Physical and emotional decluttering

Well, the Mr's work project that seemed to go smoothly blew up in the afternoon which meant I'd be on my own for a workout again.  I hate that.  It's different when you know you're going to be working out alone and you can plan for it but when it's hurry up and wait and no ETA as to when he'll be home, it throws a wrench into things.  I went ahead with the workout planned for the night, Turbo Fire 45 and made dinner.

Fish taco and brussels with 1/2 slice of bacon.

The past few months have been quite a whirlwind.

I have taken on so much with trying to keep up on many things that I feel I'm failing at many of them, including here.  I opened an antique shop on Etsy and part of that requires that I keep the items I sell all boxed up and ready to ship.  That beautiful office I redid looks like a box and craft store blew up in there.  I do crafts on the table in the dining room so there's a constant presence of Mod Podge, glitter and string which makes the Mr twitch.  I look at it all and I get overwhelmed and I don't want to do anything.  I want to clean but there is nowhere to put it all that doesn't make it look horrible.  I sometimes want to shut the door to the office.  I did that once but fully expected that if I peeked in, it would be like Carol Anne's room in Poltergeist where all of her crap was floating around.

I want to move stuff to the basement but the basement needs cleaned.  (Seems like we just did that but nope, it looks like crap again.)  So yesterday I went down and cleared off two shelves on a bookcase.  One whole shelf was taken up with this huge boom box my grandparents got me a few years ago.  We had one in our bedroom that had detachable speakers and when it died, we wanted to replace it.  My grandparents got it for me that Christmas and then we found something a fraction of the size the following year.  I felt horrible and it was probably the last gift they got me that Grandma picked out on her own before people had to start helping her shop.  I kept it out of guilt even though it was taking up valuable storage real estate.  I've had to let go of that guilt and appreciate that she wanted me to enjoy it, we did and I know she doesn't even remember getting it for me.  I will keep handwritten notes and cards but something I don't use?  I can't do it anymore.  My sanity is more important right now.  I got the shelves stocked with smaller items waiting to ship and it made the office look better....not tons but progress.

I wish I had the patience for a garage sale but I don't.  We just donate a ton of stuff and hope someone else gets use out of the stuff we don't use anymore.  I want to work on this stuff over the next few days to get a sense of organization and try to make room for things to go in their new home.  I only have so much space to display things but I have such attachment to things because if I get rid of them, it's inevitable I'll need it right after I do.  Some things, no.  Like the black octagonal serving bowls I got when we first got married.  I've upgraded since then and while they're in a donate pile, they haven't made it to Goodwill yet.  It's baby steps when you're dealing with a pack rat.  I'm looking at about 100 CD's in our armoire and I will probably move them to the under the bed storage we have with our other CD's.  I want to maybe put shelves in there or something so I can put something decorative instead of using it to display our dinosaur discs.  I know the likelihood of me following through on that is somewhat low though.  Or if I do it'll be when I repaint them in the spring/summer.  (I know the Mr just cringed reading that.)

I think cleaning up some of the physical clutter will go a long way in cleaning up emotional clutter.  There's no doubt that when you come home to a clean house, you feel less stressed.  I want that to trickle into all aspects of my life.  I know this isn't the time of year to be digging into the closets and getting to that point of "it gets worse before it gets better."  We'll have people coming over periodically and I want to keep the place as clean as possible so I'm not having to do a big clean sweep every other day. Day 1 down.

Do you have clutter you need to tend to?

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