all sorts of household junk in my bedroom in order to make the main floor of my house presentable. One would think that, after 17 years, I could come up with a better method of housekeeping. But no - Larry and I have resorted to dumping things into boxes. The box that holds all the odds and ends he cleaned off the computer desk before our New Year's party? Sits right here in the den - I just keep tossing more stuff into it. The top of my dresser was covered with I-don't-know-what-all; so I grabbed an empty box, swept everything into it, and shoved the box into my closet. The clutter is utterly defeating us.Don't tell me to throw things out. I throw zillions of things out every single day. I've read all the books. I do the Flylady thing. But we are still overwhelmed. The enemy is winning.
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On the bright side, Girl Scout cookies are arriving soon! When in trouble, eat Trefoils.
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The kids and I have had a fun couple of days. Our little bit of snow almost immediately froze to ice. So we went sledding again. Sledding is fun, even if you are middle-aged and out-of-shape and terrified of careening down an icy hill at breathtaking speed...it's fun, because it makes you feel like a kid again. So go! Right now! Just remember that second pair of socks, okay?
I always jam things in drawers and crevices whenever anyone is coming over. Of course, I don't always remember to dig that stuff back out. Which is a problem if it's like a weeks worth of mail.
ReplyDeleteOH MY GOSH! This is MY LIFE!
ReplyDeleteMy husband just wants to rent a dumpster.
Clutter is winning at my house too, despite the attempts. I keep deleting the FLYLady reminders. Maybe I should actually start reading them again.
ReplyDeleteMy in-laws came to visit today. I took everything on my bedroom floor and shoved it into my closet. Now I can barely open the door.
ReplyDeleteI'm just praying their knees are too achy to walk upstairs to see the kids rooms.
thin mints...those work too - the closet door must be shoved to close, but I feel better.
ReplyDeleteI break out in hives when I read posts like this. Clutter and I do not mix.
ReplyDeleteCheerkick for Girl Scout cookies! I need to go sledding. I've got a great backyard for it!
ReplyDeleteBoxes? What a great--and sophisticated--idea! I have dozens of plastic grocery store bags shoved in my closets that are holding my clutter!
ReplyDeleteMaybe I could get boxes and put all the grocery bags into the boxes. Wow. Thanks for the idea!
When I have to clean up, I walk around with a garbage bag and toss toss toss. Then I regret. Oh, vicious cycle! I want a dumpster so bad but I think my husband knows it will be toss and regret and a ginormous scale.
ReplyDeleteI'm not succeeding with the clutter either. And yes, I throw tons out too (well, into the recycle bag), where it apparently breeds and sneaks back out at night.
ReplyDeleteThere is always a trial that leads from the doorway to the bed, the "trees" being the multitudes of boxes, bags and miscellanoues other clutter we've picked up aroudn the house that never got put away.
ReplyDeletethank you so much for talking about it, I always thought I was weird for jamming crap into boxes and shoving them into my closets and bedroom floors. I am so tired of clutter. I throw out/give out stuff regularly, but it seems that there is an abundance of clutter woth 7 kids! Sigh, now I need to make a list of what needs to be cleaned.
My mom gave me that darn book for Christmas. I guess she was trying to nicely tell me that Clutter is winning.
ReplyDeleteI'm beginning to think it's time to hire a bulldozer to take the clutter out for good.
I, too, do the clutter dance. I love that book, Clutter's Last Stand. I think it's around here somewhere...
ReplyDeleteMy sister has a clutter-free house. She also throws away birthday gifts of glass jars of candles, because "it would just sit around and be clutter" and has no hobbies or crafts, because that would just be clutter.
I choose my way.
My mother called it instant housekeeping and shoved everything in paper bags that then went into the back of the guest room closet (actually my sister's bedroom). After she died and my father was selling the house, I helped him clean it out and those bags were a treasure trove of odd and important things: sterling silver, old family photos, broken pencils, stray buttons, and every piece of scrap paper used to balance the checkbook every month. Don't forget to unpack occasionally, lest you to lose an important family momento!
