Last night I went to bed relatively early. After making my bed during the day it looked so comfortable I laid down on it for a while. I have no idea how long I slept, but I woke up feeling wonderful about my impromptu nap. While I had intended to rearrange the furniture in the back room and call it a day, I realized that my room was bothering me so I went in there, took apart the bed, moved my desk, chairs, and the cabinet I'm using as a night stand. The end result is me being significantly less stressed and happier about how my room functions. I still have to go through my clothes and find some storage solutions for them, but I pulled the binders I had in the kitchen into my office space, set that up, and that was a tremendously satisfying experience.
In Jane's room I pulled her bed away from the long wall and moved it along the wall with the window. Her bed has two very tall posts, in my 'Use What You Have Decorating' book the author talks about furniture and art creating a roller coaster effect if there is a great discrepancy in heights and placement. Human eyes search for balance which can be achieved by grouping furniture and artwork of similar heights. This is probably the single best takeaway from that book and it really does make a difference once you learn how to do this. She suggests the space between the tops of furniture and the art intersections be no more than five inches apart from each other. Tall items can be balanced by another tall item, a mirror, a plant, a screen, etc...
I was able to follow the rules fairly well in Jill's room with the exception of a small bistro table I have in there. I have an even smaller table and chair in Jane's room. I may take her table and use it in the TV room as a coffee table. I enjoy having a flat surface to work on, but the girls do their homework in bed, sometimes Jane sits on the floor which I can't believe is comfortable, but seems to work for her. I put vertical filing systems in their rooms for paperwork. Neither of them is using it so I may rethink that. I'd like to paint and get different bedding for both rooms. Jill's furniture comes together better than Jane's whose dresser badly needs to be either painted or refinished. I was thinking a black and cream room for Jane, I'm not sure what I would do in Jill's room. I'm not wild about the blue in my room, but can live with it for now.
My front hall has a very small bookcase that holds about half of my books. The rest of them are in cheap cloth bins that I originally bought for clothes since I don't have a dresser of my own. The girls don't really use their dressers effectively, but I don't want either of theirs even though at times I'm tempted. The windows need to be cleaned, the lawn needs to be mowed, I straightened things up as I went. Sweeping in the bedrooms yielded piles of dust, wrappers, papers, and socks. The kitchen and dining room needs to be swept. The entire house needs cleaning, but first I'm going to make some calls. There are sticks to be picked up in the yard, it's rainy and cold here which is suiting my current mood. Yesterday I read some fiction for fun and realized I need breaks like that from more serious thinking.
While I dislike thinking of myself as a procrastinator, I've been putting off things that need to be done that I could be doing. Now that my furniture flows more evenly I can see where floor plants could be placed. They won't be on my budget for a while unless I get a job, but it's exciting to discover room where they can grow. I have a couple of smaller plants, never in my life have I viewed plants as clutter before, but they have to be picked up and moved to dust and some of them tend to get knocked into and around in their current locations. I have one in my closet next to my desk, that's a tighter fit than I would like so it will probably get moved. I feel great about the changes and know that it will only get better from here out. Just have to get out of this early morning funk I'm in and start my day off in a better frame of mind.