Jul 17
Another week of declutter-ish-ness Stuff
Well… I have to admit that I completely failed to keep up with the Divine Decluttering: Making Space for your Goddess to Shine. I just couldn’t keep up!! Having the kids home, working all day, trying to find time to spend with the kids (and Reg and HIS kids) in the evenings AND get all the housework done kinda left me feeling completely burnt out.
I got stuck in “OVERWHELM” and I just couldn’t get motivated to get out, I just didn’t know where to turn for that little extra PUSH I needed to move myself from “OMG WHAT DO I DO WITH THIS?” to “yes, I can do that”.
It isn’t as if I don’t have things packed up and ready to be disposed of…
It’s that I don’t want to just throw EVERYTHING in the trash to be dragged out to an eternity in a landfill. I mean, some of these things MIGHT be able to put to better use, right?
And THAT is where I got stuck with the decluttering aspect of things. That and just not feeling that I had enough TIME between babysitter, work, meals, clean up, family time, and sleep to take things OUT somewhere.
Time is a HUGE issue for me when I have the kids with me. Being a single parent (even if I am only parenting half time) means that my time is truncated even more than normal the weeks I have the kids with me. I don’t have the ability to just not cook a meal until late at night, because the kids are hungry. I don’t have the ability to leave the kitchen a disaster, because I know that the next night I will NEED to have a clean kitchen in order to make the NEXT set of meals. I can’t leave the kids alone in the house while I load up the car and dispose of things.
So these 2 weeks where the kids are with me, I have kinda let the overwhelm get me, and I have been doing more of the PLANNING thing.
Only…
I don’t know WHAT to do with a lot of my stuff.
For instance:
Text books.
Magazines.
craft supplies:
quilting/sewing
beading
book altering/ATC’s
knitting/crochet
leather work
embroidery
needlework/cross stitch
CDs.
Papers – reciepts, bank statements, pay stubs, tax returns, legal documents (several iterations), sentiments, kids’ art/school work… (GUILT GUILT GUILT)
I KNOW that I need to get rid of a lot of these things, and MORE (the kids’ toys? old airmattresses? makeup I don’t wear? plastic bags from the grocery store?) but there are a lot of things that would be “junk” and yet I don’t want to just fill up the landfill with these things either…
But more than just getting things OUT of my house… I need to stop bringing things IN.
I have stopped buying magazines
reusable shopping bags
I go through the kids’ clothes every season (we have 4 here) and donate things they no longer wear (and that I no longer wear)
I am trying to find a way to get more books in eBook format, rather than print. I would LOVE a kindle (which unfortunately is not available here)
I have put a moratorium on purchase of blank books (sorta) and pens for myself and craft supplies for my daughter and cards (Yu-gi-oh, Pokemon) for my son
I got a cable package that includes movies, so I watch movies on tv rather than buying them
But I’m STILL having trouble NOT buying things… its very much like buying things fills up a void, its a habit of want rather than real needs… I don’t need more makeup, but when I’m bored and alone I buy it. There are TONS of things I buy when I don’t need… I just need to start realizing when I’m buying non-essentials and stop myself from filling up my space with more CRAP all the time…
But in a lot of ways its not that easy to DO…
Every day that I am alone I am bombarded with the messages that I should be doing better — I should have MORE (and, seriously, seeing theEx’s new place with his ALL NEW FREAKING STYLISH FURNITURE (never mind the nice stuff he kept when we separated) really hurts me and makes me want things I know I don’t need), I should have a bigger car, I should have a home of my own with a yard and a garden, I should have nicer clothes, I should have nicer furniture…
My struggle to PROVE myself to the world is struggling with my desire to live a beautiful, clean and SIMPLE life.
I don’t really NEED more STUFF, I need more things that reflect ME as a person, that reflect the love that I have for myself, my kids, my cats, my boyfriend, my life…
I like simple, clean lines. I like functional. I like bright and clean and colourful.
If I had my way:
I would have 2 couches, not 3 loveseats, and they would be either leather or pleather not because I’m into wholesale slaughter of animals, but for more practical reasons — when you have children, you need furniture where you can wipe off crayon, sticky stuff, unmentionable stuff — and having 2 fabric love seats that have been stained in EVERY concievable way, I have vowed “never again” with fabric covered furniture
Wooden kitchen table (dark stain) that seats 6 with solid wooden chairs – right now I have a small, cheap light wood table that seats 4, isn’t expandable, and the chairs are all falling apart. This was (shock-of-shocks) a cast off from my marriage, something that theEx felt was beneath him so he bequeathed (dumped so he didn’t have to pay dump fees or haul it to his father’s church for disposal/sale). It is passable, but not ideal, for me right now.
the kids would have simpler beds. Right now they each have pieces from theBoy’s bunkbed set. The problem is that this is falling apart, cheap and ugly. I would prefer simpler wooden frames, sturdy things that will last them through highschool, with well made dressers, bedside table, and book shelves for their stuff. I would like each of the kids to have a place to create their own personal altar space in their rooms.
Book shelves. I currently do not have real book shelves in my home. I have borrowed some storage shelving (that I will have to replace now that its kinda locked into place in my bedroom) but I do not have any shelves that are fuctional AND beautiful. I would like shelving that could hold not only books, but DVDs and CDs and BASKETS with theGirl’s craft supplies.
Area rug for living room. I used to have one, but the fact that I have kids and cats (and no vacuum) meant that this already half-destroyed cast off became more of a trouble than it was worth and go unceremoniously DUMPED. I need something that fits my decore (which right now is divorcee trashbin chic) — greens, neutrals (maybe BLACK so a lesser percentage of cat hairs show??), easy to clean.
I need more colour. I need more things that fit the ME I want to become…
But I don’t need more stuff just to have STUFF…
Oh the dilemma!
Hey girly, do you have Craigslist there? We have recently been lamenting over our furniture (as you do above) and have been replacing things for free or little money. Last weekend we got bed frame/bookcase headboard/mattress for one boy for $10.00. We find that, if we keep what we want in mind and don’t buy extra junk, things improve quite quickly. Also, the kids love to go along. Just a thought…
Hey fellow de-cluttering Goddess!
I am finding it difficult to stay on track (the single-mother thing), and am still plugging along though.
Slowly, but surely I am creating space and a powerful new relationship with my space and my stuff.