Oat-less Oats (aka-when you are SICK TO DEATH of eggs on the Whole 30)

Don't gross out, I PROMISE these are so good!

I am on Day 29 of my Whole 30 plan and am pretty excited to wrap this up but while it is still fresh in my mind I'd love to introduce you to oat-less oats.  What, you say?  Why can't you have oats on the Whole 30, they are a proven healthy grain?  Glad you asked.  The Whole 30 is a total nutrition reset and one of the rules is to get off of ALL grains, ALL means ALL.  Studies show that grains cause inflammation so by cutting them all out for 30 days allows you to really listen to your body.  Then in the re-introduction stage, you can slowly add a grain at a time back in to examine how your body reacts.  If you experience any discomfort or bloating, after lets say the example "gluten", then you will know that gluten is not a good choice for you going forward.  

The first two weeks of Whole 30 are pretty easy, especially if you're an egg eater!  We are encouraged to have 2-3 eggs per day, including the yolk which I've thrown countless away in my egg-whites stage of life.  Sorry little yolk!  Who knew how completely healthy you were?  I digress.

I love, love, love eggs but by week three I was growing tired of them and thats when a childhood friend posted a link to this recipe.  I Googled Egg Banana Scramble and pages of recipes came up so I'm not giving any one person credit for this recipe; listed below will be my version even though I'm not a recipe creator but I'm a darn good embellisher!

Now don't gag, mixing mashed banana with scrambled eggs sounded hideous to me at first too and my family gags each time I make this, but it really does feel like real oatmeal and without an ounce of grain.  Ready for the ingredients and recipe?  Here you go:

Ingredients:

1/2 TBSP of coconut oil (or ghee, clarified butter)

1 ripe banana (the riper the better)

2 eggs

Almond Milk (without Carrageenan if on Whole 30) 

1/2 TBSP Chia Seeds

1/4 cup of fresh berries of choice

1 TBSP of chopped nuts (walnuts, pecans, you get it)

Instructions:

Melt your cooking fat in a pan over medium heat.  Add your banana and mash with a fork, hence the reason I listed "ripe", easier to mash. The banana will soften as you mash and cook.  

Next whisk 2 eggs in a bowl and pour into the pan with the mashed banana.  I like to lower heat at this point.  Cook as you would scramble eggs but, and this part is an important step, before the eggs set (not runny but not fully cooked) add in a splash of almond milk and add your chia seeds.  Cook until desired consistency.

Pour immediately into a bowl and add toppings of your choice plus a dash or two more of almond milk.  Mix it all up and dig in! 

*   *   *   *   *

Let me know if you try it.  My mom loved it and so did several people in my Whole 30 group.  It's SO good and I plan on making this even after my Whole 30 as I'm easing into a Paleo lifestyle. 

Please share with others, it helps me to grow my audience.  You can also add your email up top OR follow me on my Facebook Fit By 50 page where I discuss health and beauty tips! 

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Thanks for reading; I hope it was A Good Fit!

Michelle's Whole 30 Homemade Marinara {EASY}

Staple ingredients that I usually have at all time so I don't have to plan ahead.

This is my first time doing the Whole 30 and let me tell you, what a learning curve!  I've always considered myself a label-reader but this nutrition reset really heightens one's awareness.  Take marinara sauce for example, who knew that food companies added heaps of sugar to each jar?  I typically look for marinara sauce with the lowest sugar grams but on Whole 30 you cannot have ANY trace of sugar in the ingredient list.  Tomatoes have naturally occurring sugar so marinara will naturally have some but who knew how many companies ADDED sugar, and a LOT, to their sauces? What an eye opener!  Is it any wonder why Diabetes is on the rise?  

