This is a fun tradition that my husband and I started on our first official vacation together (which was a Caribbean cruise.) We bought a piece of decorative mexican pottery as a souvenir. Something like this:
Since then, we have bought a new piece every time we've gone done south on vacation (plus a few times my husband has gone on business) and now we have a collection of nine. Before we have them half hung randomly here and there, but I hung them all together yesterday in our office and they look awesome! It was also a fun trip down memory lane to try to remember where and when they were all purchased. We have seen so many places. Mexico, Bahamas, Dominican Republic, USVI, Guatemala, Trinidad and Tobago, etc. I need to write on the back with pencil the ones I remember. We have pretty much every trip commemorated, except for our honeymoon in St. Thomas, USVI. But we have some magnets from our fridge that we got there. My favorite one we have is actually not pottery. It is a metal wall hanging shaped like a sun that we got from the Dominican Republic. It is my favorite because it is so huge and beautiful. And we got it on the trip during which we got engaged. :)
Now, as far as my other goal, the kitchen. I got it about 1/2 done. Actually, I had it about 75% done, and when J got home. he cooked me an awesome dinner. Which was so delicious, but trashed the kitchen (imagine tomato basil pesto ALL OVER my stove). So, I need to get a move on today to clean it up.
Speaking of today...
After I finish the aforementioned kitchen, I will be moving on to the master bedroom and bathroom. One of the projects I will also be tackling today is laundry/outfit building.
Once a month or so, I like to do something I call outfit arrangement. Basically, I put together as many outfits as I can (top, bottom, etc) and I hang everything together on one hanger. That way, in the morning, all I have to do after showering is reach into my closet and pull out one hanger. And when I say the whole outfit, I mean the whole outfit. Have you ever seen in department stores, they will often style a hanging mannequin, that is either hanging from the wall, or even from the rack itself, in front, with all of the clothes behind it?
Well, I basically do the same thing - I set up the entire outfit on one hanger. blouse, cami, skirt, cardigan. Dress, belt, scarf. Whatever. I try to also create a mix of options, as well. Casual outfits, dressy outfits. And, I try to set up as many as I can at a time (20-25, which gives me 4-5 weeks of outfits.)
Now, I am not going to say that I don't occasionally do some last minute outfit switches the morning of, but for the most part, I pull each outfit out of my closet and wear it as is. Not only does that help with time management in the morning, but it is also helping me in my quest to edit my wardrobe down to only the essentials that make me feel beautiful and confident.
I had one skirt in particular, that I had a lot of trouble paring into an outfit, and when I finally found something to pair it with, I found myself skipping over that outfit over and over, not wanting to wear it. I finally asked myself, "if you have such a hard time finding an outfit for this skirt, and when it is part of an outfit, you don't want to wear it, WHY do you own it in the first place?" Now, keep in mind, I have had this skirt for YEARS. And, after about 3 months of outfit building, I was able to make peace with adding it to the donate pile.
So, long story short, today will be a laundry/outfit building day. Which will help with the master bedroom cleaning, because right now there is a massive pile of laundry taking up at least 1/3 of the master bedroom!
On a related note, I am feeling an itch to paint either the master bedroom or the office. I may allow myself a treat to paint the master bedroom today IF I get everything else done.
