Tiny little projects

I spent a lot of my time off between Christmas and New Year's Day tackling little, odd jobs that have been nagging at my brain for a long time.  I didn't paint the trim on the new living room windows, I didn't start a sewing project that I have a pattern and fabric for (and have had for a few years now), I didn't redo the grout in my bathroom (I have tools and grout waiting at the ready).  I decided to work on little projects that I knew I could finish, and that would leave me time to do other things.

Here is the list:

I cleaned out two drawers in my bedroom.  One of them wasn't bad, and is the drawer I use to store (among other things) my jewelry and earrings and a collection of my mother's handkerchiefs.  And an inexplicable amount of old eyeglasses.  I believe there were six pairs.  Because I don't get new glasses every year, they must have dated back about 10 years.  I bagged them up and took them to the drop off donation box at the mall.

The other drawer was a kind of a catch all, junk drawer.  Why would someone have a junk drawer in the bedroom?  It was also the top, right drawer on my dresser, which is the most accessible spot on the dresser.  And I never used it...except to dump junk.  So I cleaned it out and honestly got rid of almost everything in it.  That left me with an empty drawer that I could fill with whatever I want.  In our little bedroom where storage is at a premium, an empty drawer is huge.  I put sweaters in it for now, but may get a brainstorm later on.

I hemmed a pair of slacks I bought months ago and altered two other pairs to fit.  Basically I gave myself three new pairs of slacks in one morning and I didn't have to leave the house.

I packaged up and mailed a book to R's sister.  The turnaround was record time for me, as we usually have stuff like that sitting for months.

I cleaned photos off of my camera and ordered prints.  I bought a little album for the newest grandson  and added photos to the other g-kids albums.  I cleaned photos off of my phone because I could no longer view any pictures I took (I guess there were too many).  I haven't ordered those yet, but they are on my computer, ready to upload after I sort through them.

I took down the Christmas decorations on the 27th, the day after we had our celebration with the kids.   I purchased new clear storage bins and repackaged everything to make more sense.  We got rid of things we don't use, giving some to the kids and boxing some up for Goodwill.  The rest was organized and now we can tell what is in each box without having to open it.  I threw out the copy paper boxes we had used to store decorations since we were first married, and I had no pangs of sentiment or nostalgia whatsoever.

I made noodles for the soup dinner and Christmas celebration with my family.  They were awesome.  I wish I had made extra and froze some, but maybe next time.

And that is how I spent my Christmas vacation, at least when we weren't celebrating the holiday with friends and family.  Pretty great, huh?