A few weeks ago we decided that time was ripe to put our home on the market. Since then, it has been a whirlwind of organizing, cleaning, packing and tidying for home showings.

Anyone who enjoys HGTV knows the importance of staging a home to look as perfect and ADORABLE as possible! You want to maximize each room with furniture placement to seem larger and more inviting. Overly-cluttered, messy, lived-in spaces are not as appealing. And while we are pretty minimal, we also LIVE in our home so it looks a bit lived in from time to time. look top-notch all the time.

Example: if you need a glass of water, you have to wash it, dry it and put it away followed by a complete wipedown of the sink. As opposed to just plopping it in the sink for a later time to dispose of or clean or whatever your taste may be…so yeah…a bit of a pain!

So knowing that we had our work cut out for us, we went to town on every room; emptying everything out, wiping it down until it looked sparkly and new and then closing it off from our use. We started with small spaces like the extra bathrooms and eventually worked our way up to major living areas of the home, ending with the kitchen (since we use that space more than any other in our home). I went the extra mile by adding decorator pieces, fresh flowers and other odds and ends to enhance the spaces and hopefully win someone’s heart!

The calls and emails for showings started to rack up. Obviously, we were not allowed to be home for showings, so we went hiking or climbing or just walking around the neighborhood. By the end of the day on weekend 1, our agent showed up with a 6-pack and a smile from cheek to cheek with loads of great news. Tons of interest, several offers and all we had to do was seal the deal. Seeing that we are about to move into a slightly less then 200-square-foot sailboat…we couldn’t have been happier.