Airing my Dirty Laundry

I am so unmotivated with the house reno projects that I've taken to organizing. Pinky promise that I'll show some of those projects soon. In the meantime...

I can’t turn a wooden hanger away:
My closet is the worst use of space ever. It’s big… 10 feet wide. But only 4 of those feet are easily accessible. I bought a double-rod ClosetMaid organizer; I just haven’t installed it yet. (Yeah, that lack of motivation...) If you haven’t figured out that I hate visual clutter by now, here’s Meg at her most obsessive-compulsiveness.

First, get rid of your wire hangers. They aren’t pretty, they get caught on each other, and they put weird stretch marks in your clothes. Buy a bunch of plain plastic hangers. Personally, I like wooden ones.

Then organize by type. I like to separate my collared shirts from my camisoles and Matt’s work shirts from his t-shirts. Then I organize each section by color. Yes, I said color. Stay with me here. I swear it really cuts down on the decision time. When you dress, don’t you base a lot of your decisions on color? What matches or “goes” with the outfit?

This was my brain this morning: I’ve worn black pants nearly every day in the last week. Before anyone thinks I’m wearing the same pair of pants over and over, maybe I should wear gray today. (Scan gray pants, pick a pair.) I think a teal or green sweater would look good with the gray. (Scan green sweater section.) Hmmmmm… I need to layer a shirt underneath. (Scan to the purple camisoles and find one that goes with the style of sweater.)



Containers multiply like gremlins in my house:
I also love drawer organizers. It helps keep my bras separated from my undies and my trouser socks from my gym socks. I spared you from the actual items. I’m sure no one wants to look at that! (And I really don’t want my underwear posted on the internet.)




Even the dirty laundry doesn’t stand a chance:
I hate sorting laundry. Hate it. So having a few hampers in my closet makes me sort as I undress at the end of the day. When I throw a load into the washer in the morning (practically sleepwalking and wondering if I have any non-black pants that are clean), all I have to do is grab the hamper and take it with me to the washer. No sorting required.

I'm Betting Only 0.35% Finish Reading This

I've noticed that a portion of my blog hits are actually coming from Google searches, like "How To Hang an Ikea Malma Mirror." I knew I wasn't the only one that couldn't figure that out! lol I'm probably going to lose some of you at this point because this particular post is very specific. So unless you plan on installing Ikea's Tundra laminate flooring soon, you don't need to bore yourself by reading any further. I promise I'll return to the house renovation posts soon. (And probably some more organizational posts too. I can't stop. It's a sickness.)

Now for those of you needing some tips on the installation process of the Tundra flooring, this is for you, especially after that super-duper sale on the flooring from last month!



We choose Ikea's Tundra flooring because overall it’s a great product for the price. Very durable! It wasn’t in my budget to do Pergo. I think Pergo is a slightly superior product (in density and installation) but if you are looking to save money, this is the next best thing! The other products in this price-range looked… cheap. First of all, we had some help in our installation. My brother (a former Lowes flooring manager) and BIL (who does floors for a living) helped us start. If you don’t know someone that’s done this before, don’t worry! Take one of those free laminate flooring classes that Lowes/Home Depot runs. We learned lots from it and got some actual hands-on time in the class.


Tools:

1. The spacer/taping block/metal thing tool kit that Ikea sells.
2. I don’t know much about saws but you’ll need a saw that will cut the boards the long-way and the short-way.
3. A hammer
4. Knee pads like what volleyball players wear. Trust me, your knees will thank you!
5. An old dense paintbrush (to wipe off the dust in the lip before you click and lock)
6. A little hand saw specifically for cutting under door frames


Underlayment:

I don’t think you have to buy Ikea’s brand. You can pick up other brands at a home improvement store. Just don’t buy Ikea’s cardboard-like product. Not good if you have any water issues like we did! Most underlayment is plastic. It’s also usually a moisture-barrier (a MUST if you are installing on a slab) and helps quiet the sound. Check the packaging to make sure about the moisture-barrier. As you lay the sheeting out, you’ll need to tape the seams with special underlayment tape which is available at any home improvement store.


The product itself:
When you buy the flooring, leave it in the boxes. Put it in the room where they will be installed. They need to acclimate in the box in the room for at least 48 hours. If you don’t have central a/c and can install in summer, I’d do it because humidity makes it expand.

