Monday, April 4, 2011

Too Much Stuff...

Over the past couple of years I have realized that one of the things that I really want in life is to have less stuff. And because it's Lent that's been on my mind quite a bit lately.

The process has been composed of baby steps over the course of the past two years. I began our marriage with a ridiculous amount of clothing. I would pick things up here and there over the years and I never got rid of anything. My poor college (and post college) roommates. I wasn't quite as bad as the people you see on Hoarders, but I wasn't all that far away from going down that path either.

After Paul and I got married we both went through the boxes (which were still packed up because we simply didn't have anyplace to put the clothing) and ended up giving most of it away to the local soup kitchen (I would guess 75%). Much to my surprise, I liked the feeling of getting rid of so much stuff.

Each time we've moved we've repeated the process, filling a half dozen boxes and sending the clothes off to find new homes (the last time I realized that I really didn't need ten coats...).

At this point I have four drawers for clothing, two shelves that are about two and a half feet long and half of the closet (which is probably five feet long altogether). And it is definitely time to go through everything again and do some pruning. I'd like the small area to be neat and organized with space for everything.

The funny thing is that I have much, much less clothing than I used to, but it's still a pretty ridiculous amount. Using the tags in my Year of Dresses blog has helped me to realize that very quickly!

Then I need to get started on the ridiculous number of cooking magazines that are cluttering the house. I just never have time to write down the recipes I want, and most of them are online anyways, so I need to ship them out to the dumpster too.

And of course I'm trying to take a deep breath and use some of my yarn and fabric stash before even considering adding to it.

Now to sew a little more and then start sorting. There is work to be done!

2 comments:

  1. Well golly girl, I thought you pared down to Franciscan simplicity when you sold the surfboard. :)

    ReplyDelete

I love comments and I read every single comment that comes in (and I try to respond when the little ones aren't distracting me to the point that it's impossible!). Please show kindness to each other and our family in the comment box. After all, we're all real people on the other side of the screen!