Today is a day I must remember. If I ever feel like we're just floating along and not quite getting anywhere fast with our simplifying, I will look back on this day and be encouraged.
You see, I've been purging the house for a while now and have taken a few small trips to Goodwill and have sold some stuff, but there was still a very large pile of items in my garage that we didn't need anymore. It was stuff from the house and stuff from random boxes stored in the garage. Stuff we've been carrying around unnecessarily for years. After having said pile sit in our garage for months with grand plans to sell it on craigslist or ebay or whatever, I made the decision to just get it out of our lives. How long would it take me to go through, take pictures, decide on prices, post online, and wait for someone to MAYBE buy the items? Too long and I didn't want to wait. It was over-complicating our whole simplicity goal. So without taking a second look to reminisce about what was in those boxes, I loaded them into my car.
When everything was finally loaded, I took a step back and what I saw was inspiring. The back of my station wagon was literally filled to the roof with stuff. There wasn't space for one more thing. And my garage? There was space....wide open free space in my garage. It was so freeing. We didn't need all that stuff. We thought we needed that stuff, but it's been sitting in the garage for months and we hadn't missed a single item. And now it's gone from our lives and our home (and garage) is a better place because of it.
There is still a small pile of higher ticket items that we will try to sell (baby swing, high chair, etc), but the little space consuming, dust collecting knick-knacks are gone. One more hour of work this weekend and we will finally be able to park a car in our garage. Yes, it's THAT clean now!
I love results and I love feeling like we're doing something good for our household. I am encouraged again.
Showing posts with label garage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label garage. Show all posts
Friday, January 6, 2012
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
The Garage
Last night my husband mentioned that he really needs to start parking in the garage. It's getting colder and we've had to scrape the windshield the past few mornings. It takes between 10 and 15 minutes to get the car warm enough for all the windows to be clear. And he feels that all this cuts into his work day. (Of course, if he would wake up on time like a nearly 30 year old man should, this might not be such a big issue....) But I agreed with him. He does need to be able to park in the garage so the frost and ice isn't a problem for getting going in the morning.
But this meant something would have to happen that I'd been avoiding: We must clean the garage. <insert horror movie scream here>
Since the rain had yet to start this afternoon, I took the kids outside and had them ride bikes around the driveway while I attempted to work on the garage. I think I mostly just shuffled stuff around. It's the thought that counts, right?
Obviously, in terms of organizing and simplifying, the garage is the biggest problem area. It's better than it was at the beginning of the summer in terms of how much stuff is in there, but due to going through boxes and moving stuff around, it LOOKS worse. And all the sawdust that covers every inch of the garage from when my husband made bunk beds for the boys isn't helping.
I did purchase a bunch of storage bins so I could move holiday decorations from various cardboard boxes. I'm all for keeping the spiders out as much as possible, plus if I ever flood the garage again through our central air system (long story), our items will be better protected in the plastic containers than they would be in cardboard. I didn't know how much would really fit into them, but I was able to fit all Halloween decorations into one medium sized bin and all Christmas decorations into one large bin. All in all, I did away with five big cardboard boxes (clearing two whole shelves) just from using those two bins. Unbelievable! I was so excited and, I'll admit it, just a tad proud of myself for saving so much garage space. I foresee my storage bin/system addiction getting worse....
There's still a TON to do, but after clearing away five boxes and finally taking some pictures of larger items that we've been wanting to sell, I felt like I made some progress today. And the more progress I make in the garage, the more room it gives me to toss out more stuff from the house. Hmm? The car? Better stock up on ice scrapers, honey.
But this meant something would have to happen that I'd been avoiding: We must clean the garage. <insert horror movie scream here>
Since the rain had yet to start this afternoon, I took the kids outside and had them ride bikes around the driveway while I attempted to work on the garage. I think I mostly just shuffled stuff around. It's the thought that counts, right?
Obviously, in terms of organizing and simplifying, the garage is the biggest problem area. It's better than it was at the beginning of the summer in terms of how much stuff is in there, but due to going through boxes and moving stuff around, it LOOKS worse. And all the sawdust that covers every inch of the garage from when my husband made bunk beds for the boys isn't helping.
I did purchase a bunch of storage bins so I could move holiday decorations from various cardboard boxes. I'm all for keeping the spiders out as much as possible, plus if I ever flood the garage again through our central air system (long story), our items will be better protected in the plastic containers than they would be in cardboard. I didn't know how much would really fit into them, but I was able to fit all Halloween decorations into one medium sized bin and all Christmas decorations into one large bin. All in all, I did away with five big cardboard boxes (clearing two whole shelves) just from using those two bins. Unbelievable! I was so excited and, I'll admit it, just a tad proud of myself for saving so much garage space. I foresee my storage bin/system addiction getting worse....
There's still a TON to do, but after clearing away five boxes and finally taking some pictures of larger items that we've been wanting to sell, I felt like I made some progress today. And the more progress I make in the garage, the more room it gives me to toss out more stuff from the house. Hmm? The car? Better stock up on ice scrapers, honey.
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