Storage – Spirit of Dee

A little more comfortable

22 January 202122 January 2021 Dee Leave a comment

As part of the big year of home improvement, I’m gradually adding stuff to help make the space easier and more comfortable for day-to-day living. The coffee table in the centre of our living room had been feeling a bit claustrophobic and precarious, as it was too close to the sofa (meaning I had to squeeze in and out of my favourite spot all the time) and really cluttered on top due to my need to have a cushion on it during the day (I like to put my feet up!). I’ve never kicked any of my drinks over yet, but it was only a matter of time. As such, I bought this useful side table last week.

The soft storage basket in the base provides a space for all my gaming handhelds, and keeping drinks on the top next to me means that they are now at much less risk of being knocked over! This is important given the quantity of electronics I keep and use in the space.

I’ve also been enjoying having all our bread products tucked away out of sight in our new bread bin.

I found it a bit difficult to open at first, but it turns out the trick is not to close it too tightly.

In non-shiny news, I’ve had a fairly busy week. Not too much day job work, but I did have a lot of admin and accounting to do in preparation for submitting my tax return, which was as boring as you might expect! I’ve also been continuing with the TOMM cleaning method, which is still taking me about an hour a day while I get into the swing of it.

From Sunday onwards I was able to go outside to run, which I was really appreciating… and then on Wednesday night it snowed heavily again so I was back indoors on the treadmill yesterday morning! Thankfully it had mostly melted by today so I was back out on the roads again. Hopefully there won’t be any more snow over the weekend as I’ve got lots of outdoor running plans.

I’m still playing ukulele as part of the Zoom group on Wednesday evenings, and I’m still getting as much videogaming in as I possibly can, and… that’s about it. I expect life will continue in this vein for some time, at least until the current lockdown restrictions start to ease off again.

This week’s earworm playlists:

Saturday

The Marcels – ‘Blue Moon’
Ben E King – ‘Stand By Me’
John Barrowman – ‘Anything Goes’

Sunday

Yoko Shimomura – ‘Radiant Historia’
Cast of Oliver! – ‘Food, Glorious Food’
Duran Duran – ‘Friends Of Mine’

Monday

Noriyuki Iwadare – ‘Turnabout Sisters’
The Weeknd – ‘Blinding Lights’
Julian Nott – ‘Wallace And Gromit Main Theme’
Arrow – ‘Hot, Hot, Hot’

And a bonus track Geth was humming that day:

The Lancashire Hotpots – ‘The Technical Support Song’

Tuesday

Men Without Hats – ‘Safety Dance’
Glenn Miller – ‘In The Mood’
Audrey Hepburn – ‘Moon River’
3 Daft Monkeys – ‘Paranoid Big Brother’

Wednesday

Oasis – ‘Songbird’
Duran Duran – ‘Friends Of Mine’
The Strokes – ‘Last Nite’
The Chemical Brothers – ‘Galvanise’

Thursday

Bob Marley & The Wailers – ‘Three Little Birds’
Katy Perry – ‘Firework’
Duran Duran – ‘The Edge Of America’
Revo – ‘Fighting To The End’
Duran Duran – ‘Tel Aviv’
Belinda Carlisle – ‘Circle In The Sand
Duran Duran – ‘Anyone Out There’

Friday

Nintendo 3DS eShop – ‘Main Theme’
Landscape – ‘Einstein A Go Go’
Traditional – ‘America The Beautiful’
Pointer Sisters – ‘Automatic’
Audrey Hepburn – ‘Moon River’

Organisation!

24 June 201824 June 2018 Dee Leave a comment

I was planning to build some bookcases today, but I realised I’d totally forgotten where I’d put my bag of screws for said bookcases. However, I suspected they might be buried at the bottom of my endless bags of bags of different types of fixings, so I decided it was a good time to get round to sorting them all into the various hobby boxes that Geth and Dad had found me for the purpose.

DIY organisation — Approximately three million different types of screws, nails, nuts and bolts, each with their own individual compartment.

The point of this is that it will be a lot easier to find things among my ridiculous array of fittings from now on. It also takes up a lot less space than all the plastic bags I was using:

A boring task, but it’s one more step towards an organised house. The bookcases, meanwhile, will be tomorrow’s project.

Shoe storage!

10 April 201810 April 2018 Dee Leave a comment

One of the shelving projects that Dad and I (mostly Dad) did over the weekend was for my shoes. Even though I got rid of a lot of shoes, I still need a good amount of storage for my remaining 59 62 pairs, especially as I’ve been on a bit of a shoe binge lately (though I think I’m satiated for now). Some of my pairs are ‘legacy shoes’ (i.e. old pairs I’ll never wear again but am keeping in storage boxes or on display for sentimental reasons), and there are a couple of pairs for gardening that I’m keeping in the cupboard off the kitchen, and my dancing shoes live in my gym bag, and my running shoes tend to stay in the Skubb hanger I bought for the hallway…but that still leaves a good 48 pairs that needed a place to live in the dressing room. Which they now have:

Shoe storage — Dad built the shelves, out of our old Billy bookcases, to fit around the wardrobes, chests of drawers and mirror that I have in the dressing room.

As you can see, there’s plenty space for more, which is probably a good thing knowing me.

