111 challenge: week one

 I mentioned earlier that I try to purge regularly in our home .. to keep my clutterbug nature at bay.  Initially, I was concerned that I would have a difficult time finding 111 things to get rid of in our seemingly tidy nest.

But then. as all the Christmas decor came down.. I realized that there were a few spaces in our house that have been severely neglected over the past few months.  We have a fairly small house, so when I did a quick tour to take some "pre-111 challenge" pics, I was suprised by the spaces I have let become un-functional.

For example, my office:

Not only is it going through a bit of an identity crisis: I don't really need it as a full office since I'm no longer a student, but I'm not quite sure what direction I need it to go; but it has become one of the worst catch-all spaces in our house.

Every corner is filled with yardsale finds, assorted home decor stuff, unpacked moving boxes (from over a year ago!), and papers, papers, papers!!

Another space is the spillover from the Holidays in our third bedroom.  I stored all my servingware in here during the party season, as well as gift wrap and boxes.  My initial reaction is to just move all that into my office.. but hopefully I can be a bit more selective with what is worth saving or storing.

My final gem is my linen closet.  We are really lucky to have quite a bit of closet space in our house, and to me-- this closet has the most potential. 

The first few shelves seem fairly nice:

but I have to admit that I could probably lose over half the things in those bins and not cry. The worst part of this closet is the bottom half.  It's filled with more moving boxes, a non-working lamp or two, some vases, and then random items just shoved willy-nilly. The linen closet, along with my office closet need the most work. The office closet is my craft supply catch all, home to unfinished projects, and too many bins and clutter catchers.

  Enough exposition...

Let the purging begin.

So far, I have a paper box in the livingroom and my purge-atory in the garage. Probably about 20 things, and that's without actively sorting and attacking the mess.  It's not much, but it's a start.

How's your challenge going?

Check out everyone else's week one progress over at Words on Wendhurst!