One Room Challenge: Confession Time

I wish my office was looking as pretty, neat and stylish as the

Christopher Peacock showroom at the Boston Design Center.

My One Room Challenge to-do list (week 4)

1. Completely empty office.

I may need to get a storage pod just to relocate all the stuff I am trying to sort through. I am not sure I can get through it one category at a time with any amount of joy at this point (sorry, Marie Kondo!) I am basically feeling pretty overwhelmed by my surroundings, and I have not made much progress since I have been working on other projects that I actually get paid to do, and the rest of the time has been procrastinated away by scrolling through facebook or playing with my new bunny or going out to eat with friends or taking care of my family (not necessarily in that order). 

2. Paint walls, touch up trim and ceiling.

I am not a huge fan of painting, in fact I dread getting started, but if I can empty the room, I will take on this part of the project myself. Once I get in painting-mode it will be fun, right? A fresh coat of paint is the quickest way to transform a room, unless of course you have to declutter the room to paint it.

3. Style the space.

Of course this is my favorite part of any design undertaking, but to get to this point I am going to have to move mountains. And probably reduce my time spent on social media for at least a few days. Already feeling withdrawals.

Can I do it? I am not feeling very confident. I really wish I had a personal assistant. Or a fairy godmother. Or both.

How is everyone else doing with their One Room Challenge? Check out their progress here. And here. 

One Room Challenge + The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up

Ok, I am going to make this brief. I have many rooms in my home that are challenging. Years have passed, and life has piled up, and motivation has dwindled. But I am ready to make a change. Now that I am working from home full-time again, I need to clear some debris from past projects, positions, and bouts of creativity. The photo below is of my home office, taken almost 5 years ago superimposed over a ghosted image of my office today. I can’t even post a picture of what it looks like right now ... it is that bad!

My dirty secret ...

Clutter has taken over every surface in my existing office. Am I a certified hoarder or am I just lazy? Have I given up or am I just too busy looking for instagram worthy moments outside of my four walls to pay much attention to what is right in front of me? Or is it that I am just too micro-focused on creating that I neglect to manage the chaos that ensues from being overly involved in multiple projects? Constantly living in a state of construction while running a household of six certainly doesn’t help, but others manage to make it work – and do so in elegant surroundings – so I really do not have an excuse. But now I do have a deadline, so I am hoping that will help!

My goal in entering the six-week One Room Challenge blogger link-up event hosted by Calling it Home is to hold myself accountable. To put my designer challenge out there into the blogger universe, and to work towards creating a designer worthy space that I am not embarrassed to share with others (including my boys who come in to chat, but seriously have no where to sit!)

How I am going to get it done ...

Have you read the best selling book “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing” by Marie Kondo? I now have it downloaded onto my kindle, and the plan is to use it as a road map to finding my way back to my former uber-organized self. 

Six weeks from now, I am hoping to be able to post a pretty photo of my newly organized office that is a true reflection of my ability to transform a space into a welcoming environment, one that will assist me to be creative while comfortably celebrating my family and all that is important to me. But first I have to clear the clutter. Stay tuned for next weeks post to see how I do. And be sure to link up to follow the progress of other design bloggers who are tackling far more ambitious projects than my own! It takes serious commitment and resources (whether financial or emotional) to undertake a room makeover. But we are all in this before and after journey together, right?! Good luck to the rest of the One Room Challenge participants and to all of you who decide to muster up the courage to tackle your own projects, whether a complete room makeover or just clearing out a junk drawer!

#oneroomchallenge