More checkmarks on my "to-do" list!

I have had the same "to-do" list for a while now.  I finally made some time this past weekend and got a few of them marked off. 

Emily's room has been in a horrible state of confusion and disarray for months now.  I got a nice all-wood entertainment shelving unit from a fellow Freecycler last year, and I wanted to clean it up and finish it since it was bare wood and dirty from the previous owner's young boys.  Unfortunately, I made the mistake of putting it in Emily's room just to get it out of the garage because I wasn't ready to work on it yet, and it hence became a catch-all for her stuff, and apparently a clean canvas for her writing and artwork (she wrote and drew all over the place on it).  Since the last hamster died (it has been a horrible year for pets at our house) and we no longer need the 2 cages in her room, I cleared off took the shelving unit out of her room and moved it to the garage.  Then I commenced cleaning her room, organizing her 3946703476 Littlest Pet Shop toys and accessories and 94603497 Barbie toys and accessories and other assorted toys and trinkets in to categories and separate bins.  I went through most of her clothes, bagged up the ones that didn't fit any more and set them aside for the Goodwill trip.  I stripped her bed, washed all her linens, cleaned out her school backpack (yeah, a month and a half after school let out), and vacuumed everything.  The next morning (YES, it took me ALL DAY to do the major cleaning), I steam-cleaned her carpet, remade her bed, and then headed to the garage to tackle the shelves.  I sanded it up and applied a couple of coats of clear polyurethane to it and finished it up in about an hour.  Really kinda made me feel like a turd for not doing it sooner.  It looks SO much better!  Next day, after it was fully dried and ready for use, I put it back in her room and put all her nice neat little bins and books and stuff back on it, nice and tidy.  Her room is spotless and the way it SHOULD be once again.  If only for a little while.... but she hasn't even slept in there all night yet!

Anyway, those are some of the things checked off my list of stuff to do.  Of course, in true Deanna fashion, cleaning her room led to my cleaning the laundry room because of the dryer working so slowly... lint was clogging it up so badly that nothing would dry and I'm surprised the house didn't burn down.  I clean out the inside of the lint trap and dryer vent at least once a year, usually twice if I can remember, so it was weird that it had so much in it.  Anyway, that room was another check on my list.

The bad part is, that I spent almost all of my "weekend" away from work working at home on chores.  But it felt good to get something accomplished, so I guess it's okay.  :)