In case you're just joining me, I'm following along with Apartment Therapy's January Cure and documenting the process. You can find week four's recap here.

We made it! February is here which means I've completed the cure and while it was a serious challenge I can honestly say my place has come a long way in the past month. That said, this past week I have been feeling under the weather, so I didn't go out on as high a note as I would have liked. Sometimes "progress not perfection" means paying attention to your body and easing up (temporarily) on your goals. Not the easiest thing to admit when you skew a bit type-A, but it's the truth. My bathroom did not get a full scrub down over the weekend, but I did work on "un-toddlering" it by swapping out the plastic stool for something more attractive and cleaning up both the sea of products and bath toys that had taken over, I'll post a little B&A here in the following weeks.

DAY TWENTY 

was to spend three minutes clearing surfaces in each room. Ironically this is essentially my routine every day at nap time and before bed, and I fully credit it with keeping my house (relatively) clutter-free and livable most of the time. I personally love the basket method, where you gather anything that doesn't belong in a given room into a basket and put away everything that does, then move onto the next room putting away anything in the basket that belongs there while adding anything that doesn't and so on throughout the house. Once you clear surfaces it's much easier to walk back through and spot clean as needed (in my case this usually involves vacuuming up the tumbleweeds of dog hair that are continually forming.) The only difference with setting a three-minute timer was the added hustle, and while I'm glad to know I can get a lot done in a short span of time unless company is en route, I prefer to move at my own pace.

DAY TWENTY-ONE

Was to revisit your cleared out living room and replace any items you missed. I already caved in with this one, bringing back the coffee table book and pillow because it was so dang empty, but the rugs that were once in here have been re-homed throughout the house. On the upside, we got a fantastic new set of chairs (you can check them out here) and are on the lookout for a new rug and some pillows to tie the room together. Part two of the assignment was to empty the outbox and while I will have to wait for the weekend to drop off any donations (I share a car) everything is sorted and ready to go. The one thing that I unexpectedly loved about the outbox assignment was that putting stuff in limbo gave me some added flexibility, not only could I strip things away to see a space's potential, I also found myself fishing items out to use in new ways. Some old desk organizers of mine turned out to be the perfect way to store my daughter’s “busy bags” in the top of her closet, and I rescued an old stock pot we’ve since replaced to attempt some DIY projects involving fabric dye.

DAY TWENTY-TWO 

is to keep it going! I’m excited to continue tackling the items on my list from week one, and it was motivating, seeing how much progress you really can make in a months time. Once I get a little more accomplished, I think a full house tour might be in order. 

Thanks for following along with me! I would love to hear your experience in the comments below.