Continuing the 30-Day Housecleaning Challenge - Day 15

It's the beginning of a new week, and the 30-Day Housecleaning Challenge with Money Saving Mom continues.

For Day 15 of the Challenge, the task is to clean in the living room and kitchen.  Yesterday my husband's parents visited for Sunday dinner, so I spent quite a bit of time cleaning up yesterday, which makes today much easier.  A quick check of living room showed me that it survived a whole day and did not require any cleaning today.  Yay!  The kitchen is another story.  It is still in better shape than when I started cleaning this weekend, but there are some dishes that need done and put away, counters to whip off, etc.  Spending 15 minutes yielded a pretty decent result.  

Now I just need to tackle the filing system, so I can begin to work through the paper clutter.

I also started a few other projects today including:

1. Revamping my entry nook into a home organization nook. 

I forgot to take a before photo, but the nook where we usually walk into our house from the side door had a keys jar, pretty wine bottle, and mini bookshelf turned into a photo holder.  Overall, it looked sorta cute, but was not functional except as a place to drop our keys on the way in.  The new plan will include a dry erase board, weekly calendar, mail/paper organizer, puppy leash holder, and key jar.  I wanted to put scrapbook paper in the frame that I'm turning into a dry erase board, but the width of the frame was causing problems.  Instead I found this awesome grey fabric at Hobby Lobby today!  A little bit more expensive, perhaps, but very easy to do without the hassle of figuring out paper measurements and such.  In progress, it looks like:

I can't wait to get everything finished and hung!

2. Making homemade baby wipes.

As I've mentioned, my husband and I are going to go on a cloth diapering adventure with our first baby.  The Bean is due in a couple of months, and as soon as school is done for the semester, I will be preparing for his arrival in full force.  In the meantime, I allow myself to get a bit distracted from schoolwork to search online for fun ideas, garage sale for cheap baby clothes and other awesome deals, and work on his farm-themed nursery.

Since we are going to be cloth diapering at least part of the time, I thought we might as well have some cloth wipes to go with the diapers.  Plus, there are so many recipes online for homemade solution for the cloth wipes!  

I wish I could say otherwise (and hopefully soon this will no longer be true), but I'm not particularly good at sewing.  If the machine is all set up, the I can work my way through, but if I have to set up a sewing machine on my own and get the thread all strung correctly, I'm in trouble.  In light of this, I plan for my first wipes to be no-sew wipes.  In other words, adorable flannel + pinking shears = wipes.  I can always go back later and adjust if needed, right?  

I purchased some clearance and remnant fabric today at Hobby Lobby.  (I love remnants since they are usually discounted 40-50%!)  Thomas the Train and ice cream cones!  Adorable, right!?