After spending the weekend cleaning out the garage and finishing a couple of kids rooms I now am laughing hysterically at myself and some of the crazy things I've kept. Here's a partial list of some of the craziest...
Some of the crazy things I've kept...
A baggie (not the ziploc kind, but the one that "folds over" to close). In it were the "remains" of thread I picked out of a denim jacket that I re-made for my husband when we were dating. (I had changed the sleeves from denim to a lilac-colored corduroy...yep...it was that long ago...remember the "color-blocked" fad?). My reasoning"need to keep the thread in case I have to match it." Why I'd have to match it I have no idea
Ribbons and balloons from each of my children's baby showers (that would have been 3 out of 6 kids...imagine how many I'd had if I'd had baby showers for all SIX!)
DIAPERS...in each size... for each of the kids...so "they could see how little they were at one time". (Don't worry, I kept UNUSED diapers)
Streamers that came off my husband's truck from our wedding...very faded streamers, I might add.
Ribbons and wrapping paper from my bridal shower and wedding gifts. It almost seemed "wrong" to get rid of them...wouldn't that be like "dooming" the marriage? :-)
Birthday, wedding, Christmas, Easter, Valentine's Day , etc...cards... Some from people I can't recall who they are. (It's been a long time and I'm getting older...so that memory loss thing is setting in. :-) )
Decorating magazines from the early 90's...yeah...those dusty rose and wedgewood blue geese are really going to make a comeback here in the next few years...NOT!!!
Half-finished sewing projects I started 10+years ago...that none of my children even fit into any more...nor would I put them on them.
That was just PART of the list of things we cleared out of our garage. I personally liked the "thread" the best. I should have gotten a picture of that. :-) LOL But it's too late. It's gone with the other 7 garbage cans of stuff (which is not the end...just the beginning). It's amazing what has little sentimental value attached to it when it's been in the garage for years. It's not like I go out once a month to "touch" it all and reminisce over the "good old days." What's even more amazing is how GOOD it feels to not have to trip over it or look at the ugly cardboard boxes I put it in years ago...which were crushed by the sheer weight of junk saved in the box(es) above it.
Breathing a "sigh of relief"...and headed back to what's important....
Ooooohhhhhh.....it feels so good to weed out. I had to quit for a bit because we had some other things going on, but we're back at it in the garage. I don't have pictures of before (I'm not sure that it would matter because you wouldn't be able to see the pile of stuff that was covering my husband's "fun" truck. It would have just looked like a pile of stuff about 9' high, 8' wide, and 18' long next to a bunch of bikes. You probably would have been shocked to hear that there was a truck under all of the junk. Now we have a pile of boxes and baskets on our halfpipe (also in the garage)...and you can see the truck EVERYTHING on the halfpipe goes. There's not much room left...and we haven't taken anything from the house out yet. That's pretty sad. I think it's been a good 3 or 4 years since we did a major clean-out. Sometimes, life just doesn't give you time to do some of the "needed" things. Even though it's not out of the house, it is in the "Garage-Sale-Fodder Staging Area". I just wish I had more containers to put things in as they go out. But then I'd have to figure out what to do with them after the garage sale...Patience...Patience. I'm already feeling "lighter."
My dd REALLY wanted to spend the night with a friend and I'd had enough of the room that looked like it had been through Hurricane Katrina (minus the rain and flooding...unless you count the damp towels on the floor under the dirty clothes Yuck!). At midnight last night, they finally "dropped" into bed...with a spotless room!! VICTORY!!! She even drug her friend down to her room to show her when they came to pick her up. I still have to go through their drawers and pull all the clothes that don't fit or they don't wear, but for now, I was satisfied enough to move on to...the BOYS ROOM.
When I walked in I was all "pumped" to get it as neat as the girls room...but when you "wade" and sort through Legos that are knee-deep...under a foot of clothes that should have been taken to the laundry room...most of which are the 12yo's...it kind of takes the wind out of your sails after a few hours. However...We persevered and now he's working on sorting the last of the Legos (and probably wishing that he could just throw them out). I went though his drawers to clean out his clothes (that he insisted still fit even though they were 2 or 3 sizes too small). Now there's enough room to put all the clothes in there that he'd somehow hidden in his bed (top bunk...where I don't usually venture...I'm still wondering how he slept in there with them and still kept them folded). He had a big smile on his face when we got them all put away. He was really unhappy when I told him what we were doing, but he was a trooper...even though he wasn't nearly as motivated as his sister...but he wasn't spending the night with anyone, so I guess it wasn't as urgent for him. Now that it's done, I'm guessing he is not quite so unhappy that I made him work a little.
Well...I was just taking a "sanity break" ...back to clean out the other ds's drawers...
I was taking a break from my dd's room and had to post a progress report. I cannot believe all the stuff we took out of that room. They had so many clothes on the floor that SHOULD have gone to the laundry room ("many moons" ago). However, it already feels better. I'm making notes on the things that I need to "stress" to them...