It’s very nice having all my shoes to hand. Of course, since I put them all up, it’s been pouring with rain and I’ve not been out (save for a very wet run this morning) so I’ve been living in my slippers indoors. It will be good to get some use out of them once the weather clears up, though!

Shelves!

6 April 20186 April 2018 Dee Leave a comment

We built the Ikea Kallax wall for the boardgame collection today!

Kallax boardgame storage — Boardgame storage extraordinaire!

I designed this mishmash of Ikea Kallax units to fit our dining area space a few weeks ago, and ordered the requisite Kallaxes in the big Ikea order. I built the individual units over the last couple of days, and today my dad came and bolted them all together to make a nice solid structure. It got a bit tricky, involving having to shave bits off where the wall width was uneven, but the finished result looks amazing (and Geth finally has access to the boardgames again, which will keep him very happy).

We also started building some shoe storage, but that’s mainly a project for tomorrow!

Retail therapy

28 March 201828 March 2018 Dee Leave a comment

I’ve been buying a lot of stuff the last few weeks. At first it was all house stuff, but lately it’s been mostly treats for me. New clothes for my almost-at-target figure! New makeup for my new makeup storage unit! New shoes (quite a lot of new shoes) for…uh, they’re not for anything in particular, I just love shoes.

I mentioned before that I always feel a bit guilty if I go on a spending spree, but I’ve found it difficult to resist these last few weeks. It’s mainly because I’ve been carrying out a ruthless cull of my entire wardrobe and so the state of this particular collection is always on my mind at the moment. Post-cull, the gaps in my wardrobe are far more apparent, and there are a few areas (underwear, jeans, skirts) where I genuinely do need to buy new things.

I’m not delusional enough to think that’s the case with the shoes, obviously. But I did get rid of an awful lot in the cull, and shoes are pretty, and shoe shopping makes me feel better at the end of a difficult day. I’m very aware that I’ll need to replace this habit with something less expensive soon. Seeing as I can’t go back to binge-drinking now that I’m (sort of) healthy and slim, I imagine it’ll be baths, especially as the bath in our new house is so awesome. I just have to hope I don’t develop a ‘luxury bathing products’ obsession instead, although in fairness it would be cheaper than shoes. We’ll see what happens over the next few weeks.

New shiny things

21 March 201821 March 2018 Dee Leave a comment

After a couple of days of dribs and drabs of small deliveries of house stuff, the big Ikea order arrived today! Most of it (I’ve already assembled the replacement lamp) is still sitting in the middle of the living room, as there’s no space to assemble the units or put them in their eventual places yet. And just when I thought I’d reclaimed that bit of living room floor. Oh well.

I also finally finished the wardrobe cull. It’s amazing how much stuff I realised I just didn’t like or want to wear, and in total I’ve probably got rid of about 75% of my clothes. To be fair, I am now spending a lot of time online, fantasy shopping for replacements, but I’m trying to be good and only (mostly) buying things I actually need.

Now that the Ikea order is here, one thing I can do is start putting stuff into its proper storage boxes. Hopefully I’ll have a properly functioning dressing room, at least, by the end of the week!

(Justified) excessive spending

18 March 201818 March 2018 Dee Leave a comment

I spent a lot of money at Ikea and other homewares suppliers today. There should be lots and lots of shiny packages arriving this week. It’s all stuff we need for the house, though, so I don’t feel guilty about it (I know I shouldn’t ever feel guilty about spending money on stuff I want as long as I can afford it, but broke girl habits die hard!).

I bought new shelving (the Kallax units for the boardgames, plus a couple of things for upstairs), a new kitchen bin (I’m fed up of the ridiculous balancing act required by our current small one), a lamp to replace one of the ones that packed in earlier this week, a magazine rack for the downstairs toilet, hanging shoe storage for our tiny hallway, a wardrobe rail to replace a broken one in the wardrobe that came with the house, a new rug for the dressing room, a chair and mirror for my dressing table (my old director’s chair that I got for my ninth birthday has sadly seen its last days), hooks and other stuff for making jewellery storage, and approximately 1,000 pretty storage boxes for the various shelves in the house. I’m so excited about the packages. All the packages.

I’m not done with homewares buying yet, but I definitely think that’s enough for this week.

Storage junkie-ism

16 March 201816 March 2018 Dee Leave a comment

We’re having to buy a lot of new stuff for the house anyway, so I’ve just treated myself to some new makeup storage:

Sorbus makeup storage — Sorbus Acrylic Cosmetics Makeup and Jewellery Storage Case X-Large Display Sets. I had to copy ‘n’ paste that ridiculously long name off the Amazon website.

It’s going to sit on my dressing table, once I unbury the dressing table. And buy a new mirror for the dressing table. And buy some new lights for the dressing table – well, it’ll live there eventually. In the meantime, it’ll have to perch precariously on the bathroom windowsill. I don’t mind, though, ’cause it’s pretty, and I’ve been desperately wanting to organise something pretty – everything else is so functional and crammed in at the moment.

Also, all my lamps have decided to pack in at the same time for some reason, so I’m currently sitting in the dark. I will be doing the giant Ikea order this weekend, so hopefully there will be more storage organising (and light) soon.