over using them for everything but they're awesome and so versatile.
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| Before 1 |
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| After 1 |
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| After 2 |
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| Before 2 |
I was hoping the can organizer I bought would be wider or expand. I think once I get rid of some of the beans on that shelf I might put another one on that shelf for more soups. I'll see how it works. I'll be putting my home canned beans on the mudroom shelves with the rest of my canned goods so that will open a good portion of that shelf.
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| Before 3 |
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| After 3 |
I still have a bit more work on them but it's a definite improvement. I have way too many jars of rice and need to use some of them up. I also found three half bags of noodles that I need to use. I'm still not totally happy with these cabinets but I'll give it some time and figure out how to change up the organizers to make it more functional.
I still have two shelves of pet items but at this point I'm not sure how to reduce it. I also want to get a container to put on the bottom to put the dog food in instead of leaving it in the bag. I'm also thinking of replacing these shelves with pullout ones to make it easier to find what's in that back. The back of this cabinet is like a black hole due to it being so deep. I'd love to find those vertical pull outs to put in it so I could store more pantry items in it and be able to see what I have easier. I did buy a couple metal baskets and put cat treats in one and dog treats in the other. I took the organizer I had in cabinet 2 above and put it on the third shelf to organize the canned cat food so I don't have to pull out a bunch of stuff to get a can.
CRAFTS:
I was able to work on my rug last weekend for about 90 minutes and have only about 8" left on it now. Hopefully this week since I have several nights off. I need to cut some more strips of the brown to be able to continue and I measured and it will fit in the camper!
READING:
I've been reading more of the Bromade Home books by Alison May. I finished up The Winter Home and all the journal suggestions and have started The Spring Home. I've also read The Slow Scrub - A 90 Day Journey to a Cleaner house, which is a way to do Spring or Seasonal Cleaning over 90 days instead of in one rush. It's great for those of us that work a lot and can't devote several days or an entire week to doing nothing but spring cleaning. I'm currently printing The Seasonal Scrub for further Spring Cleaning ideas. These are downloadable ebooks that are only found on her webpage.
PETS:
I've been having issues with Oreo for quite some time now and with her whining so much. I've been worried it was from pain but have come to the conclusion that it's probably boredom. She only does it at night and it typically starts when we're eating. I feel bad for her as she's losing what little eye sight she has left and she doesn't hear well either. Life is rough being a 16 year old dog. Matt's been complaining a lot about it so I needed to do something. For the last couple days I've been making up Kongs and giving all the dogs one when we eat supper. I need to remember to do them up and freeze them so they last longer but they've been keeping them busy for about an hour or more and it's stopped a lot of evening whining. If this continues to work well I'm going to need to buy a lot more Kongs so I can rotate them in and out of the dishwasher to keep them clean. I'm crossing my fingers this continues to work.
