Day 24: Dealing with the Sentimental Stuff

The Task: To sort through my box of sentimental items I've been storing in the basement

The Why: I am not a very sentimental person.  I rented my wedding dress and have never regretted it, I recycle birthday cards upon receiving them, and my husband lost his wedding ring during our first year of marriage and it didn't create any real marital upset.  (He lost the replacement a couple years later, too.  He's now on wedding ring number three!)

Nonetheless, I do have one box of items in the basement that I haven't known what to do with. It's time to sort through that box.

The How: In order to remain in our home, all sentimental items must now be used, displayed, or properly archived (in the case of favourite photos and love notes.)

Here are a few things I try to keep in mind when sorting through sentimental stuff:

• We are not obligated to keep anything that is given to us.  Period.  Not gifts, not heirloom gravy boats, not my children's Sunday school craft projects.  Nothing.  That doesn't mean that I can't or won't keep some stuff, but I am not obligated to.  If the person who gave it to me wanted to forever control it's destiny they would have kept it.  I am the gate keeper to our home and our home is not a museum.

• Just because somebody passed something down to us doesn't necessarily mean that they treasured it.  I think sometimes that we are playing Old Maid with family heirlooms. Stuck with something they don't particularly want but would feel guilty shipping off to a thrift store, a family member passes the "treasure" on to us.  We are then stuck with it for the same reason until we can find somebody to pass it on to, and the cycle continues.  I don't want to play that game!  If it doesn't bring us joy, I need to send it off to the thrift store so that it can find its way into the hands of somebody who will treasure it. 

• Stuff is always just stuff.  The emotions attached to the item are not actually in any way attached to the item!  People are not memorialized by their stuff, either.  I look around my house and definitely am not hoping that one day my friends and family will treasure all the stuff I've collected.  I hope they will treasure memories of time spent and love shared, not serving dishes and picture frames and tea pots.  If we don't want to be memorialized by our belongings, why do we tend to think that our ancestors wanted to be memorialized by theirs?

•  Using our sentimental items will keep them sentimental.  We have a beautiful set of wedding china that was given to us by my (now passed) grandfather.  We use it every single week. We use it when the whole family gathers for a birthday, we use it to plate fancy desserts and serve tea.  My two year old has used it, my friends have used it, we have even broken a couple pieces.  One day when we are dead or ill, and my children have the task of going through our belongings I would rather them encounter a partial set of china that they have used countless times than a full set that sat behind glass their whole life. And if one of them chooses to take those dishes home that day, they will know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are free to use (and in time, break) those dishes. 

• Which brings me to my last point: One day our kids will have to sort through every single item we have chosen to keep. I don't want to burden them with a house full of crap I couldn't bring myself to get rid of!

 The Verdict: There are a couple small items sitting on my counter while I decide what to do with them, but for the most part this task was easier than I expected.  Some old staff t-shirts from a job I loved have been added to the thrift store pile (I considered searching pinterest for a way to turn them into something, but it is time that they go), some childhood letters sent to my husband from his grandparents are in the family photo album to be read and enjoyed.  My raggedy thread bare baby blankie was way beyond being used for anything and became trash.

The tote is empty and I feel good about that.

We are doing one small thing (almost) every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 23: Purging the Books {Gulp.}

The Task:  Purge our book collection until it is a carefully chosen selection of books that we love, use, and refer to often.  The rest are going to the local library!

The Why:  I'm a homeschool mom.  And I like books.  When generous friends and neighbours pass their gently used children's books on to our family I act like I just found the gold ticket.  Instead of carefully sorting through the books and keeping only what we need, I hoard them in my basement for all of eternity.

I've tried to sell some in yard sales before.  I put a box of books out early in the morning, and throughout the day I find myself walking past the box thinking "oh, no, I can't get rid of this one." and "hmmm, I think I'd like to read this one again" and by noon half the box has made it back inside. This happens every. single. time.

Oh, and just for fun I decided this morning to go through my amazon account from the last year and discovered that since this time last year I have purchased  (please don't judge me...) seventy-eight books!  No wonder the UPS guy has started asking questions!

What we're keeping: 

and

 

• Books we want to read again (like, um, immediately)
• Books we intend to (actually) use as part of our children's education
• Cookbooks we use at least once a month
• Reference books that contain useful, up-to-date information and that are fun to browse through.
• Children's books that are delightful family favourites.

Books we aren't keeping: 

 and...

 

• Books we might maybe sort-of want to read again someday (If we ever really do decide to read them again, we can borrow them back from the library!)
• Books that look "educational" but we've never actually used.
• Cookbooks that only contain one or two recipes I really use (I'm copying the best recipes into my recipe binder and getting rid of the book. Why keep the whole book for just a few recipes?)
• Mediocre reference books.  (Almost anything can be looked up on the Internet at a moments notice) 
• Books full of pretty pictures but little information.  (I kept 2 decorating books, the rest are going to the library.  If I feel the need to drool over some pretty rooms or fabulous table settings or fantastic landscaping, isn't that what Pinterest is for?)

The Verdict: I have the books boxed up and ready to go as soon as the library opens tomorrow morning.  I'm surprisingly okay with this. I like knowing that many of them will be available at the library if we ever need them, but in the mean time they will be read and used and enjoyed instead of collecting dust.

And I don't need to store them anymore!

I've decided to start following the one in, one out rule for books.   When we bring home a new book, an old one must go.  Because we do school at home and have kids in different grades I think I will have to waive this rule for curriculum and the occasional reference material, which means I'll have to be all the more ruthless about the rest of the books in order to avoid ending up on an episode of Hoarders.

