1000 Places to See Before You Die

I came across this book last night when I was putting away some things and got side-tracked... my attention span has been about that of a goldfish of late. I was tickled pink to see that Bora Bora and Moorea are both in there and then I got curious how many other places I've been that are on the list...

1. London, England
2. Oxford University
3. Stratford-upon-Avon
4. Blarney Castle
5. The Book of Kells
6. The Ring of Kerry
7. Vienna, Austria
8. La Grand Place - Brussels, Belgium
9. Paris
10. Chateau de Versailles
11. Brandenburg Gate
12. Sans Souci
13. Pompeii
14. Rome
15. Sistine Chapel
16. Cinqueterre
17. Milan
18. Il Duomo
19. The Last Supper
20. La Scale Opera House
21. Florence
22. Lucca
23. Asolo
24. Venice
25. Verona
26. Anne Frank House
27. Canal Cruise - Amsterdam
28. Red-Light District
29. Castle District, Prague
30. Charles Bridge, Prague
31. Old Town Square, Prague
32. Kronborg Slot, Denmark
33. Sydney Opera House
34. Great Barrier Reef
35. Grand Canyon
36. Hotel Del Coronado
37. Mark Twain House
38. Kennedy Space Center
39. Key West
40. Walt Disney World
41. Savannah Historic District
42. Oahu
43. French Quarter
44. New Orleans Restaurants
45. Mardi Gras
46. Freedom Trail
47. Cape Cod National Seashore
48. Martha's Vineyard
49. Mackinac Island Grand Hotel
50. Natchez Trace
51. Bellagio
52. Las Vegas Strip
53. Route 66
54. Carlsbad Caverns
55. Roswell
56. New York City
57. Historic Downtown New York
58. Biltmore Estate
59. Great Smoky Mountains National Park
60. Rock & Roll Hall of Fame
61. Cliff Walk
62. Charleston, SC
63. Badlands
64. Black Hills
65. Graceland
66. Nashville
67. Monticello
68. Colonial Williamsburg
69. National Mall and it's Monuments
70. Smithsonian
71. Greenbrier
72. Yellowstone National Park
73. Niagara Falls

It was so fun to look through the book and re-live the memories/trips that took me to these places! (Also, to make a list of all the places I still want to go!!) I can't wait to add 74 and 75 on the Honeymoon! What about you?  How many have you checked off your list?! 

Closets thru the Years!

I confess... I have a deep burning love for CLOSETS!  Well, storage in general, but especially closets.  I thought it would be fun to take a trip down closet memory lane.  I could kick myself though, I don't have very good closet pictures at some of my houses so we'll have to make do with what we have.  I'm also not including my "current" closet because I have some changes in plan for it (minor ones) but it's still not photo ready!

First up, my college apartment closet:

Unfortunately, this was move in day and I never took another picture of my closet the other 3.5 years I lived there!  I do remember thinking that was the smallest closet EVER and got pretty creative with storing TONS and TONS of stuff in it through the years.  Plus, I can recall at least two times that the stupid wire shelf pulled loose and everything was in a heap in the floor.  Enter mom (remember her alter ego Shelf Expert) and we re-did the shelving and it never came down again!

After college, I moved into my first house in Cleveland, TN.  I may or may not have bought the house for the closet.  It was ah-ma-zing.  Again, I didn't do it justice with my pictures!

 

I loved that it had the little room (where I had a spot for ALL my jewelry) and then it went right into this awesome space with hanging on both sides!  I bought the shoe cubes that have been with me now at 3 houses and still really like them for my shoe storage.  They can be used like this or stacked (below).  Love love love this closet.  My first house had a lot of awesome storage in general.

Next up on the closet tour, Baton Rouge.  I wasn't so sure about these closets in the master bathroom at first but I ended up really liking this set-up.  There was one larger closet that had a lot of shelving and hanging space and then another smaller one with shelves and double hanging.  I'm not a big "folder" so I didn't think I would be able to utilize the shelves (at first) but have no fear, I filled those babies up in no time. 

I stored empty storage baskets on the top shelf, winter pajamas/boots below that, lighter weight pajamas, then purses and more comfy clothes, then jeans, shorts and some more purses and finally, on the bottom shelf, in the pink bins I had bathing suits, house shoes, tights/slips, etc.  The shelves ended up being awesome and I loved having my purses so easy to get to.

The before...

And the after!  Pretty self explanatory.  But, this is only my warmer weather clothes.  Didn't need many winter clothes in the B. Rouge!

This was the other closet off the master bath.  I ended up storing all my books on these shelves and it worked out great. 

These hanging rods housed all my cooler weather clothes.  Loved having a closet just for my winter clothes that wasn't completely accessible!