If you're a regular Aldi shopper like me, they have a great, compliant marinara in their Organics line. The label says Organic Marinara.  There is zero sugar in the ingredients and it's a pretty good sauce.  I've been buying it for years but our local Aldi is under construction and has been out of it so I just decided to start making my own.  We eat marinara at least once a week.  This recipe is easy but I'll be honest, not as convenient as twisting a lid off a ready made jar.  However, there is nothing as tasty as homemade.  Making your own marinara will require a blender or food processor, both of which I have though I prefer my processor for this sauce. 

Does anyone else wear these?  If you have sensitive eyes to onions, these are a must!

https://www.amazon.com/HAIXUN-Professional-Goggles-Endurance-Glasses/dp/B01F4QCFT8

I'm not even kidding you right now, I NEVER cut an onion without suiting up in my goggles!  My mom gave these to me back in 1999 when I complained about tearing all of my eye makeup off.  Only a makeup maven mom would understand my dire circumstances, I mean, I spend a lot of time on my mascara.  But I digress.....

Chop up a small yellow onion and 3-4 cloves of garlic.  I buy elephant garlic so I only need one clove.  Heat up a tablespoon of olive oil and sauté your onion for 2 minutes.  Add salt prior so that your onions get nice and sweaty!  Stir constantly, no one likes burnt onion in their marinara.  Next add the garlic and sauté with the onion for one minute only.  Then transfer to blender or processor.  

add salt to onion before sautéing for a good sweat

Open your big ol' can of tomatoes (check ingredients for zero sugar) and dump right into processor.  Then add your can of tomato paste.

I like a lot of seasoning. 

Into that add a big splash of balsamic vinegar, 1&1/2 TBSP of olive oil, and 1 TBSP of Italian Seasoning (more or less depending on your taste preference)

After that I pulse to a chunky consistency, I don't like liquidy sauce, but it's your sauce so you choose the texture.  

If you want plain marinara then transfer to a pot and heat it up stirring constantly but if you are going all carnivore then hang tight....

MEAT!!!!!

I will either do an organic grass fed beef from Aldi OR if I'm feeling crazy I'll add ground pork Italian sausage or ground lamb.  You could do any ground meat really.  Venison anyone?

Look at that steamy steam!

Once the meat is browned I'll add my marinara and heat it all up!

Larpin' good!  Does anyone say larpin any longer?  Is that an old mid-west word?

Because I'm on Whole 30 and because I rarely, if ever, eat real gluten pasta, I usually opt to make spaghetti squash or ZOODLES!!!! Who likes Zoodles?  My family doesn't so thats more for me!

Aren't they pretty????

I researched a lot of Spiralizers but went with this little handheld one so it would take up less space and it was only $14.99!  

https://www.amazon.com/OXO-Good-Grips-Handheld-Spiralizer/dp/B013KAW5IQ

Fits in the palm of my hand, and I have small hands.

Doesn't take long at all to spiral up these babies!

I bring water to a boil, add a steamer basket and steam my Zoodles with the lid on for only 2 minutes.  I like them al dente, not mushy.  Today I was lazy so with last nights' leftovers I microwaved them for 45 seconds and they came out perfectly and no pot to wash.  Hmmmm, might be my preferred method.

Voila! Eat em up, yum yum!

And there you have it, an easy, tasty, compliant Whole 30 meal that I was actually eating long before I ever did Whole 30.  

I hope you like my Michelle's Whole 30 Marinara Sauce.  I love it and it's customizable.  You can add and subtract.  When Whole 30 is over it's wonderful with Parmesan Reggiano grated on top.  You can also add a teaspoon of sugar to the sauce as sugar is used to balance the acidity of tomatoes.  But only a teaspoon, let's not get silly.

If you try it, let me know.  Please share this recipe with others and subscribe to my blog at the top of my page if you haven't already.  You can also follow me over on my Facebook page, Michelle Spieler Fit by 50.

https://www.facebook.com/michellespielerfitby50/

Thank you for your time and I hope this was A Good Fit.

