Decluttering...

It's always a good thing to help friends move.  We come home and get rid of superfluous stuff!  It's also helpful to go to the Parade of Homes because the show homes have just enough decoration to look nice.  My honey made a comment during our tour of homes that our home looked a little cluttered...um, lived in.  So, the next week I walked around the house trying to look at each room with the purpose of decluttering. 

I started in the kitchen.  The counters definitely had too much stuff on them.  I evaluated what needed to stay and what could go or be put away based on use.  It's so much easier to clean the counters now!

The next thing I decluttered was the hutch.  I've learned to think outside the box a little when decorating.  Just because an item has always been in a certain spot doesn't mean it needs to stay there.  My cute mini bunny lamp has a new home on the hutch and I really like it there.  It brightens up that part of the kitchen at night and on rainy overcast days.  Why didn't I think of that before?! 

Before:

First attempt:

Much better:

I gravitate towards symmetrical arrangements so the top shelf has tall items on each end with a shorter item in the middle.  The next shelf is the opposite with a tall item in the middle and shorter items on the ends.  The top of the hutch base is not symmetrical but is visually balanced. The larger baskets ended up on the bottom of the hutch with the smaller baskets on the top.