Today I’m sharing a SUPER quick update I did in our master bathroom. It’s a small thing that is making a big difference. Well, actually two small things, and I should say they are making a difference…to me. Wyatt probably doesn’t care as much.

First, I bought a new toothbrush holder. Simple enough, but what a change. We went from this:

To this:

The one I bought, which you can grab using an affiliate link, HERE, was one of the only ones I liked when I quickly grabbed one at Target the other day while wrangling too fussy kids and a cart full of stuff by myself. It isn’t the nicest or prettiest toothbrush holder I’ve ever seen, but it was cheap at just $7.99, and I liked it enough to use temporarily because I honestly just needed something better than what we had. I might upgrade if I find one I like better, but let me just say, the jar we were using before (which I shared in a tutorial SO LONG AGO), was really, really gross. I mean, I had tried to clean it, but let’s face it, 5 years (EW–FIVE YEARS?!?) is way too long to be using the same toothbrush holder, especially if the top is metal and rusting from water drips and the inside is painted and can’t be cleaned that well. Yuck.

The second thing was a free update. Well, sort of free.

Over a year ago, maybe two years ago, Wyatt found some whiskey on the sale rack at Wal-Mart and bought it on a whim. I don’t remember how cheap it was, but cheap enough we’d never heard of the brand. It wasn’t so great. And thus, it sat on our liquor shelf for awhile until he finally drank it all or poured it out, I’m not even sure which. But, he asked me if I wanted the bottle and I immediately had a brainstorm. The mouthwash bottle!

I had been wanting to get a pretty glass jar for awhile and this one was just the right size and it even had a great reusable cork topper to keep it sealed. And, it was free. All we had to do was get the label off. Which was a bit of a job, but after a couple long soaks and my favorite Goo Gone , it was clean and ready to go.

Sidenote: how pretty are these cool hexagon bubbles inside the bottle? Not sure why they were that shape instead of just round, but it was so cool that I took like 50 pictures trying to get one that showed how pretty it was. It still doesn’t do it justice.

And then, I rinsed it out and poured in the mouthwash… and breathed a sigh of relief.

So much prettier.

Calmer.

More serene.

Maybe that’s reading a little too much into a bottle of mouthwash and an $8 toothbrush holder. Maybe it just makes me happy because it looks pretty. Maybe it’s because it doesn’t have a label and I’m surrounded by advertising everywhere and this does feels calmer. Does that mean I need something for the Colgate tube, too?

But, I’m a recovering over-decorator and I’m striving for more minimalism in my life. Is that an oxymoron? Anyway, I have found that with the toys and papers and dishes and other daily clutter that surrounds me, I want less clutter in the other stuff. The stuff I CHOOSE to have around me in the form of decor. Now, I am NOT a minimalist in the purest sense of the word, or maybe even in any sense of the word. After all, I own like 1000 books. #noshame But, I’ve found that even a small tweak can make me feel more peaceful. And in the morning, after a long night…or in the evening, after a long day, a slightly more serene bathroom counter is a bigger deal to me than you might think. There’s just something about it that makes me feel a bit more at peace.

I say all this to say, if something in your home is bothering you, like a pile of mail on the counter, or an ugly bottle on the bathroom counter, DO SOMETHING about it! Yes, I’m preaching to myself here. (I’m looking at you, giant pile of mail and clutter on the kitchen counter–I’m coming for you next!) 

And, if you want a new mouthwash bottle like ours, you can:

• A. Buy a bottle of clearance whiskey and take forever to drink it before you can clean it out and use it.
• B. Buy a bottle of clearance whiskey and just dump it out and use it.
• C. Buy a bottle like this one (affiliate link from Amazon)  That one even has a pretty glass topper!

And if you do switch up your mouthwash bottle, or maybe you have already done this, I want to know if you feel like it made a small difference in your soul, too. So, tell me. Do the little things matter when it comes to design?