My Minimalism: Project #3 {DIY storage bench}

I am a native of Los Angeles, 44 happy years there, but we moved to a small historic town in North Carolina at the end of 2011 for a new life!  In SoCal (Southern California) the average home is under 2,000 sq ft and sits on a lot of typically 1/8 of an acre.  To put it politely, we could hear our neighbor's toilet flush.  Our rental home in Long Beach was around 1,400 square feet and we sold almost all of our furniture and appliances to move east so imagine how HUGE our new home was to us, all 2,615 square feet of it NOT including the ginormous finished basement and on almost an acre! We had virtually zero furniture to fill it and even five years later only have partially furnished rooms.  One room in particular is quite odd to us.  It's our fireplace room, or Hearth Room as we've titled it, though the gas fireplace no longer works.  It's sort of the breeze way from the front of the house to the kitchen, like a giant hallway.  It has an 80s chandelier so I imagine that the previous owner had a small table under it but that would sit right smack in the middle of our pathway so we just shortened the chain and now it's serves as a light more than a chandelier.

In 2012 a dear, sweet gal, who was my Bible study group leader knew of our situation and gave us two excellent condition wingback chairs so we placed them in our Hearth Room allowing us to enjoy our fireplace. Then a neighbor gave us an end table that we stuck in the middle of the chairs and before we knew it, it became THE "hot-spot" to set all of our stuff on.  Do you have hot spots in your home?  We have several but this is the worst.  I could tidy it up and within a day everything (stuff) was right back cluttering these three pieces of furniture.  

After watching the documentary The Minimalists (on Netflix) I knew I had to start streamlining my home.  IF every item had a home then it couldn't be left out to clutter.  The only way to give everything a home is to edit, in other words, give STUFF away that no longer adds value to your life, or spark joy.  See my first post on Minimalism where I completely decluttered my office/Gracie's work space, and my second post on my clothes closet.  

And this is not that bad compared to how it usually looked.  Stuff, stuff, stuff!

Project #3.... the Hearth Room.  I mean, what is this room anyway?  I wanted to surprise my family so this project had to happen all in one day and be completed by the time my husband came home.  I moved the chairs to the basement, put the end table up in the guest room, and ran to Ikea, the home of streamline and organization.  I decided I wanted a bench but didn't want to pay a bench price tag, and I also needed storage.  I needed something that could contain Gracie's backpack, my purse, and Rob's messenger bag.  The Kallax shelves worked great in Gracie's work space but I didn't want 8 cubicles for stuff so I went with the single layer Kallax in black/brown.  My purse fit perfectly into one square area and there was even room for my sleek laptop bag and maybe a few books, I'm a HUGE reader.  

I wanted it to look like a bench and not just a lateral shelf, and since hubby works for a manufacturer that uses foam, I asked if he could find a remnant piece that was long and narrow.  Score!  He found one and off to the Ikea fabric department I went.  I love the material I chose, only $7.99 a yard and nice and thick.  On the way to checkout I went through the art department and one piece really caught my eye, a series of 5 small pencil animal sketches by Picasso.  I wasn't going to buy it because we're chipping away at debt but I haven't bought a piece of decor art in YEARS and I knew I wouldn't stop thinking about it, especially because Gracie, Rob and myself are all so fond of sketching.  It just fit us, you know?  

I ran home to put the shelf together.  They also had a double drawer you could buy to fit into one of the cubicles.  If you've ever put together Ikea furniture, you know how HEAVY the pieces are since they're all made of MDF, and how tricky it can be to assemble all alone.  But I did it!  

Once everything was assembled I ran down to a concrete floor in the basement to cut the foam to fit the shelf and hot glue the material onto it, wrapping the ends almost like wrapping a gift.  Once completed I grabbed some picture hanging wire and museum quality hardware to hang it.  Ikea doesn't provide any of that.  With the help of Gracie I was able to hang it easily.  

Bam!  Done! 

The Kallax shelf can be vertical or horizontal.  See the double drawer insert?  We can place sunglasses, keys, etc.  

Doesn't the cushion make it look like a bench now?  I love how smart it looks!  