Each box has nine boards. While all the boards are the same exact size, they don’t all have the same exact pattern. (Meaning the wood grain look to the board.) If you install them willy-nilly, it looks fine. But it looks fabulous if you install them in the right order because then all the boards look continuous and the seams aren’t as visible. I think there are three patterns. As you open the boxes, you’ll want to separate the each pattern into it’s own pile. Figure out which pattern matches the next pattern. Then install board 1, then 2, then 3, then 1, etc. Hopefully that makes sense! It can get a little tricky because the pattern was a bit puzzling if I remember correctly. It was like 1, 2, 3, 2, 3. It took us a few minutes to figure out something that seemed really simple. lol

Figure out how you want to run the boards. North to south? East to west? Some things to keep in mind… sunlight. Depending on which way you run it, it can make the seams appear more noticeable. i.e. Our boards run north-south. Our sunlight is mainly southern sun so you see the seams a bit more in the light. (Not really noticeable, IMO.) They “say” that I should have installed it east-west. But my hallway, entryway, and galley kitchen all run north-south and it looks much better when the flooring is run in the same direction.


General installation: Lowes/HD can probably tell you much better than I can. But just some things I remember... The spacers are important because the laminate will expand in hot weather. The spacers help accommodate for this. There will be a gap between your baseboards and the flooring. Purchase some quarter-round and attach it to the baseboard after you install the flooring. My suggestion: paint the quarter-round the same color as your trim. I’ve seen it the same color as the flooring and it just doesn’t look as sharp.

The click-and-lock is pretty easy. Before you actually do that part, I use an old paint brush to dust off the lips of the boards because the grit can prevent the boards from being seamless if you don’t. This is the one very apparent downside to Ikea’s quality. It’s almost like there are little jagged cardboard pieces in there sometimes.

Watch Ikea’s online video regarding the actual installation or youtube it (since their video is a bit of a joke with cartoon characters and no sound. lol But you’ll get the picture.) It shows how to start, how to overlap each row’s seams, etc. The first row you lay is easy because you are only clicking them on the sides. The subsequent rows are a bit more tricky because you are clicking them on the top and sides.

Let’s say you are working on row 2:

Lay down the first board in row 2, click-and-locking it to the board above it. Wiggle the board into place at the top. Make sure it’s seamless all the way across. Sometimes you REALLY have to wiggle it and press into it. Once you lay down the board, the seam disappears if you did it right.

Put the next board close to the previous board but give it a tiny bit of space on the left/right side (depending which direction you are going). Push it into place with the board above it. Then take the plastic tapper and lay it on the side of the board. Tap the block with a hammer until it “clicks” into place with the board on the left/right side. Be careful where you place the tapper. There’s a bit of a ledge you need to lay it on. If I wasn’t careful and didn’t put it on the ledge, I’d break the edge of the board. Very frustrating! But once I figured that out, it was smooth sailing! The metal thingy included in the kit comes into play when you get to the edge of a row because the tapper obviously won’t fit between the board and the wall.

Continue this process until finished. And viola! You have a great looking floor for a great price.

Battle of who is Smarter: Meg or the Mirror

The contenders:

Ikea Malma mirrors:



Meg:



I just bought 12 of these mirrors for my entryway. I already have a mirror in my entryway but it just doesn't look finished.



In addition, when the front door is opened, it hits one of the sconces and keeps marring the freshly painted door. So I bought these iron scroll-y things for $3 each on clearance at Target. Blech.



I thought that adding a frame around the mirror would snaz it up. Until I put this ginormous 6 foot thing in my living room.



It's only a few feet away from the entryway. I think two big mirrors make me look a little vain. But in all honesty, it's a decor trick to bounce some light in this dark area. $36 is a lot cheaper than a new front door with some glass inserts. (That will come. Just not in the budget right now.)

But sadly, these Malma mirrors have been sitting on the floor for 3 weeks now because I couldn't figure out how to hang them. Like in traditional Ikea style, there weren't any instructions. (I would have even settled for their picture-only instructions.) Google wasn't helping except to reassure me that I'm not the only one in this quandary.



There were two small hooks and a short piece of string included. Huh? I finally realized you need to screw the hooks into the back and run the string through the hooks a few times. But if I screwed them into the back, the mirror won't lay flush on the wall. Now, I love me a tilted mirror ( a common restaurant decor trick.) But it wouldn't look right with two rows of tilted mirrors.





On top of that, I'd have to screw in 24 of these hooks. (Did I mention I'm lazy?) There were no pre-drilled holes. I'm not that ambitious. But necessity (or laziness) is the mother of invention. I found these 3M picture hanging strips from their Command Adhesive line.



What do you think?



I may add some hooks for coats underneath the mirrors at a later time. Not necessarily for my coats (because it's visual clutter to me and my OCD tendencies). But while I have 2(!) hall closets across from these mirrors, they are currently serving as storage. Not something I'd want my guests to see.