Less Hustle More Coffee

Blogmas Day 10 sheds light on How to Decorate inexpensively and trying to use what you have in the house already. Why? Because I experienced that today and I decided to share it.

When I walk in my bathroom lately, I’ve just become so disgusted with it. It was cluttered and becoming less functional. It needed cleaning but I didn’t want to clean all around the surfaces because I just needed to declutter the whole darn thing and I really hadn’t had time until this weekend.

Wasn’t it just recently when I “redid” my bathroom “getting ready” functionality and made it all fresh? Well, I think it may have been back in the spring? Time flies. I had set it up back then so that I could quickly grab the items to get ready for work or church and out the door. My hair was longer then, I used different cosmetics back then, and my approach was a little different.

Now my hair is shorter, I don’t wear as much makeup, and I just didn’t really want or need so much on the counter. So I did a complete overhaul today in a two purpose strategy on my bathroom. 1) For functionality – resetting up what I need and no more and 2) Decorating for Christmas because it is the main bathroom of our house.

There are a few things you have to have first though:

• Some greenery – I use it all over the house and have collected inexpensive pieces throughout the years. It’s fun to use in various places and mix it up. I use it all year long during all the holidays. Greenery in every room is a must to making it calming and inviting, in my opinion.
• Inexpensive Decor – So it’s assumed you probably already have some classic favorites that you place about the house for just about any season. If not, there’s some cute finds sometimes at Pop Shelf and Dollar Tree, Hobby Lobby during sales, etc.
• Containers – various styles and kinds that tickle your fancy. I also have collected these over the years as I have found things I love at a good price. I also mix, match, and repurpose.

So in my case, I usually have some options to choose from. Sometimes I have to empty a container and find another to put that stuff, if I really decide I want that particular one. I move stuff around all the time.

I would have shown you the before picture but I was too embarrassed! But I had all my stuff on the bathroom counter in these four black containers. It worked great at the time. I think I had actually ordered these for Mom and I when we were sharing the bathroom while she lived with us while waiting for her house to be built. I had two and she had two and it helped us to sort of keep the bathroom cleaner.

So I removed the black baskets and started all over.

The Decorating Went Something Like This

• I removed everything for a complete slate.
• I cleaned the area and made it sparkling
• I took away anything from the surface area that I was no longer using or that didn’t serve a function
• I left out only things that I needed to have accessible quickly or didn’t want to put away if I needed it daily. I really don’t want to stand on my head and bend down under the counter several times while reaching for mouse and hairspray and such, lol. I decided what I absolutely had to have on the counter.
• I made a convenient place for the things less needed. For example, I made morning drawer filled with items I use after getting out of the shower: comb, deodorant, moisturizing lotion, under the eye bag roller, lol, etc. And I made a nighttime drawer with toothpaste, eye makeup remover, my ear drops, etc. (I keep my night moisturizer by my bed.)
• I used greenery to hide cords and decor to hide flaws.
• I decorated by looking around to see what I had that matched the vision of what I was trying to do. My theme was green, so I used green Christmas decorations from my normal stash of Christmas decor. I detest using red in that bathroom on the counter. One year I used gold and used the gold deer I had, and it looked good, but this year it’s green. Green is calming to me. I found some white soap with green lettering in my soap collection.

The mascara and eye liner and coverup and eye pencils – nehhhh, I wasn’t willing to dig around a drawer for those items, but I used a pudding cup dish to make it look nicer. George will probably wonder where it went, lol. I almost used a wine glass but I figured I’d knock it over, lol.

So then I had this eye sore of the cords, after I took away one of the black baskets mentioned above. The basket had hid the cord and now it was bare.

But I looked around and found some more greenery, lol. It was just hanging in my office. Might this work?

Much better, yes!

I grabbed a hand soap from the hall closet because it was green! I put away the lavender one until next year.

I still need to scrub with a toothbrush around the base of the faucet where soap has collected. I didn’t even notice it till I am looking at these pics. I’ll get alcohol and a q-tip after that! My eyes don’t notice dust and such anymore. Maybe I should take pics of everything else around my house to see where to clean, lol.

I don’t find these soap holders useful but I put greenery or other things on them and use them as a shelf. This one has had Alexa echo on there for a while. And the plant kinda hides her.

On the other side, a cranberry soap and a Merry Christmas sign is used. And below that are my products I didn’t want to stand upside down on my head for every morning underneath the sink, so I found a nice little basket in the house (it was holding recipes, lol) and repurposed it to fit here because it would fit on the side of my bathroom. Also my counter cleaner is in there for quick wipe downs.

So maybe it’s not grand and glorious. But it’s my nature bathroom. Not a lot of wild busy decor. It’s very simple, but it sure looks a lot better than it did and it gives me just enough Christmas to go on! I used what I had! And I am happy with the little bits of decor and the functionality of it.

Morning and night drawers.

I moved my makeup to the drawer below my morning and night drawer. No problem to reach down and grab what I need there. I used to have a big basket of soaps there – for years and years, but doing something different today was good.

And hair styling items on the bottom drawer. Still easy enough to reach and grab quickly. But the hair products are staying on the counter! That’s all the reaching I’m willing to do in the mornings, lol.

I’ll have to admit I really liked seeing that little bit of greenery out of the corner of my eye while going by the bathroom.

OK so, we are off to a Christmas party. And I did get a lot done today. Got the laundry completely finished. I slept in too! We all did. Even Dexter let us sleep. And I got some wrapping done. Worked on the bathroom a good while. Watched a YouTube show. Put up some Nic-Nacs out of the way in the Sun Room. Ironed. Cleaned the kitchen a bit. Did an Amazon order. And this blog entry. The day went by fast. Didn’t get everything done but I’m in pretty good shape!

Hope you got some ideas and or inspiration from today’s entry. Like I said, nothing grand to show, but you can do wonders with a few pieces of greenery, baskets, containers, and just shuffling things around.

Hope your weekend is going well and that you are enjoying Vlogmas!