Sprucing Up the Office - For Real This Time!

Some of you early birds know that I have accidentally posted this blog twice (eyeroll) before I was completely ready to do so. But this time I MEAN IT! This is really what I want to talk about today!

Back at the end of December/beginning of January, when all the Christmas decorations went back to their tubby little homes for another year, I spruced up our living room. New picture groupings, new furniture arrangement, just a breath of fresh air for our living space. It has indeed been refreshing. We've enjoyed feeling like we have more space and looking at new things. (I've regrouped some decorations again since then, actually.)

The room I'd been pretty much avoiding since then was my office. But I declared that in the month of June, that office would get some attention. And oh. my. goodness. What a welcome relief that has been!

As you know, I work from home, so the office is my main office. I don't go to another one and come home to this one for social media and bill paying. All the creativity that is my writing/speaking life happens in this room. Or at least it's supposed to. But the piles of papers and mail and books and junk and (well, you get the idea) had all gotten crazy out of control. So I just started going in there for a few hours a day and slowly sprucing it up. Want to see what I did?

We have two huge bookshelves in the office, and 99% of their contents belong to me. I have one shelf designated primarily for fiction books and one for non-fiction, but both have a few extra shelves that house work, office supplies, scrapbooks, etc.

I went through both shelves book to take away any books I didn't want to keep. (That was a small list!) I do that periodically just to make sure I'm not using very precious real estate for books I don't love. There aren't many books I don't love. Then, using freebie labels and letters I found on Teachers Pay Teachers, I labeled the sides of the shelves fiction/non-fiction, I labeled where each letter begins in the alphabetical book rows, and I labeled other book sections and shelf-use sections.

I also reorganized some of our pictures and such. (On our last trip to IKEA, I purchased all new 4x6 frames that are turquoise and match each other, so I could replace the mismatched-in-not-a-cute-way frames on the shelves now.) I also pulled pictures from the stack Ryan printed for my birthday so I could update what's actually in some of the frames.

I also bought this really cute date block calendar because I've always wanted one. (Hello, Hobby Lobby gift card!)

After I finished the shelves, I moved on to the walls. I updated this organizer to serve me better in keeping track of lists, upcoming projects, prayer requests, brainstorms, coming-soon events and more. Above it, I replaced a piece of art I no longer wanted with this little sign my sister-in-law made for me.

I cleaned off my perpetual calendar and magnetic white board so I can use them more efficiently. (I wanted to be able to use the white board in my tutoring/reading camp I'm doing.) I updated some pictures on the wall to include a map of Indiana. I mark off every county as we tour it so we can see where we've been and where we need to still go!

Then I started in on the file cabinets. We each have a two drawer file cabinet (which we got for free back when I worked at the station and they were updating their décor). I stayed out of Ryan's cabinet. He can do what he wants with that. But I went through both of mine, threw away things I no longer need, labeled hanging files that hadn't been properly labeled, divided up files that had gotten too fat, and made the whole place much more pleasant.

The last bit for now was to clean off the desk itself so I had room to work! (Our desk is actually an old dining room table that was passed down to Ryan when his parents got a new one.)

So the room is clean and inspiring again! I still have to tackle the closet, which is my office storage, and I have some exciting ideas for that! But for now, the main room is done and usable!