Every DIYer's Dirty Secret

When you DIY, you are bound to have one project room that looks like this:

What IS all of that junk?

Does this resonate with my fellow DIYers? For some of you it's your garage, others have an extra room, or a basement to store this stufdf. I finally got around to cleaning this room for several reasons really: 1) This is a fire hazard. I couldn't walk in this room it was so messy! Most people know that I don't kennel my dogs because I'm paranoid there will be a fire and they won't be able to get out. 2) I'm a neat freak. My mom is shocked and amazed because my room looked like the above photos throughout much of my childhood. 3) I wanted to make this space more functional for guests, a project/craft room as it was initially intended, and I needed a landing space for my misplaced downstairs furniture. More on that here.

Some of this stuff went to live in the underbed storage in the guest bedroom, some in the guest closet (namely the additional guest twin bed), some in the garage-- projects that just needed cleaned up and put away, and items to donate to Goodwill or Restore.

Most people are familiar with Goodwill. This is a charitable organization that supports a diverse group of individuals, but they are most commonly known for employment and aid to people with developmental disabilities. A less familiar charitable organization is Habitat for Humanity Restore. This donation driven program is supported by individuals and retailers. The products include gently used (or in our case sometimes unwanted but unreturnable) building materials. This is just a friendly reminder this holiday season to donate that old t-shirt or ceiling fan if they are still in good working condition.

Here are the afters with just a little good old fashioned cleaning (well, picking up mostly):

View from the doorway

View from the closet

What a huge difference. I can't believe I ever let this room get that nutty. I know I wanted it for a DIY/craft/project room, but that was insane. It wasn't even functional. You can still see a bit of miscellaneous stuff on the computer desk. Most of that consists of projects that need to be taken care of: sell the desk and chair (any buyers? $20 each), sell some old Nintendo games (any buyers? price varies), several frames that need hung/new pictures/spray painted, and some in process craft projects (like my failed canvas attempt). My grandma gave all of the old school Nintendo games to Tim when my grandpa died, but both Tim and my grandpa had a ton of games. We still have a collection, but we won't be keeping every single game. There were even some duplicates.

I used my displaced furniture from downstairs in this room. It's at least a functional sitting space. When we have guests (like this weekend), I'll move the furniture to accommodate an inflatable mattress or the fold up twin. A small desk worth of items isn't too bad, but I still need to tackle those items. Now that I actually have room, I will be able to tackle these!