30 Days of Spring Cleaning–Final Thoughts & May’s Challenge

There is only one day left in the challenge of Spring Cleaning for April– and in a mad dash to at least say that I had continued my weak attempt at attic cleaning, I spent the entire day going through tubs of children’s clothes.  (minus the nap, and three meals of course)

I ended up in this version of H.E.DOUBLE HOCKEY STICKS.  And yes, I cried.  And yes, I moaned and groaned.  And yes, I bargained.  And no, I couldn’t be bothered to change the signs from Girl to Boy – and why didn’t I just make them size signs instead of Girl/Boy signs in the first place?  The other day?  That was Keira’s mess, which I wrapped up this morning.  This afternoon?  Oh my.  Turns out the boy had much more in the way of clothes than the girl.  How is that even possible?!  So this is his “mess”.

The end result of the entire month’s challenge is this:

The attic, it turns out, is much harder to purge/clean/reorganize than going room to room inside the house.  First of all, it’s hot up there.  Second, it’s chaos up there.  Third, anytime you have to sort through 200 cards from your youth…that’s a project better left to the shredder.  Fourth, it’s puts the inside of your garage totally out of commission for said month. Fifth, if you don’t finish…and you won’t….you will consequently beat yourself up each and every time you open the garage and have to jump, jive, and wail your way into the house.  Sixth….it’s hot up there.

Our garage is a hodge podge of trash, donate, yardsale, keepers, and wedon’tknowwhatitissoweignoreit piles.  I’ve just about given up the idea of a yardsale after my buddy Anna’s BLEAK outcome.  Yikes!  Donations are easier and take a half hour, as compared to the hours you will spend pricing, the signage you will need to make, the organization, the haggling…it’s all so NOT my cup of tea.  On the other hand, I do love to GO to a good yardsale.  Decisions, decisions.

We have not been back up in the attic after our first attempt, or brought down any more tubs.  For the record, there are still many up there to be gone through.  So our purging will continue into May.  Ugh.  Too many Saturdays that were just packed in April – so I guess I could have planned that out a little bit better.  Double ugh.

As for the children’s clothes…I made a decision today that was the best I could do.  I’m keeping them.  And I have two things to say about that:  first of all, it’s hundreds (probably thousands) of dollars worth of beautiful clothing.  I had already donated and given away tons of stuff.  This was the best of the best, for the most part.  I had nine tubs, and I got it down to six.  Two tubs for each child ranging from 3 months to 2-3T.  One tub of shoes, bottles, and everything else that you need with a baby.  One tub of keepsakes.  So, the agreement we made was five years.  We keep the five tubs for five years.  After five years, if we have not grown our family, the tubs go to consignment.  The one small tub of keepsakes stay no matter what.  I’m still proud of myself, but choosing a keepsake tub was brutally hard.  I kept adding and then whittling it down.  Ultimately I chose the items that made me cry just to see them.  Keepers.  The rest I decided to love through pictures and not go through them again, unless we add to the family.  Anton was very understanding and when I admitted that I was not ready to let them go just yet, he simply shrugged and said “ok”.  That was that. 

So we still have a haul in the attic to sort and purge.  We still have a garage full of “I don’t know” and “put this back up in the attic”.  We just need the time and energy to sit down and get it done.  I’ll keep ya posted!  The upshot is WE TRIED!  And that’s half the battle.  We made a dent.  That’s the other half.  Sometimes, that’s the best you can do. 

Since Tuesday is May 1st and some of you are wondering about May’s Challenge, I am OH SO HAPPY to introduce you to what will probably be the favored of all my challenges:

I’m taking a break.  I need a month off and quite frankly, I miss writing about life stuff.  The challenges are great, don’t get me wrong – but I’m still working on the last four.  Especially April.  Not so much January.  (blech)  So you have two options – forge on ahead and create your own challenge for May, or do what I’m about to do…put your feet up and catch up on life before summer hits with a boom and it’s rushing here and there and everywhere and packing as much good stuff into it as you can.  Come to think of it, I can’t decide if I’m going to Challenge through the summer or not.  My gut says “NO”.  But if I don’t, I would probably make up the months starting in Aug or Sept.  Whatever…I’m not sure.  I just know that to complete a year we have FOUR more challenges to go. 

I’ll keep you posted…but for now?  Nothing.  Literally.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled Bushel and a Peck writing for a month.  All in favor say “ayeeeeeee”  (like a pirate if you’re feeling sassy)

xo