Looks much better in person but it is stark and that's how we like it.

Imagine.... five Picasso sketches!  Ok, they're replicas, but they look like real pencil close up!

See?

This needs work but a low priority, at least it's not cluttered, but I will streamline more.

Isn't this an odd room?  The left doorway leads to our family room, the right leads to upstairs and the front of the house.  Our plan someday is to line the entire right wall with bookshelves and put in big chairs for reading.  Maybe a music/reading room?  It's adjacent to the kitchen so guests could sit and visit while I cook. 

I just love how it looks and for several days now there has been zero clutter.  We each get a cubicle and now have a great bench to sit on as we put on our shoes.  Rob flipped out when he saw it.  Every day my family tells me how much they love it.  It's still a strange room but now when passing through it feels good.  I was able to tidy up the fireplace mantle though it's still in progress and hopefully someday we will be able to have our gas fireplace fixed.  We miss our fires!

I completely changed this room for only $115.  The Kallax shelf was $44.99, the two drawer insert was $20, the material was around $10 (7.99 yd), the foam was free, and the Picasso picture was $39.99.  Normally I wouldn't spend money on the house until we're debt free but my sanity needed it and I'm much more productive and happy when my life is clutter-free.  And I feel no guilt which is usually an indicator that I made the right decision, no buyer's remorse, at all!

Please share with me any projects that you're doing in your home.  It inspires me and others.  If you haven't already, please subscribe to my blog at the top of the page and/or follow me on my Facebook page Fit by 50.  Thanks for reading, I hope it's been A Good Fit.

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My "Holy Grail" Mascara {and do primers really work?}

If you could only take ONE item of makeup with you on a  desert island  what would it be?  If your answer is MASCARA then this article is for you!

Read my article to decide if you see a difference, I totally do!

If you've followed me over on my Facebook Fit By 50 page then you've probably heard about my lifelong search for the perfect mascara.  I even did a video on it so check it out. But because not everyone wants to sit through a 20 minute video, I've decided to write about it including before and afters, plus comparison photos.

Like many of us over 40, I grew up using drug store mascara and there were many good ones, but by college I was introduced to Lancome Definicils and it became my standard in which I judged mascaras. It lengthened and thickened my lashes like nothing else, but it also came at a high price tag so anytime that my budget called for it, I found the next best mascara, in my opinion, and that was L'Oreal Voluminous.  L'Oreal owns Lancome therefore they share the same mascara patents.  Back in the mid 90s when I worked for MAC Cosmetics, Product and Development shared with us that it was REALLY tough to create a good mascara and wand because Lancome/L'Oreal owned all the top patents.  This prompted me to start testing out the L'Oreal mascaras and that is how I fell in love with Voluminous, so much so that it has been the ONLY mascara I've use in my professional kit since the 90s.

BUT, Lancome kept drawing me back and when they launched Hypnose Drama I went crazy for it!  I had tried the "industry" favorite, Dior Show by Christian Dior and claimed that as my all time favorite for all of 3 weeks, until it dried out, and at a price tag of 29.00 that was the last time I purchased Dior.  Lancome's Hypnose Drama became my favorite mascara EVER!!!!  It lengthened and really thickened my lashes to the point where I didn't feel the need to wear fake lashes for special events.  Now let me preface, I am NOT your natural-feathery-lash girl, I like them super dark, long, and thick!  Think Tammy Faye Baker, but toned down a bit.  

Here's the bummer: one day a client pointed out to me that Lancome still tests on animals and if you've ever seen those photos of sweet bunnies with red, bleeding eyes due to mascara testing then you'll understand why I needed to move on.  In this day and age of technology there is no reason to test on animals, convicts yes, but poor defenseless animals (?), no!  I made a decision never to buy Lancome mascara again until they become a cruelty free company.  I've even written to them explaining my stance but never received a reply. 

SO, the search continued.....

