Cleaning the Style House: My Sample Pledge

I’m getting organized [H busts out laughing in the distance].

I’m cleaning house. Literally and figuratively.

While there are major home organization and cleaning projects (like, say, clearing out the minicrib Bean No. 2 hasn’t slept in for oh, over a year, of all the accumulated crap. It makes for great storage, people), I’m also trying to clean up me. #healthyme was obviously the start of that. Now that I’m feeling physically cleaner, I’m taking baby steps on other fronts.

First up was my 10% weightloss goal reward: my new Clairsonic Mia. I can’t review it yet, as I’ve only used it twice. But it is pretty fun, this “toothbrush for my face” (only way I could describe it to The Beans).

Second, and also a first step [again, H busts out laughing in disbelief] in the Big Projects, was cleaning up my dresser top. It’s a horrible catch all. Our nanny regularly clears it off for me (bless her), but I think she’ll stop soon out of frustration.

So Saturday, after a Big Tar-ZHAY run in which we bought a new lamp for the living room and I found one for my dresser (similar here, I just couldn't find my exact one online), I hauled proverbial ass and cleaned up the dresser. I dusted it, and I even pulled out the Old English Polish like Mommy taught me (if you have wooden furniture, it's really the best).

Isn’t it pretty?

I’m blessed to have a family that pulls things from the trash. Good things, like, oh, this actual dresser and this beautiful enameled tray. It’s graced my dresser or a dining room table in my “grownup homes” for as long as I’ve lived on my own. It was also Grandmom’s. Which means I won’t ever part with it. I found the box that now holds my cosmetics samples at Container Store (similar, but not wood, here) a while back. It’s held various things on and off, but it’s been a clean way to hold my cosmetics for a few years.

The last part of my cleanup pledge to myself is that I have promised myself I will use All of My Samples before I buy anything new. Between birchbox and blogger events, I’m full up. I do love getting them, but I always forget to use them. So between Saturday afternoon and Sunday afternoon, I cleared out all of the old swag bags and birchbox shipments and organized them: hair products, body treatments, facial treatments, facial cleansers, and random @#$% like press-on nails (yup. you read that right). And those cute little birchbox boxes? Two of them fit perfectly inside my wooden box to keep things in line. I like lines.

I’ve made it through 2 nights and have used up 4 packets so far: a Kiehl’s Avocado Eye Cream (my regular cream, I got extra samples on my last order for travel. Clearly, I used them that way), Kiehl’s Rosa Arctica cream (creamy and light all at the same time), a Darphin wrinkle serum (I’m totally undecided on whether serums are worth any trouble at all), and a Paul & Joe face moisturizer. I don’t have any particular product reviews; trying samples just doesn’t give enough time for this girl with a sensitive face to test the reaction.

But I am cleaning house.

Curious about what else I use up in my attempts to purge the samples? Follow my #SamplePledge tweets and on Instagram (yes! I'm finally on Instagram @DCCeline).