B&A: Good Friday Springclean

It was the long Easter weekend this week, but instead of cleaning my office over the Good Friday break (which I intended to reorganize and all to make space for new staff), I decided to clean my room which has been turning into quite the junkyard after several weeks of busyness at work. It only took one day, but I was really proud of myself that I had finally found time to straighten out my immediate living space. No surprise that I slept much better that night.

Here are some before and after pictures that I always love to take. I swear by before and after pictures. They are really encouraging and give one such a sense of satisfaction.

This space has always been "sacred" to me.
Somehow, the state that this cabinet is in is highly correlated to how messy I am inside at a particular point of time in life. Interestingly, though, is that my mother has a HUGE habit of stuffing (hiding) things in this cabinet. Clearing it out again was a wonderful feeling. Yes, I cleaned out the side unit too.

Stuff was all over the floor!
It was so refreshing to have a clear walkway again.

After coming back from Bangkok, the space at my bedside somehow became a clutter-attractor.
I cleared everything away, and in its place put a small tray of all the products I use at the start and end of a day - creams, gels, sprays... helps me keep all my things in one place without getting mixed up with the sisters'.

Imagine waking up to this everyday! It was a warzone!
It took quite a bit of effort organizing the nitty grits like jewelry, but it felt so much better after.

Because of the clutter, I completely stopped using this desk and my administrative work piled up!
It was so lovely to be able to see my table again.

Tomorrow, I shall be organizing the office spaces as I have new staff coming in and would like to ensure that proper spaces are created for a new and effective team. I haven't shown the new photos of the office yet, but I will - in time when all the proper spaces are set up! :)

Now that the room is in much better condition, I think I'll be tackling the other side of the landing next week. It's mostly filled with my SIL's stuff...cause they're waiting for their house to be ready, but I think there is some work that can be done on my end at least. It's a really a heap of a warzone - also the first thing that the family sees after we exit our rooms, so it's pretty important to start the day right.

Till next week.

redecorating Tuesday

Ahh, Tuesday. 
Tuesdays have now become my designated "me-day" when I get to do stuff just for myself.

Today, I've chosen to spend some time redecorating this forgotten little space. It's still a work-in-progress though... it's amazing how nit-picky I am with colours and fonts. I simply haven't been able to get the right "feel" out of the typography... but there were only so many choices I was given. Also, yes, I know it's ironic that the background graphic is that of winter, whilst the blog is about springcleaning... but I thought it was a nice philosophical touch to the space. :) Okay, that, and for the fact that I couldn't seem to find any other nice background that made the space look as...clean?

These days, my time has been somehow sucked into a whirlwind of work, thoughts and emotions. It's a strange phase in life I've entered - perhaps it's a normal season of life everyone eventually gets into. I haven't been quite too "on-task" with physical springcleaning projects as I've a whole list of priorities and goals that I have this year - including quite a few reading and working projects - and I have been clocking most of my waking hours to ensure that I stay on track with working toward accomplishing them.

The office has been renovated since the last post, and looks like a completely new place...though there's still quite a bit of unpacking and reorganizing to do. I'll have to put up photos another day though as I have to organize those too. But here's some pictures from the old office and the process of tearing down.

Starting with photos of the mainoffice...

and this was on a normal day.

From the door.

Files and boxes and stuff everywhere.

More boxes and stuff.

It always looked this cluttered.

Even from this angle.
 Look at that disgusting floor!

The library area...okay, I think we were doing some sort of packing that week.
Still, I can't believe I met clients in this space! :(

The walls were lined with all sorts of stuff.

This was toward my office. :( More clutter.

My old space on a generally good day.

My space on a bad day...okay, actually this was in the midst of packing for renos.
Still, it looks terrible!

The "other side" of my "office".

Yep, this was the space we worked in. :/ And yes, I'm glad we renovated.

Here was the start of the tearing down of the central wall.

And here was the start of putting up the new partition.

Shall put up photos of the new office at the end of the week...when I finally properly unpack and organize everything. :)

I'm going to start reorganizing the way I blog here too.
Shall come up with a blogging plan so that I can tend to each one just as well. :)

Writing this post has somehow given me the happies, and a lot of motivation and excitement about tidying up the office. Can't wait to get to work tomorrow.

I LOVE CLEANING!

major springclean preparations

It's been a while since I've last written here as I've been writing in other places regarding other bits of my life that I've been straightening out.

Tomorrow's Springclean plan.
Organized and furnished with spaces
for recycling, for things that need fixing,
as well as a table for our vehicle to be parked for
easy loading of things to be given away. :)

I'm up late today and now find myself writing here as I'm organizing for a major springclean of my factory and preparing for some major renovations and office reorganization. I've been going through stacks of paper as I sketch out spaces...after lots of understanding of our operational processes, storage needs, strategic goals, budgets (argh! budgets!) and all sorts of other details that I've needed to put this whole project together. I've been planning the reorganization of walls (including considering which ones to hack and which to put up), the movement of different furniture, the reorganizing of their uses, measuring, imagining, planning colours and aesthetic detail...it's been quite the feat! I can't wait till it's all done though!

Tomorrow will be the day that my ops team, and VERY amazing helper, will be clearing out our upper store and outer storage cabinets. I'm so excited! I can't wait for the before and after pictures because I know that it will be such a blast - especially that we're finally ready to throw a whole bunch of things out/give them away. And what perfect timing - it's Chinese New Year springcleaning season! It's going to be such a workout! :)

The plan for tomorrow will be a major springcleaning of the two areas, then it'd be down to a lot of measuring of other areas and spaces - including our finishing room, pastry room, staff area, and the office - and some furniture fitting if we can get that done. Then it'd be planning for all the budgets, schedules, and springcleaning tasks for these two weeks before the festive season.

Will come back with the awesome transformation pictures.