Last summer, Michael and I started talking about getting some things accomplished around the house.  We created a budget and plan and worked on it all through the fall and winter.  And this month, we are going to get the bigger projects accomplished, just in time for the arrival of our little one!

The first project on the list was a shed in our backyard for Michael’s aquarium hobby.  A few years ago, he had a frag tank where he grew coral frags that he would sell to friends and at frag swaps.  This is one great way to get involved in the aquarium community, and he really liked doing it.

But he closed up shop, so to speak, after our second daughter passed away and took a year off.  He definitely wanted to do it again, but wanted to make sure he had the proper space and time to do it.

And that’s when he got the idea for having a shed in our backyard to move his frag growing tank.  He also wanted to build it in such a way that it could be used for other things down the road.

We ended up hiring a contractor to do the work, since it is busy season for Michael, and I’m, you know, pregnant (could you imagine me building this right now?).  So here was the process last week.

Before.  This was where my garden was last year.  We moved the garden to the other side of the yard, which actually will work out better.

After the first day (you can see the platform).

During the second day.  I stayed inside with the pups during most of the construction, so that’s why these look like sneaky pictures from the window.  Because they are.

The final product!

I refer to it now as our barn because of the big door in the front.  Michael still has to paint it to match the house, and we have an electrician coming to wire it, but it’s neat to see the project come together!

For the month of January, my home goal was to clean out and organize the coat closet downstairs.  This closet has been an electronic catch-all, plus any boxes the electronics come in, plus a lot of paint cans (which you soon shall see).  So, let’s begin with the before picture, shall we?

I wasn’t kidding about it being a catch-all.  This is also a safety issue, as this closet is where we usually go when there are tornado warnings.  With all of the junk left in there, we would hardly fit!

First, we removed everything from the closet, vacuumed and dusted all of the walls.

The word for this particular project was “purge”.  There were just a lot of things we didn’t need and probably just needed to be recycled. Here were a few of the collections.

All of the cables, cords, and even cell phones since we have been together.  Check out the blackberry!  In addition to the cables and cords, you will see several routers that we have inherited over the years.  Those are also going to be recycled.  We kept the extension cords, outlet extenders, and a few of the cables, but the rest he is going to take with him to work, where there is a computer recycling place.

Also, all of those paint cans include pretty much every color we have used on our walls and every paint color the previous owners used as well!  I ended up taking a picture of each sticker on the top of the paint cans so that we could have that information instead of housing all of these huge cans in our home.  Some of the paint cans have dried out by now, and some of the paint cans were pretty much empty.  It was time for them to go.

As I was going through everything, Michael built these basic shelves in the back of the closet.  I wanted something vertical so everything doesn’t end up on the floor.  Once I had gone through everything, it was time to put everything back.

I got rid of all the wire and random hangers, keeping a few of the same kind (and one that is a little more sturdy for my winter coat).  I put all the cables in the small box on the top shelf, along with a backup fire alarm and some carpet cleaner (since we house the vacuum in here too.  On the second self, I put another bin of extension cords and my husband’s toolbox.  And then, on the third shelf, there is a bin that holds all of the things on my mantle when I decorate for holidays (and I need somewhere to put the things that I take down) as well as some computer bags for travel.  We also house the air filters in here.

Now we have plenty of room, and we can access everything in the closet.  It was a lot easier than I thought it would be since most of the things were purged.  Sometimes projects turn out that way.  I’m glad I can check this one off my list!