We are doing one small thing (almost) every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 20: We Cheated.

The rules (which were arbitrarily created by us the night before the project began)  clearly state that we aren't going to eat out unless invited as part of a social occasion.  Today we cheated.

It wasn't even a little accidental cheat like a drive through coffee and a muffin. It was a full blown we're-only-half-way-done-our-errands, the-kids-are-hungry, and-it's-too-rainy-for-a-picnic... rules shmules, we're going to Pizza Hut for lunch sort of cheat.

It just seemed...simpler.

And then we ran into the grocery store for a couple things, including lemons so that I could make fresh lemonade for my husband's birthday party this weekend and....

I forgot my reusable produce bags.

So today was kinda a big fat fail.  I'm going to go feed my kids banana smoothies and popcorn for supper.  It's that kind of day....

We are doing one small thing (almost) every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 19: Cleaning out the Cleaning Products

The Task:  Today I'm decluttering and making cleaning day simper by only surrounding myself and my family with products that I feel are safe and friendly!

Over the last year or so I have become increasingly careful about the products we use in our home.  But for some reason I was still hanging on to some commercial cleaning products, even though I refuse to use them!  (Please don't call Hoarders, I promise I'm getting rid of them!)

The Why?  I've read lists of most dangerous cleaners in our homes and some of the products I have in my cleaning basket were on those lists....but instead of ditching them I held on to them"just in case".   I have a can of a certain bathroom cleaner (hint, it rhymes with bubbing scrubbles) that I haven't sprayed in over a year.   What just-in-case situation was I saving it for? Just in case vinegar becomes illegal? Just in case I start to miss that burning sensation I get in my throat when I use it?  Just in case of what exactly?

The How:
 All my half used cans of  commercial cleaners have been boxed up and are ready for the next hazardous waste collection day in my community.

I now have a total of six cleaning products that meet all of my cleaning needs:

• a gentle dishsoap (I use this, in warm water, to clean almost any surface: cabinets, walls, the inside of my refrigerator.  And it's super for cleaning bathtubs.)
• vinegar (I put a splash in my mop water. I mix it half and half with water for windows. I use it full strength in a spray bottle to clean toilets)
• baking soda (Great for cleaning the kitchen sink)
• Peroxide (I mix with baking soda to make a paste for heavy duty cleaning, like cooked on stove top gunk and dirty grout lines)
• Rubbing Alcohol (for cleaning the microfiber sofas!)
• Tea tree oil (for disinfecting)

On top of being great cleaners in their own right, every one of these products has another use around the house as well.  Meaning less bottles of junk stuffed under my sinks and in my cleaning basket.   Yay for multi-purpose items!

{By the way, I wrote a guest post for a friends blog a couple months ago about how I clean my whole house without nasty chemicals.  If you want more info on how I do my chores using the 6 household products mentioned above, check it out!}

The Verdict:
If everything we knew about cleaning came from television commercials, it would be easy to think that we need a specific product to clean every surface in our home. Tub and shower sprays, toilet cleaner, counter spray, window and glass cleaner, specialty products for leather, stainless steel, stove tops,ovens and floors!  But really cleaning can be so much simpler than that.  People had clean homes long before grocery stores devoted whole aisles to cleaning products and television commercials started telling us that we could buy magical cleanliness in a can!

In my opinion, many of those commercial cleaners are often just selling us an illusion of clean.  Sure, a heavy duty spray on cleaner can make our tubs sparkle, but if it leaves our bathrooms coated in toxic chemicals,  that is not my definition of clean!

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 18: Umm....We Got Rid of our Bed

The Task:  Okay, we didn't get rid of the whole bed.  Just the bed frame.

The Why:  There isn't any deep spiritual meaning or underlying concern for the environment on this one....I was just really sick of cleaning under the bed.  I hate how dust accumulates there.  Why not just ditch the dust bunny zoo altogether and be done with it? Sounds like a good step to a simpler life to me!

Here's what it looked like under our bed the day we decided to ditch the bed frame.  I think I see a corn chip. Ewww.

I've wanted to do this for ages,and I finally got hubby on board.We removed the bed frame a few days ago and so far we love sleeping closer to the floor!

The Pros: 

• No more dust gathering under the bed.
• No more socks disappearing under the bed.
• No bed skirt to wash.
• The bed is easier to make, no tucking necessary.
• If I don't make the bed very nicely and just throw the duvet cover over everything haphazardly it looks more like a spread from the Anthropologie catalogue than a big ugly mess.
• It's safer for the kids who climb into our bed in the wee hours of the night and occasionally engage in middle of the day tickle fights, wrestling matches and unsanctioned trampoline competitions on our bed.
• I like the relaxed bohemian sort of look it gives to our bedroom
• The bed doesn't make any noise when we, um, you know....

The Cons:

• It's a little unconventional (which isn't exactly a big motivator for us anyways).

Also, we found we weren't using our nightstands for much (and they were too high without the bed frame raising the bed up) so we replaced them with one little basket to keep the books we are currently reading.  We had a sofa table in there too because we had nowhere else to put it...we got rid of that as well. The only furniture left in our bedroom is the bed and one dresser.  I love how big and open and relaxing it feels!

 The Verdict:  I realize this isn't for everyone, but I am thrilled to not have to clean under the bed anymore or squirm under there in search of lost socks.   Why keep something that just adds unnecessary mess and work to my life?

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!