Bingeing and Purging II

Since my first post about trying to take control of our stuff and our house, Mat and I have managed to take seven large boxes of stuff to the local Value Village. We have also filled about the same number of large garbage bags. It's kind of awesome.¹

I come from a long line of people who should probably be on Hoarders pack rats.² Mat and I dated for several years before he was allowed into the basement of my parents' house, which is a repository for all manner of stuff (and possibly still contains some unpacked boxes from when we moved into that house 25 years ago). My mom has been making a concerted effort to clean up the basement³ over the last few years

Sentiment is my biggest problem--I am a nostalgia junkie. If you have sent me anything in the last ten years, I probably still have it, be it letters, cards, bookmarks, yarn, etc. No matter how much I don't like, need, or want something, if it was a gift from someone else, I will keep it. I don't necessarily think this is a bad thing; I like to think that it demonstrates how grateful I am when people give me gifts. That said, there comes a point at which I simply don't need (or, sometimes, want) the things that I am given. For example, in the big purge, I gave away 3 different dip bowl with spreader sets; I kept one.

I have been reading a few different sites about managing space and clutter over the last few months, and I've come across a basic principle that has been enormously helpful to me in terms of making me feel okay about letting go of things that I've been given. It's called the Six Months Rule, and it essentially states that if you haven't used it in the last six months and aren't going to use it in the next six, gift it, donate it, or toss it. (There are some exceptions, obviously, for special items, like my collection of beaded evening bags, or Mat's collection of Scotch.) It's such a simple thing, but it's amazing to me how much of a difference it has made in relieving my guilty conscience about getting rid of gifts.

Now, if only someone could make come up with a rule that would make it okay for me to get rid of books, I'd be all set.

=====
¹ I mean awesome in the sense that we got it done, not awesome in the sense that we had that much crap to throw out.
² On both sides, even.
³ I'm sure it helps enormously that most of my stuff came here when we bought the house, though I'm pretty sure there are still a few boxes of books at my parents'.

Bingeing and Purging Part I

Over the last few weeks, Mat and I have undertaken a serious effort to re-organize our house. We've noticed, when we visit other people, that other people's houses are not cluttered like ours is: we simply have a lot of stuff. (I also think that the fact that we have wall-to-wall carpeting in our house contributes to this appearance, as does the total lack of storage space.) Thus, our co-resolution for the new year has been to try to make some sense out of our living space.


Mat will be the first to tell you that I am the problem here. He thinks (mostly correctly) that I am the source of all the clutter, what with my books and my knitting and my grading. While this is true, he's not totally blameless, since he does tend to leave Magic cards and video game paraphernalia lying around.

As a wedding present, we were given a dining room table, and we have just recently finally purchased the matching chairs. Yes, that's right: I am now sufficiently grown up and classy that I have a matching dining room table and chairs. Not a moment too soon, either, as two of our mismatched chairs had quite literally fallen to pieces the week before. Now that our living room looks classy, we're working on reorganizing the rest of the main floor. We've moved the computer upstairs into our spare bedroom, moving my computer desk out of the craft room to do so. The old computer desk is going to a second handstore, and we are going move the couches around and perhaps move the bookshelves into the living room, which will leave the dining room as open as it can possibly be.


I now have a 6' tall pantry cupboard in the craftroom to hold my crafting things, and I am in the process of sorting things out in there...very slowly. The thing that I need to deal with most is actually *not* my yarn stash; it's my fabric stash. I own an awful lot of fabric for someone who doesn't sew very much, and I think that now is the time to start looking for ways to weed out what I will use and what I won't use. I think that is an excellent job...for tomorrow.

I found four sweater quantities of yarn in a pale grey heather: a DK alpaca/merino/silk, an organic merino worsted weight wool, boring old Patons Classic Wool (also worsted) and an unknown fingering weight wool that my mom bought me in Scotland. Apparently I have a need for sedate, conservatively coloured garments?