Ingenious

Paige's closet has been a wreck for the longest time.  We have been meaning to get one of those closet organizer thingies, but I can never remember to get one while I am out and about.  Not to mention the fact that they cannot be installed in a short period of time, and that child must take her naps.  So, I had an ingenious idea yesterday.  Why not use something that is currently not being used, and is collecting a very nice layer of dust in the basement - Emily's old toy shelves.  Ingenious I tell you.

So I called Eric - I like to call the office phone when he's all the way down in the basement, and I am all the way upstairs...it's convenient - and told him of my ingenious plan.  He concurred. He didn't just marry me for my looks you know.  

After he finished with his work for the day, and after a frantic search of the whole house for the shelf brackets - they were in the garage - he came armed with his tools for the installation.  It only took about 20 minutes from start to finish - a record for my darling husband.

I would have a "before" picture, but I forgot to take one.  So, here's the after.  If you want to visualize what the before was - just picture all that stuff that is on those shelves, on the floor in a big, huge, totally unorganized pile.  If you know me very well, you know that this whole situation was pretty much grossing me out every time I opened the closet.
The very top shelf in the closet is not as neat and organized as I would like, but it's better than it was.  I did a little reorganization of that area too.  Thank goodness you can't see all the way to the right inside the closet - still a little scary.
Now Paige, and Emily too, can see all the toys at the same time.  It's SO much better this way. Except that her room was a total disaster this morning when she proceeded to pull just about every toy off of those shelves.  But she had fun.
In cleaning out the top closet shelf I found Emily's Baby Einstein Animal Discovery cards. Emily LOVED those.  I am surprised that they are still in one piece.  Well, as expected, Paige loves them too.  It's amazing what joy a 20 minute project can bring to a house.  I am good I tell you.