Clutter Battles - Part 7 An Update

The progress continues and we are amazed at how clean and open our basement looks. Here is an update on the variety of things I have been dealing with.

Things I have gotten out of our house:
1 violin
1 large keyboard, stand and chair (lent out)
1 printer
1 book
1 Package w/3 books, shirt, sunglasses
2 bags shredded material
1 small bag of diaper covers
1 small bag of waffle style baby blankets
4 bags to Joanna
3 bags to Goodwill
1 CD

My new total of things out of the house is 60 "grocery bag units". And we are not done!!! All I can say is this has been really fun once we got going. We definitely have momentum. I will need all the momentum I can get to go through all the remaining paper which is the bulk of what is left.

Clutter Battles - One Piece of Paper at a Time

Lost

Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you.
If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.

David Wagoner
copyright 1976

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Ok. Now I can recycle that piece of paper. :)

Clutter Battles - Part 6 Back to the Garage

In addition to all the work we have been doing in the basement (more to come soon on that) on Saturday, we spent 1 hour in the garage sorting and purging tools. We set everything out on the ground and put like items with like items. We purged a whole box of tools that were duplicates or just didn't work very well. What we were left with, we sorted into three categories: everyday tools, woodworking tools and all the rest. The everyday tools went into the top, removable section of the tool box. The woodworking tools went in the bottom of the tool box and the rest were just put back in a cardboard box. We struggled with what to do with the other category. For now we are going to get small containers (shoe box size) to sort the other tools into. I am still not convinced this is the right way to go but we can try it and see. I have vague recollections of my dad's peg board with outlines drawn where the tools were supposed to go. This may be a better way. Only time will tell. It felt great to make some progress on the garage. Thanks to W for helping do the work!

p.s. the more I think about it the more I think that the small boxes are a bad solution. I need to talk it over with W.

Clutter Battles - Part 5

I cannot believe I am on "Part 5" of this topic. It is more like being on "Part 5" of a long, long journey. Stuff has continued to fly out of our house at an amazing rate. This includes:

* 2 baby bouncy seats
* 1 bag of maternity clothes and supplies to a friend
* 1 Baby Bjorn baby carrier
* 2 boxes mailed to people (I should have mailed the stuff long ago (whew!))
* 7 bags of shredded paper (with no end of paper in sight)
* 11 (!) more bags to Goodwill plus a large wire shelf
* 4 handmade pottery bowls (made by myself and my guy) (two of these were promptly regifted to me on the very next day as a joke but then the jokester took them back). they were very nice bowls. :)
* 2 handmade pottery cups (made by myself and my guy)
* 1 handmade pottery vase (made by me)

I have two items out on Craig's List for sale but haven't gotten any bites yet.

In terms of a sheer amount of "stuff" out of the house, if I use grocery bags as a unit then I am up to a total of 43! Wow!

But it isn't all good news...the garage, which was off to such a great start, has gotten stalled and is now in a state of minor decline. We did such a good job "Sorting" but never got any further. I have been working more on the basement since, a) we are having company in a few weeks and our guest is staying in the basement and b) my office is also in the basement and I need to work down here. So now I am torn. Do I go back to the garage or do I stick with continuing on with cleaning out the basement? I see the garage as a shorter term project but the basement is a more immediate need. A final question...does it matter what I am working on if I am still making progress?

Harry Potteritis

Last week I started having severe pain my both my forearms. The pain was unrelenting and I tried to figure out why my arms were hurting so bad. It felt as though I had injured both of my arms but I hadn't and I was baffled. My husband, who is no stranger to these types of injuries, suggested a course of action which included Traumeel cream, internal Arnica homeopathics and Advil. I did all these things before bed one night and the next morning I felt much better.

Better, that is, until I picked up the latest Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Both arms started screaming again and it hit me...I had Harry Potteritis.

The good news is that I finished the book (I liked it) and my arms are feeling much better. If you are planning to read the new book, make sure you protect your arms!