It’s amazing that I haven’t written anything on this goal in almost three years. The bedroom has changed so much since then. I never exactly forgot about this goal; I just never seemed to have anything to write. Hmmm. I’ll have to do better.

Today I rearranged things again. Gave my Dearest a little more room for his desk and drawing board area, and sorted through a box that had some great stuff in it. I hadn’t done that in a while because the boxes are now all over to one side of the room, not bothering anything.

My bedroom is probably twelve pounds lighter now that I put away (or threw away) the things that were in the box.

One thing I found was a big fat fashion magazine from which I had planned to remove the eyes from the pictures to use in a collage. Today, instead of just tossing the magazine in one pile or another, I actually went through the entire thing and ripped out all the eyes I needed. Sounds kinda morbid, doesn’t it? Well, what I’m going to do with them is sweet and awesome, and now the one ounce of eyes is in an envelope and the rest of the 3-pound magazine is in the shred box, so it can become new paper. 2 years ago

This is going to take some creative resources that I don’t have. My walls are made out of the chalkboard material, so I am going to add some drawings of things I like: mangoes, eggplants and my dog for starters. I’m not very creative, so I will try to gather some inspiration over the next week before I begin.

The other half of this project will be throwing away garbage and keeping my clothes in a more scheduled rotation. I am hitting a bottle neck on Fridays which leads to a week full of dirty clothes floating around. I hope this project is done by the end of the week. 3 years ago

I’m having to take baby steps with this one, but I have now cleared off and organized the top of one bookshelf in my bedroom. It only has the essentials on it and looks very organized. The rest of my bedroom is still quite a mess, but at least one part of it looks good.

I’ll keep working on it to create a sanctuary of peace, one area at a time until the whole room is peaceful and serene. 3 years ago

Can’t have a sanctuary of any sort let alone a sanctuary of peace with all the clutter I have in my bedroom. I’ve begun going through the clutter and bagging up the stuff that I intend to throw out. I’m finally getting some momentum up now that I have cats living with me.

I’m glad for whatever motivation I can get, but I have to ask myself why I would clean up the clutter for my cats but not for myself. That doesn’t seem right. I should value myself and my happiness more than I do. 3 years ago

Okay, in light of the enormity of this task I have decided to start small by clearing off the surface of a 3’x3’ table that I have in my bedroom and restore it to my original purpose for it. That is to hold and burn candles. It used to look very serene and I am determined to make it that way again. Hmmm, maybe I better not burn the candles again until I clear away the clutter next to the table, too. 4 years ago

I expect it will take awhile to accomplish this goal as my bedroom is currently more of a disaster area than a sanctuary of peace. I am prepared to take this one step at a time, though. 4 years ago

I knew I wouldn’t be able to achieve this goal this year but perhaps I can next year. I’d like the room to have a nice style. I love color so I could go in so many different directions with the room. I’d like new paint, flooring, and sheets. 4 years ago

^{I liked the splashes of color in this interior design photograph}

I had several little things done with the room but yesterday we had the most significant progress! A. & E. helped me completely rearrange the furniture in the room and it has made such a difference. It looks less cluttered and cleaner. 4 years ago

When you walk into my bedroom is shouts out feminine!! I think it has a lot of personality. The colors are blue and white with accents of yellow. Except for my desk and the cat condo by the window it is filled with antiques which I love. My iron bed, oak dresser and wash stand, the childrens clothing, and the folk art picture all add to the charm. Well, at least I think so. This is an old picture, minus the cat condo, but you get the picture (no pun intended!). 4 years ago

So much done. It will be easier to work on this now that the bulk of it is cleared out of the way. I’m glad I said yes to help. 5 years ago

My youngest son’s girl friend is coming over to help me start anew on the “sanctuary of peace”. He came through my drape and said she wanted to help and I said “yes”. I have given up trying to figure out why I can’t do this myself. I accept that I can’t do this myself and I said “yes” to help. 5 years ago

six loads of laundry washed, dried, folded
and put away, bathroom done, kitchen done,
garbage done, makeup on. ready to go. 5 years ago

:D 5 years ago

But for now as we prepare to move, I need to put it on the back burner. I will keep this goal in mind as I search for a new home. I will not live in the living room in my new place. I will have my sanctuary of peace. 5 years ago

The spare mattress is out of my room. Yay!

Once I FINALLY got my game closet all organized, the hall was bare again, and it’s four feet wide and echoey, so I dragged the mattress around three corners, tipped it up so it is standing vertically, and leaned it against the wall.

“Doesn’t that look a little tacky?” you might ask.

Maybe. So? It gets used a lot—by the very people who would otherwise come down the hall and call it tacky, but they don’t because that mattress is one of the reasons they come to our house instead of staying at a hotel.

