Took some time yesterday to start going over all of our current layers of junk, waste and excess. I started by tossing out straight up garbage, nobody can be upset by the removal of wrappers, shredded papers, and empty plastic containers. Then I took to the art supplies and recapped a bunch of markers, and put them all back into their respective boxes. I then dug out a handful of broken Mc Donald’s toys, and Wendy’s loot bags and put those in the trash for safe keeping. If I had my way, and a small dumpster I would air out this house, and drastically reduce our amount of stuff. Or at least take items out of their boxes, see them used, and the dregs thrown away. Instead we keep all the packaging and the items until whatever is inside has gone bad, gone off, dried up, or become totally unusable. It’s a real shame. I get not wanting to waste it, but also not using it before it goes bad is a terrible waste as well. Oh what could have been.
I have a three foot stack of homework, and art projects to sort into recycling, or a child specific keep pile. That’s a whole morning in and of itself. We either need more storage, or a lot less stuff in the communal living spaces. I think the “art station” might be at the tail end of its life span as both kids are too big to sit down there any more. Need to keep the art supplies but the two child seats, and the small table could probably go away. These kids grow up so fast!
They both still actively use the doll house(s) plural, so I’m not looking to remove those for a few years yet. I did move a whole slew of Lego creations down to the basement where they belong. That has sufficiently tidied up the living room enough to scratch my itch – for now.
I think if the kids would clean their rooms more thoroughly they could move the new interests into those spaces, and not have them occupy the family room floor. Our house is not large enough to have a separate, equally sized Living room where I could escape the messes created, so I have to be a little firmer about the tidiness of our communal spaces than the kids would like, I expect. Oh well.
I certainly don’t want to erase their presence in the house, or make them feel like their things aren’t important to us. I just constantly need to battle for space in our very small open concept home. Not tripping, or stepping on toys is a big win for me, them having toys at their disposal is important to them. If they would pick it all up, or push it against the wall when taking a break, I would be happy with that compromise, and they don’t have to entirely disassemble every creation each time they play. You clean up a little after yourselves, and I won’t tear it all down and put it back in the toy boxes out of my way. A good compromise!
Problem is our basement isn’t big enough to take all of this stuff and keep it out of view. So much of it has to stay visible up stairs on the main floor. Which means I want it tidy-(ish). If I were heartless I’d toss much of it into a giant garbage bag and run it to the dump, never to be seen again. But that would devastate everybody, and I’d just wind up feeling terrible about it. We have done a lot by way of taking things to the cottage for the young niece & nephew to enjoy them. That’s brought me a fair bit of peace of mind. Not in a landfill, not in my house, still getting used by the littles. Win-win all around.
I could go through my own closet again. Especially the t-shirt section, as I have more than I generally wear. I did give a friend about 12 pair of jeans, and several sweaters. I donated work shirts that I am too fat for. So I’m not exactly running fat in the wardrobe department. It’s not lean by any measure either. I too have a vast collection of sweaters that I wear. I could be more ruthless about my clothes and donate more of them I suppose. I’ll look into it once we get closer to shorts wearing weather.
Oh god, don’t get me started on the shoes & boots situation. I do have a pair of rubber Wellington boots to throw away, unrepairable holes in soles. I think we could do with paring down the number of coats we all have, as well as footwear. If it doesn’t fit, pass it along!
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