I went to Ulta one day and asked what they're number one SKU# for mascara was.  The gal told me Better Than Sex mascara by Too Faced.  I tried it, and I hated the wand.  Remember, because Lancome owns the patents on the best wands it's really hard to top their's.  Too Faced wand was thick on the ends and skinny in the middle.   To grab those smaller inner lashes you have to get close to the eye but because their wand is fatter on the ends, it kept poking me in the eye, AND I'M A PROFESSIONAL MAKEUP ARTIST!  Honestly, I don't even understand how that is Ulta's top selling mascara other than the name.

Next I tried Urban Decay Perversion ONLY because I was given a deluxe sample size.  I loved it.  It takes me about a week to decide if I love a mascara and by the end of week 1, I knew I had found my Holy Grail of all mascaras!!!!  I know that sounds melodramatic to some, but if you are a true mascara lover, if mascara is the one item of makeup that you couldn't live without, then you get it.  Better yet, Urban Decay is a cruelty-free company!  Score!!!!  Then I got really crazy and bought their mascara primer as well!  Primers are the foundation to mascara as they help build your lash volume so you actually use less mascara.  I could not believe my lashes with their mascara and primer together.  It is BY FAR my favorite mascara to date!  And I'm not settling here, I actually prefer it to Lancome's Hypnose Drama AND it retails for $22, about $7 less than Lancome.  For real!

Here are a series of photos so you can see for yourself.  If you're like me, you are skeptical and like to see proof.  All over Instagram and Pinterest we're being "sold" to!  I'm not trying to sell anyone, I just know there are crazy mascara lovers out there who need to know how great these products are.  I buy all of my products with my own money and I am not sponsored by any brand.  However, I am including some links to make ordering easy for you and it helps my blog so I'd appreciate if you want to order mascara anyway, please help a makeup artist out!

Au naturale, my natural lashes, curled but prior to mascara application

and get yourself a good eyelash curler, would you?  my choice is Shu Uemura

https://www.amazon.com/Shu-Uemura-Eyelash-Curler-Silicone/dp/B000VSG1PO

First eye is with L'Oreal Voluminous only

not bad, but only eh, and ignore my wrinkles please

Wait for it.....

Looks like glue but you apply it exactly as your mascara

http://www.ulta.com/subversion-lash-primer?productId=xlsImpprod10921018&sku=2278143&_requestid=6499269

That big bushy brush means volume!  Plus it lengthens.  And the shorter end means it won't poke your eye

http://www.ulta.com/perversion-mascara?productId=xlsImpprod10921002

Pretty dramatic, I'd say

The left eye is Perversion, the right eye is Voluminous

Do you see a noticeable difference?

Remember, Tammy Faye Baker is my icon!  The right side is definitely for the more natural gal.

I hope this has enlightened you or at the least, entertained you!  If you end up trying Perversion, please let me know, and if you already use it and love it, comment below so other readers can hear other's opinions.  Also, please add your email if you'd like to receive my blog and/or follow me on my Facebook page, Michelle Spieler Fit by 50.  And could I trouble you to share this article?  It helps to grow my audience.  There really aren't that many "mature" makeup artists teaching "mature" gals makeup and skin care.  Let's change that together!!!!

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Day 15 of My Whole 30- Is This For YOU? (Day 1 and Day 15 progress photos)

Have you heard of Whole 30?  Maybe it's all you hear about and you're sick of it, then this is not the article for you.  Like many others, my eating got a little off track during the holiday season.  I love to challenge myself and knew the Whole 30 would be a great way to kick-off 2017. Because I believe strongly in support and accountability, I asked others to join me and now have a private Facebook group of 33 members.  Knowing throughout December I would embark on this journey I devoured the book Whole 30 (link below), preparing my mind for a challenging month of January.  I believe mindset is everything in achieving success, in diet, in exercise, in career, etc.  

https://www.amazon.com/Whole30-30-Day-Guide-Health-Freedom/dp/0544609719

To begin, the Whole 30 is not a diet, but a total nutrition reset.  Here are the basic rules: 

Some of you might be thinking : NO FUN, but rather than focusing on what we CAN'T have, we're encouraged to focus on what we can have.  I already eat everything on the YES list so the toughest thing for me was giving up peanut butter (the one food I could eat if stranded on a desert island for life) some cheeses, cream occasionally in my coffee and oatmeal.  I guess that's a lot but it's ONLY 30 days!  

