shelves of our house

Thank you to everyone who has entered my give away for the two address files (previous post). I've been sick the past several days, so I will be selecting the winners once I feel better - hopefully in the next day or two. 

I am sick at home today, Adelaide is off with her auntie who is here visiting us from Toronto, and our house is so quiet and still. I don't feel well enough to do much, but I thought that I'd take this opportunity to snap some photos of some of the shelving around our house and share them with you.

Our house is fairly small - about 1,100 sf. - and since I spend the vast majority of my time here it has become really important to me to have it set up and organised. This was a long time coming - I was never a neat or tidy person! But I learned pretty quick when I became a mama, that if I'm going to be spending a lot of time at home,  it's important to have a home that I feel good and want to be in. I truly would have lost my mind by now if I didn't! 

So long ago I set out on a mission to train (and force) myself and begin to get rid of clutter and have a place for everything to belong. I'm still slowly working on this - but being organised really makes all of the difference in the world.

The shelves in our living room which hold several items, but mostly books, magazines, and my vintage world globes, which I've collected for years. We had two large Ikea Expedit shelves and made them into an "L" shape with one sticking out from the wall, to make a nice reading and movie watching spot, filled with lots of blankets and pillows. This is probably one of the coziest spots in our house, and I have visions of lots of board game playing happening here when Addie gets a bit older.

Here is a bit of the shelf that sticks out from the wall, where I keep most of my paperback novels. I have always loved to read and I keep a look out for goodbooks at thrift shops and used book shops. Although I try to pass on many of the books I've read, I can't bear to be rid of them all. I think they look so nice all together, even on the backside of the shelf. I also hope that by having a lot of books around, Adelaide will learn to love books, too. So far, this is working well!

Beyond this shelf you can see a little into the dining area of our house (which is mostly a play area for Addie), and the front entranceway to our house.

Here is Adelaide's play shelf and area. I was inspired by the shelves in this photograph, and it reminded me of and that it would work perfectly in our house as well. This solution works perfectly to utilize a space that normally wouldn't be that functional. It creates a low, convenient storage space for Adelaide's toys and books without taking up a lot of room. (and gives our kitties a great place to sit and look out the window) 

To make it, Charles and I went to Ikea with our window measurements and checked out every possible shelf that might work. We finally found this ODDA cabinet which was the perfect size, and simply modified it by removing the back and front sliding doors. (Although I also thought it would be fantastic to cover the back red piece with some lovely vintage wallpaper or fabric, too). 

I also picked up a simple white rug at Ikea as well, for Adelaide's "play rug". She loves her play rug and I've found that it is a nice way to encourage her to keep her toys in one spot rather than all over.

Here is the girls' closet, which was formerly my sewing closet before we switched rooms all around. Adelaide and I share this closet together which I found works great as we mostly get dressed at the same time. After moving the rooms, I was unsure what to do about this closet, as the top shelves took over the area where the rod would normally hang, but I decided to keep them in place and simply add a rod beneath them. This has worked out well as Adelaide can almost reach her own clothes and will soon be able to take care of selecting and hanging up her own items of clothing. 

Because this room is tiny and only has room for one small dresser which is Adelaide's, I bought the white baskets which fit the white shelves well, and they are filled with my socks, underwear, t-shirts, etc. The other wicker baskets are filled with itmes like old photographs, Adelaide's lotions and potions, and  a "sick" basket filled with thermometers, cough drops, etc, which is so handy to have ready all in one place.

Finally, here is my computer desk space in the closets which were formally our master bedroom. Once again I decided to make the closet into another place to work, and removed all of the bi-fold doors and standard clothes racks and rails. I hung up some vintage wallpaper to the back wall by simply thumb tacking it up - you can't notice, and I didn't have to deal with glues and rollers! My dad then helped me to hang the white Ikea shelves for storage, and I measured the space and at a hardware store had them cut me a desktop to size. I used some Ikea table legs to form the desk, and covered it with some heavy kraft paper which can easily be replaced when it gets mucky. This is the perfect spot for my computer to be!

The other side of the closet is filled with more work supplies which I don't use as often, and also acts as a linen closet, with blankets, towels, sheets and laundry soap, etc. Because of this I decided to hang a inexpensive bamboo blind which I can open up easily when it needs to be, but cuts the visual clutter nicely when down.

It is funny to me, the things that I do not notice until they are captured in a photograph - such as Jack's little white mouse in the bottom right hand corner, which I guess that he tossed up on the desk while I was taking these photographs: Come on, play with me, mom!