ReplyDeleteIt's taking over here too! I know...we should all go on tour. Travel around to each house and the whole lot of us would help out one house at a time.
ReplyDeleteLike a working-vacation! We'd have a blast inbetween warring with the clutter!
I have been looking for a few items lately...I'm afraid this means I have to start digging through bags and boxes. Once those get opened, everything escapes AGAIN. But we can't just toss it all --sometimes I find things like $100 check from Christmas!
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad to know there are others like me, doing the stash & dash. I loved FlyLady, but her e-mails were cluttering up my computer. *sigh*
Samoas are my favorite.
ReplyDeleteMaybe you should move - it's amazing what gets tossed when you think you have to haul it somewhere. Then again, it's amazing the amount of stuff we think we need and ARE hauling somewhere!
Sledding and GS cookies. That is healing for sure!
ReplyDeleteIf that makes you feel better, cluttering has been on-going battle in our home too! Especially around my desk, I had to take out a small folded table to hold up piles and piles of papers.
ReplyDeleteYay! The Girl Scout cookies are coming.
ReplyDeleteBoo! Our baker has decreased (by one ounce) the contents of each and every box.
I've decided the next thing I'm clearing out of my house is the eight books I own on clutter prevention and annihilation.
My first thought on seeing 'remember the second pair of socks' was, OMG, she's knitting on the sled....hey, it's Friday, my brain is fried.
ReplyDeleteI have piles... then piles become boxes... then boxes become a stack... and THEN I go through them...
ReplyDeleteI think the solution is to move more often... or at least swap houses for a week now and then because other people won't feel attached to the junk (the fact that I call it "junk" should clue you in to the type of stuff in my boxes)!
The kids tried to wear two pairs of socks to school today "just in case" they got to play in the snow during recess, lol. Gotta love them being prepared!
ReplyDeleteTREFOILS!!!
ReplyDeleteI ordered some Samoas and Thin mints too.
I didn't think we had any Girl Scouts in our neighborhood. I' so glad that one found me.
And I'm so glad to hear that I'm not the only one with the filing system called "Stick it in a box and put it in the basement and we'll go through it later to decide what to do with it."
If I was really organized, I would label the box with the date filled, so I could find things easier later.
But then that would take all of the fun out of it.
I hate clutter. What can I do being married to a packrat. He has papers from college that he got good grades on 30 years ago. Now that we cleaned our room, he found enough parts to put back together 2 of his old pc's-a packard bell 386 purchased in 1992 and another old 386. He wants to add them to his nbetwork, so he can use the 5 1/4 inch floppy drives on them to open his old documents and then save them on his newer server. Then we can throw out the multitude of old floppy disks. Though, since they can degrade over time, they may not work anymore. But he won't know if the info on the floppy disks is salvageable until he ahs a pc that has a working 5 1/4 drive so he can try. :)
ReplyDeleteMy grandmother swore someone stole some of her jewelry when she was older. My mom found it in a tissues box in a cupboard, with the tissues stuffed back into the box over the jewelry. We learned then to check every thing in the trash can or that we thought was trash before it got pitched.
I love the image of you cramming stacks and stashes in the bedroom. Incurable Clutter Brain Suck is the reason I couldn't have six children.
ReplyDeleteI have this big box where I throw everything. It's called the garage.
ReplyDeleteHaven't parked the cars in there in years.
They say two moves are as good as a fire.
ReplyDeleteI need to move.
A few times.
So...More the Messier...where have you been all of my one and a half year blog life?
ReplyDeleteLOVE YOUR BLOG...there, I said it, and I yelled it out too.
I will be back. Love your writing style.
Oh, clutter.
ReplyDeleteMy parents are coming tonight for five days and I'm sitting here waiting for my back to unkink.
Still to do? More than I can imagine. I haven't even made their bed or scrubbed their bathroom yet.
Help, send help...
The clutter is particularly hard to take in January, when even the idea of slogging to the garage defeats me...I also blame the recycling service that comes only once every two weeks. There, I feel better now.
ReplyDelete