The Whole 30 forces you to read labels because if you eat foods that are not compliant, BACK to Day 1 you go!  It's pretty strict and the reason for a forced "reset" is to keep you disciplined and on track.  I always thought I was a good label-reader,  but now realize I was still buying products with added sugar, a trick food companies use to make food taste better and/or hook you into buying their product again.  After all, sugar is a drug and coming off of it can be really rough.  Many of the group's participants had fatigue and headaches the entire first week.  I did well my first week; I did experience fatigue on Day 7 but I was fine again by Day 8.  

An important key to success on Whole 30 is meal planning, shopping and prepping.  A failure to plan is a plan to fail.  Its more work than most people are used to.  No longer are we buying processed "convenience" foods.  And you have to be mindful of every bite you take, no longer can you just take a few bites of your kid's pasta, or Mac N Cheese.  That's a tough habit to break because so many of us do it daily without even realizing it, but all those "bites'' of food add up to wasted calories.  

Gracie's DeCecco pasta last night with Parmesan Reggiano, oh how tempting this was!

But, I get:

but ONLY if it's compliant

And LOTS of.......

I LOVE eggs and can have 2-3 each day and WITH the yolks!

For years I ate egg white omelettes which lacked flavor and I totally burned out on them.  Now I can have the whole egg and cooked in Ghee or clarified butter which really brings out the flavor.  That's the thing, because of the fats we use to cook with, Whole 30 food is so flavorful!  I don't feel deprived at all.  

So today is Day 15 and I'm feeling strong.  We are told to weigh and measure on Day 1 and Day 30 but nowhere in-between because the number on the scale can mess with our heads and throw us off track.  We are encouraged to recognize non-scale victories, like one of our participants just got back into her pre-pregnancy jeans (she had a baby in August), or some are sleeping better.  As for me, I wake up each morning without my usual aches/pains and muscle and joint stiffness and I know that is due to cutting out all gluten.  Grains, especially gluten, can really inflame our bodies which is why we avoid ALL grains for 30 days, so we can truly identify how we feel off of them and how we feel once we reintroduce them back into our lifestyle.  

To encourage or motivate others I did want to take progress photos but I haven't weighed.

Not sure why I look so miserable on Day 1, I was pretty excited about this.

I've been in pretty good shape since July and only gained a few pounds over Christmas holiday but I was puffy and uncomfortable when I began on Day 1.  Today I feel much leaner and notice the biggest difference in my tummy!  That is reason alone to continue for 2 more weeks!

There are SO many more details I could go into about Whole 30 and an entire science behind it but the book explains much better and I highly recommend "It Starts with Food" by Dallas and Melissa Hartwig (link below), and THEN get "Whole 30" also by the same authors.

https://www.amazon.com/Starts-Food-Discover-Whole30-Unexpected/dp/1628600543/ref=pd_sbs_14_img_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=ZX1SHBXS3182Q0KQQG56

Once our 30 days are complete we are encouraged to go into a Paleo diet which is much like Whole 30 but not as strict.  And we can start making our favorite foods again like pancakes or muffins but using coconut or almond flours instead of the usual wheat flours which contain gluten.  On Whole 30 those type of foods are considered "trigger" foods that could send us off the deep end so zero baked goods for 30 days, but it's only 30 days!  I can do anything for 30 days, can't you?