1. When clothes come off of your body, they either go to the laundry room (if they're dirty or have been worn a long period of time), or they get folded/hung up and put away (if only worn a short time AND still clean and fresh smelling).
2. All toys must be put away before you can take another one out. You don't keep your room clean by making a huge mess all day THEN trying to pick it all up at once. KEEPING clean means doing a little at a time as you go along. It takes a little while longer, but it saves you from the overwhelming mess that "hurts" to clean up.
3. God did not give you everything you have to leave it laying around to get destroyed. Not caring enough to properly take care of what He gave you is like telling Him that what he provided really isn't important to you. It would make him feel like He's "wasting" His love on an ungrateful child. Caring for the property of others is the essence of stewardship.
4. All shoes must be properly lined up in your closet. If you put them in their place, you will be able to find a MATCHING PAIR when you need them (novel concept for my girls...and my boys too).
5. All clean clothes must be put away in your drawers the moment they come through your door. Do not leave stacks of clean laundry in your room when you have empty drawers.
6. Absolutely...without exception...all day, every day...NO SCISSORS, WRITING INSTRUMENTS, OR GLUE STICKS IN YOUR ROOM AT ANY TIME!!! This will never change, don't even ask for permission or I will show you the remains of the words you wrote on your wall in marker and the glue residue after I removed the picture you drew that you were "tired of now" and the doll whose hair is now considerably shorter than it was when I bought her.
7. Always keep your room neat...you never know when you will want to play with a friend. If your room is not clean, you do not have the privilege to play with them...even if it is not at your house. This is non-negotiable from now until eternity. If you ask...my first response will be "Is your room clean?"
I may have more "guidelines" as I get further into their room, but I think it will be more likely to be "Rules of Pitching: How to Decide If You REALLY Need a 'Beloved Item' "
I'm trying to gather my thoughts so I have in mind some principles when I am going through my house...I don't know if it will help or hinder, but this is what I've come up with so far. I reserve the right to add to this list at a later date.
The Purpose of My Home
1. Hospitality
I would love to have people over more often, but feel like if it's not clean that I can't "show that" to anyone...so I don't ask anyone over...not even my kids' friends.
2. Haven of Peace
With all the "visual chaos", I have a hard time being calm and relaxed...which makes my family uptight...as the old saying goes, "If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy." I don't want my kids to think that this is a picture of a "normal mommy".
3. Facilitate Education
I want the school area to be neat and orderly, not a clutter magnet. It's difficult to do any learning if you can't "find" what you're supposed to learn.
4. Family-Oriented
I would love for the house and all that's in it to draw the family closer together rather than drive us apart. There are too many things which make it easy to not spend time together building relationships. There is a time and place for "retreating" and spending time alone, but the amount of "retreat"-type things vastly overwhelms the "family-oriented" things.
5. Christ-Centered I hesitate to put this so far down on the list as this should be the most important thing for me to desire, but all of the above are encompassed by this. I often wonder exactly what this "looks like"...and this is the conclusion I've come to...If it is something Christ would approve of and enjoy, then it is Christ-centered. This does not mean that every last thing in my house has to have a Bible theme. That would be a bit on the legalistic side, although I wouldn't throw out my Christian-themed things. Having a Christian theme doesn't make them legalistic, NEEDING them to have a Christian theme because you feel it wouldn't please God if it didn't...THAT is legalistic. If Jesus came over to my house for the evening, what games would I break out to play with him? I'd hesitate to play any Bible trivia game because he'd beat the pants off of me. LOL But I might pull out Taboo or Pictionary. I would NOT pull out any '80s music trivia DVD game. (...good thing I didn't buy that this past Christmas ha ha) There's plenty of ways to have fun and still honor God.
That's all I can think of at the moment...but I might be back later...
Well...I went to bed last night totally exhausted and thinking on all I had written. But NOT totally and hopelessly overwhelmed and ready to cry...which is one step up from the past. And woke up this morning with 3 of my kids and a dog in bed with me (wish I could train that dog to sleep on the floor). I had a nice little chat with my packrat-inclined girls while the baby jumped on the dog (not budging from his "spot" on my bed). While they are not ready to relinquish any of their stuff, they did agree with me that playing in a clean room is MUCH nicer than playing in a messy room. (Hey...it's a step in the right direction...)
Now which room to start in first...I'm almost say the "easiest" would be best, but the "easiest" is not the most urgent. And what to do about the clothes...I have 6 children... 3 girls, 3 boys. They all get "hand-me-downs" from the older ones, but they also seem to get a lot of new things too. So you can imagine that the youngest girls & boy have a TON of clothes by the time they get into that size. My dilemma is trying to figure out the "ideal" amount of outfits/clothing that they need without overwhelming the laundry room (or the "Laundry Lady"...A.K.A. me ). I know there must be someone somewhere who has figured this out and recorded it for future generations, but for the life of me I can't find it anywhere. It seems that half the mess in their rooms is clothes...but the laundry room (which is the envy of my friends...very large) always seems overflowing too. I joke with my husband that if I washed and folded all the clothes we own, there wouldn't be a place to put them all...and the bad part is I KNOW I'm right. There's got to be a solution.