That and the big homemade breakfasts they get for free when they wake up.

;) 5 years ago

When I lie down to sleep I tend to think about my problems and get anxious.

I don´t want to take sleeping pills again … 5 years ago

My bedside table is now neat and clean. :D
I like the way I feel when I organize things and keep them organized. Why don’t I do it more often? Why do I let clutter invade my life? 5 years ago

Yay! I went through boxes today and got rid of a bunch of stuff and condensed what was left into fewer boxes. That by itself was pretty huge, but that was the little, easy part.

I moved all the boxes from in front of my dresser. It’s a long, low dresser and because the boxes FIT right there, they seemed to take up residence. There are still plenty of boxes to go through on TOP of the dresser, but I have that much of my floor back and I am psyched! The boxes are now up on shelves and are accessible when I need them, but not in the way, and my bedroom just took one giant step toward becoming a sanctuary of peace! 5 years ago

it turns and goes another way. Months ago we changed our living arrangement and the use of the space we lease. While in the hospital I came to understand the I really needed to split up my sons who were living in the HUGE master suite. I had moved into the small second bedroom. The room I was going to make a sanctuary is now a bedroom for my younger son. My older son now has the suite to himself. It has it’s own outside door. I now sleep in the living room. That sounds so weird, but it works. And very nicely. We weren’t using the living room. My day bed is a beautiful piece of furniture and it looks nice in the living room. The room needs paint, but happy happy green won’t cut it. So I will be shelving the happy happy green and rethinking the space. I will still make it a sanctuary of peace. 5 years ago

Ever since I first stumbled across this goal back in July, I have been thinking about all the wonderful things I could do to transform my bedroom into a sanctuary of Peace.

The room is stacked with boxes right now. No, I’m not moving and I have lived in this house for 12 years. I file and store things in boxes, that’s all. We have virtually no storage in this house except the garage and I don’t want all my possessions stuffed away in the garage.

I have to do some thing, though. The room has the ambience of a warehouse, or at best, an office, but certainly not a sanctuary of peace.

These are the steps I have thought of so far. I don’t know how long it will be before I can really start accomplishing them, but at least I will have something to think about:

1. Clean the room. This is not as easy as it sounds. Only half the room belongs to me and the other half is MY other half’s business. He will not appreciate me moving around or messing with any of HIS stuff. Maybe I can make a cute little gate between my side and his. hee hee hee =D

2. Put away, throw away or give away all of my clothes. I have been slowly doing this for a while, but I’m getting the idea that it may be time to overhaul (or would that be “underhaul”?) my wardrobe.

3. Minimally make the bed—just good enough for sleeping until I really get to the bed part of my plan. I don’t want to spend time making it every day when I have so much else to do.

4. Go through each and every box. Condense boxes and get rid of a lot of stuff I’ve been holding on to “in case I needed it.” Store condensed, labeled boxes in Office closet [such as it is (eyeroll) I need to clean it out first!]

5. Put up the two big pictures and move the small ones to smaller spaces. All of them are Kinkade-style paintings of country cottages with peaceful paths or gardens, so they will be perfect for what I want to accomplish in there.

-6.-DONE!Get that mattress out of my room!!!!! We have an extra king-size mattress that the kids drag into the family room to camp out on when they have friends over, or our relatives use when they come to town. It used to lean against the wall in the hall, but has lately come to residence against the craft hutch in MY room. I do not like it there. It doesn’t really have a place and can’t be maneuvered around all the corners it would take to get it in and out of the garage. Plus, the hall is all echoey now. It may as well go back there.

7. Make luxurious curtains with tiebacks and buy a fancy curtain rod to hold them up. I will have to work around the blinds, but I plan to do that by ignoring them.

8. Get a little stand for my “new” jewelry dresser and set it up in my sitting area. First paint the narrow, 15-drawer dresser all cute. I was thinking M.E. style, but that would go better in my studio. OK. #8 checked off. I’ll put the jewelry dresser in my studio.

8. Now I need a new #8. OH! Clear off the dresser so I can put my boombox in there to play soothing music … or totally jam out with some hip hop when I’m in the mood. =)

9. Re-design the closet so the husband won’t be afraid to go in there and put his clothes away. It’s not scary now. In fact, it’s probably the best part of the room, but he piles his clothes on top of his dresser so he won’t have to walk all the way across the room to the closet. AAAACK! It’s exasperating. I’m sure he would appreciate having a sanctuary, too, but he likes the convenience. Maybe I should just have him build himself some shelves around his dresser and I can take over the ENTIRE closet. Yeah. That’s a good idea!