There are countless blogs, websites, and Pinterest pins galore of amazing Whole 30 and Paleo recipes.  Never before have we had so much information so easily accessible.  There really is no excuse to fail because too many have gone before us and paved the way with delicious recipes to keep life flavorful and fun!  But if you pin on Pinterest daily, let me just say.....

Let me know if you try it!  I highly recommend Whole 30 and haven't found it difficult.  My husband did no grains for 13 days and my 9 year old daughter lives on carbs so I have plenty of non-compliant food in my home at all times.  That is life.  You have to learn to adapt to a new lifestyle even when those around you don't.  You have to learn to balance special occasions where food is always used as celebration because that is life.  And life is about balance!  You can do it!  

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I hope this has been A Good Fit!  Thank you for your time.

My Road to Minimalism- Project #2 MY CLOSET

My closet has been an eyesore for some time now but I just didn't have the energy or motivation to edit it UNTIL, I watched the Minimalists on Netflix (they have a great podcast by the same title) and it motivated me to completely change my home and purchasing habits in 2017.  Please see my first de-cluttering project titled, Minimalism: What it Looks Like to Me (before and afters).

Gives me angst just looking at this.

Since today was a holiday, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I had Gracie home with me and knew it was the perfect time to tackle our closets and entry way coat closet.  I had NO idea how much I truly had to give away, how many articles of clothing and shoes that no longer added value to my life.  I put on a good podcast and was able to complete my closet in about 3 hours.  I made a pile for Goodwill, and another of higher end items to sell to consignment.

I probably only wear 6-7 pair of shoes each season, no one needs that many.

No order or rhyme or reason, just stuff thrown on shelves, I didn't even know what I had.

The best way to organize a closet is to pull almost everything out and then replace each item back in, and really evaluate why it goes back to the closet and not to the thrift store pile.  Have I worn this in the past year?  Is this still on trend or a classic?  Is this a quality piece?  Do I feel good wearing it?  Is it comfortable? DO NOT base your decision on if it was a gift and could hurt someone's feelings, you're not wearing it anyway.  DO NOT base your decision on how expensive it was, I've kept things for YEARS because I dropped good cash on an time but then let it sit in my closet or drawers for years without wearing it, so who really cares how much it originally cost?  

 Ready for all the piles of "stuff"?

Here's the GW pile and it doesn't even include Gracie's stuff OR the shoes from our entry way closet.

Here's the consignment pile: that bag is holding about 15 pair of denim and corduroys

and consignment shoes, hopefully I can get an appt this week, I want it all GONE!

OK, Ready for the reveal?  It's not perfect but I'd say about a 85% improvement.

My shoe rack makes me happy and now I know every pair I have.

Instead of hanging all of my jeans which took too much room on my bottom rack, I've decided to stack them.  I probably only wear the same four pair anyway and now they're easier to grab.  I also found scarves and knit hats that I haven't worn in years.  Now I can use them again.

Denim and sweaters just make more sense folded and stacked.  They'll hold their shape better this way.

Now all of my tops, shirts and jackets have room between them and aren't crammed tightly together.  I actually found half a dozen or so black tops that I forgot I had.  I have a lot of black, it's a makeup artist thing.

Hard to see but the very tip-top shelf is where I now keep a couple fine handbags and my tall boots,

I'll be honest, there were quite a few things I questioned yet kept but I'm going to edit my winter clothes when spring arrives and I'll know better by then if it's worth keeping an item for another year. At least now I know what I have, it's refreshing!

And here is my Goodwill haul, a giant contractor's trash bag of clothes, 5 bags of shoes, bags of decorator pillows, and a box of housewares.  Good riddance, and may someone else find value in my discarded things.  

I really need to tackle my drawers and accessories but I find the common areas of my home are more pressing so back down to the main floor.  You can be sure that I'll post any before and afters when I do.

I hope this has helped inspire you to edit your wardrobe, and your family's.  You can subscribe to my blog by adding your email up top AND/OR following me on my Facebook Fit By 50 page, link below.
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Please check back this week and as always, I hope this has been A Good Fit!