Unfortunately, in order to deal with the clothes there has to be a clean place in the kids rooms to sort/organize it...so may that should be my first area to "attack"...the toys. If it wasn't for the fact that I really could actually see my house being neat, clean, tidy and organized (like it has been in the past), it might drive me to quit at the sheer overwhelming task ahead of me. But God is not a God of disorder and chaos...he wants all things to be done decently and in order...no matter how long it takes.
I feel so...abnormal. We finished taking down the Christmas decorations the other day, and I did something out of the ordinary...and completely out-of-line with my natural packrat tendencies. I threw away all my Christmas lights that came off the tree...even though I had just bought them and they worked perfectly fine. I also threw away all the hooks that came off the ornaments on the tree. It was kind of strange...something I'd never experienced before. I LOVE the feeling!!
It all started when the dog decided that our (fake) tree needed to be "marked." Well, the "marking" got all over one of my favorite ornaments, the tree branches, the light strings, then ran down onto a new board game box, my hand-embroidered velvet...dry-clean-only...tree skirt, and into the carpet...which I did not find for several hours, so it had lots of time to soak in. I cleaned and cleaned...still smelled it...couldn't figure out how to properly clean a light strand without either creating a fire/safety hazard or leaving part of the smell there. Well...the next best thing was to throw the lights out. The funny thing is that I didn't like those lights anyway. I have this thing about using chasing lights on our tree, but instead of running them around the tree, I run them up and down so it creates a "twinkling" effect. It's really beautiful...at least it was in years past, but those old sets died on me this year. So I went to Walmart and found what I thought was the "jackpot"...CHASING LIGHTS!!! When I got them home, they really didn't chase, they just alternated between every other bulb. Really disappointing, but I figured I'd make them work this year and look for new ones next year. but I had no intention of getting rid of them, just storing...because you "can't" get rid of anything that's still useful, can you? You never know when you'll need a set of chasing lights that doesn't really chase fro something that I have not dreamt up in all of the years of my life. It COULD happen!!
Well, anyway, it was a blessing that the dog peed on them. I didn't have to put them back in my storage box. But that just got me started...The ornament hooks were me "rebelling" against my natural inclination to keep them. I have no idea how long I've used those ornament hooks. It may have been years now. But as I was putting the first ornaments away, I notices 2 unopened packages of ornament hooks in the storage box that I bought in 2006!! That's when I said...forget this...CHUCK THEM!!! Next year, those lonely little hooks will be hanging on the tree. They'll be so happy.
Then I went on to the gift boxes...all those gift boxes that I put shirts or blankets in...GONE!!! I am so tired of storing these things. It will be worth it to spend a few dollars to buy more next year if necessary. I never need them. If I have to give a gift during the year, I always buy a gift bag.
I am so loving this time of "weeding out" my house. If only I could "weed out" the dog with the rest of the stuff. I'm dreading to find what he's going to "mark" next.
Welcome to my blog...Why "gidget"? Well...my husband tried to teach me how to surf before we were married. I was lousy at it, but he called me his "gidget" and the name stuck.
Why "Treasure Trove"? I love sharing about my sweet little "treasures"...and God has blessed me beyond measure....and no, I didn't mean that to rhyme.
Yuck!). At midnight last night, they finally "dropped" into bed...with a spotless room!! VICTORY!!! She even drug her friend down to her room to show her when they came to pick her up. I still have to go through their drawers and pull all the clothes that don't fit or they don't wear, but for now, I was satisfied enough to move on to...the BOYS ROOM. 
He was really unhappy when I told him what we were doing, but he was a trooper...even though he wasn't nearly as motivated as his sister...but he wasn't spending the night with anyone, so I guess it wasn't as urgent for him. Now that it's done, I'm guessing he is not quite so unhappy that I made him work a little.
And woke up this morning with 3 of my kids and a dog in bed with me (wish I could train that dog to sleep on the floor). I had a nice little chat with my packrat-inclined girls while the baby jumped on the dog (not budging from his "spot" on my bed). While they are not ready to relinquish any of their stuff, they did agree with me that playing in a clean room is MUCH nicer than playing in a messy room. (Hey...it's a step in the right direction...)
). I know there must be someone somewhere who has figured this out and recorded it for future generations, but for the life of me I can't find it anywhere. It seems that half the mess in their rooms is clothes...but the laundry room (which is the envy of my friends...very large) always seems overflowing too. I joke with my husband that if I washed and folded all the clothes we own, there wouldn't be a place to put them all...and the bad part is I KNOW I'm right. There's got to be a solution.
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