10. The Bed. The only real sanctuary in the world. The place of physical rejuvenation. The place of physical intimacy. The place of staying up all night dreaming with each other and sharing our dreams with the Universe. ... Yeah, well we don’t have a headboard, so the window covering I put up will serve as part of the bed decor. I will look for rich colors and soft linens to complete the setting. I have a bunch of pillows already and if they don’t go, I will make pillow cases in better colors and MAKE them go. I can tie pretty cords and ribbons around old pillows, too, and give them a totally new look.

This is going to be great. :]

If only I could start immediately, but I have other projects to tackle first. Soon. Very soon! 5 years ago

As I go through this space, I touch each item and consider whether I really want to keep it in my room any more. It is time to let go of an entire classification of books. Wedding gifts from people who never really liked me. Things my children made for me in kindergarten. I’ll scrapbook some of those items. I really only want the things that will help me move forward into my new happy, dignified, peaceful, joyous and abundant life. 5 years ago

I went to OSH today and bought paint, Spearmint Green. I also brought more of my belongings back here from my daughter’s. I’m getting excited. 5 years ago

With gentle motherly persuasion I insisted that it would be possible to go to my daughter’s and retrieve my daybed from her apartment where I used to stay on week-ends when my estranged husband and I were bird-nesting. Both son and son-in-law were very skeptical. My daughter kept smiling because she knew I was determined. The frame, taken all apart, went in the trunk of my car and the mattress and platform were tied on top. Mom wins! The daybed is now reassembled in the little room and the hide-a-bed mattress is back in the hide-a-bed. I get to sleep on my very own bed tonight. Ta Da!! 5 years ago

OR should I say out the sofa. I pulled the mattress out of the sofa and put it on the floor in the bedroom. I can have privacy while I prepare that room for my furniture to be returned from my daughter’s apartment. I slept very well last night. What a strange life this is, I feel as if I am starting over from square 1. Well maybe 3 or 4. This too shall pass. I’m visualizing my new room as I write this. Next month this will all be a bad memory. Pace yourself my dear, pace yourself. 5 years ago

As this marriage changes and this separation becomes even more separated it is now time for me to create my own bedroom again after sharing a room with a man for 21 years. Chaos reigns in the little room now. We gave the boys the big master suite. Such a mixture of pain and tiny little new sprouts of excitement and do I dare say joy. There is such grief and desolation in there now. It is time to begin. I can’t sleep on the hide-a-bed in the living room forever. I’m going in, wish me luck, joy, peace, hope. 5 years ago

we’re in the middle of trying to do the house up and inevitably as always seems to happen everything moved out of other rooms seems to congregate into our bedroom. So intead of having this goal glaring me in the face and adding to the pressure of getting everything done I’m moving it off the list until we’re at a position when I can actually make it happen. 5 years ago

Yesterday I began washing some of the hamper clothes. I’ve started putting clothes into the closet to get them all into one space so I can go through and get rid of some. Cleared the floor a bit as well. 5 years ago

clear the floor of clutter
have all clothes fit into closet and perhaps one other container
clear head of bed of clutter and put books/ds games in neatly
rearrange and dust shelves
empty hamper of dirty clothes
hang up artwork
hang up big mirror (already a goal in itself)
place candles and actually use them
keep creative things near bed – (books to read, small knitting projects, a small sketchbook)
place relaxing/inspiring cds near stereo and actually use them
move bed to other side of the room
have little vanity/jewelry area
make the bed

(I’ll add more if I think of anything else.) 5 years ago

Him indoors has set himself an aim to get himself fit and has been going to the gym while he’s away at work. So he asked me to buy him some weights and a bench ready for when he came home. Which I did. The weights found their way up to our bedroom on his return and the bench sat in it’s box for a week. Wednesday I opened the box and we got the bench built up. Tonight I suggested that maybe the weights could move out of our room and into the same room as the bench :/ 6 years ago

sanc·tu·ar·y
n. pl. sanc·tu·ar·ies
1.
a. A sacred place, such as a church, temple, or mosque.
b. The holiest part of a sacred place, as the part of a Christian church around the altar.
2.
a. A sacred place, such as a church, in which fugitives formerly were immune to arrest.
b. Immunity to arrest afforded by a sanctuary.
3. A place of refuge or asylum.
4. A reserved area in which birds and other animals, especially wild animals, are protected from hunting or molestation

Somewhere where I can feel relaxed, somewhere where I can go and be glad to be there. A room that is peaceful, serene and not the centre of chaos that is currently feels like.

• Clear out the homeless junk.
• Decorate.
• Replace the old horrible yucky coloured carpet.
• Sort out some sort of window decoration, I currently don’t have any and while I don’t want to shut out either the stars or the rising sun the window looks bare. (Don’t worry I don’t scare anyone by prancing around naked in front of the window)
• Buy a new duvet and lovely plump pillows.
• Organise some sort of artwork. 6 years ago