Over the weekend, I had a tough war within four walls. Fighting the war with me are my lovely mum, dad and Abang. After 11 years of living in a war zone like room, I think, this is the most successful and well fought battle. Sneak peek at my now de-cluttered work table…

Revisiting from 2005… the amount of things in my room was crazy ok! And there are many colors on my wall and many many damaged paint (holes) too.

Then in 2007, the mess was still as bad. I’m a trash collector you see. Everything also must keep!

Operation Groom My Room Day 1

Operation Groom My Room wasn’t a planned battle. My initial plan was just to de-clutter and throw out as much unwanted stuff as possible over couple of days. So last week, I spent a day clearing 1/4 of my room. Then last Friday night, I started clearing the other 1/4 of the room. It was that night where my dad came in and saw the badly damaged painted walls and volunteered to help me refresh my 11year room with new coat of paint. (Painting my room was the very last thing I want to do as I really really have LOTS of things!!) But dad kept pushing for me to paint it, comparing my room with the rest of the house. So I decided to take up his offer. That was the beginning of Operation GMR.

So my plan changed that night (on Friday). Saturday throw out everything (unwanted) in room and keep things in boxes/ bags for easy move-out to living room on Sunday for the painting work. At 11.30am Saturday, my dad called, “Clear your room now. Later I come back paint liao!” *shocked* *speechless* How can I possible clear out the things by 4pm when he returns? No time was wasted, with Abang help, we managed to throw most stuff and shift all out of my room before dad comes home.

So the rest of the day was spent waiting while dad painted my room. When its finally done, I’m loving the color and am very grateful he persuaded me to paint it. Just when we were clearing up, dad decided to do the most amazing thing… to straighten my wardrobe (which I’d no idea that it was slanted). The already weakened and badly depreciated wardrobe, with few strong pushes and readjustment, it decided to speed up its depreciation period within that 15 minutes. There! Gone! It threatened to fall onto me while I sleep every night. Not wanting to die in the middle of sleep, I had to get a new wardrobe! (As if I’ve not already burned a big hole in my pocket with the recent 2x birthdays and 1x wedding!)

Operation Groom My Room Day 2

Couldn’t sleep in the highly dangerous room I was in the night before. Woke up at 8am on a Sunday (sooooo rare!!) and off we went to Ikea at 9.30am to get me a new wardrobe. Cash and carry the huge 236.5cm wardrobe in dad’s van back home.

With dad out for the rest of the afternoon, brave mom and I went ahead to clear my wardrobe, move my mattresses and bed frame out of the room and tearing the wardrobe down on our own. The process, a sweaty, dangerous and dirty one. Everything was cleared out of my room within couple of hours. Pretty amazing what my mom and I are capable of doing. Ha!

The assembling process began immediately when dad returned around 4pm. With three of us working together, we carried the heavy wooden board into the room, hammered, screwed, hammered again and put the 2 frames together. Then came the interior assembling and finally the 3 huge doors and handles. The wardrobe was up by 6.30pm. Cleaned up the room, moved my clothes back into the new wardrobe and left the rest lying around to be continued after dinner.

Worked through the night on Sunday to unpack the stuff from the living room, throw away even more stuff and changed the bed sheet, showered and finally got to see my 90% cleared room by 3am.

All these hard work and time spent, what did I get?

A better living and working space! Hope this will aid in providing me a better health too, since air is cleaner and less cluttered in my room now. Presenting my freshly groomed room… (Please take note of the above mess and condition and compare it ok?)

Now that I’m facing the window while I work at night, I think I breathe in much cleaner air as compared to the past where I faced the wall. Helps think better too (I think!). LOL!

Parents, Abang and brother all agreed that the room now is much much neater and brighter and cleaner! I think so too! Now I’ve to ensure that I stop buying any more things to add mess again. Looking at the bank account now, I think this room will remain as it is for quite a long while. Ha!

Finally, I just have one thing to say…

And its still working!!!

I.am.amazed!

Operation Groom My Room a Great Success!!! YEAH!