I honestly NEVER expected my day would go the way it did. I knew I needed to clean. I was really bad this past week and didn’t clean much. In my defense I was sick the beginning of the week.
My dear husband let me sleep in this morning since I have had such horrible insomnia the past few weeks. When I woke up I found him cleaning the kitchen from top to bottom. I loathe cleaning the kitchen and the bathroom so it was a wonderful way to start my day.
We recently purchased a new bookcase for the living room. We have two but they didn’t match. Since they are inexpensive bookcases they don’t have a long life expectancy. One of the bookcases was falling apart so we had to replace it.
All week long I was SUPPOSE to move the books back into the bookcase (they were all over the place and in the closet). Instead I ended up getting rid of about 100 books and dozens of magazines. I used to collect crafting magazines. I held on to them “just in case” I wanted to craft something. Yeah, OK. I haven’t looked at them in years. I doubt that will happen.
That was my logic today as I decided to weed through my massive collection of books. I had books that I paid a lot of money for over the years that I NEVER even opened! Brand new books collecting dust on the book shelf.
Over the years I always had these “visions” in my head of doing all this crafting. I purchased dozens of books on jewelry making and TONS of supplies. I made a couple of earrings and then retired the supplies to the closet and let the books sit on the shelves never to be touched again.
I had a great idea to make my own soaps. I purchased several books and more supplies then I care to admit to, only to make a couple of bars and then let the supplies and books go the same way as the jewelry books and supplies.
Same applies to candle making…and crocheting…and faux painting… SO MANY “great ideas” that cost us a lot of money in supplies and books that all just died out.
Am I the only person who does this? It’s crazy, isn’t it?
I guess I’ve always been looking to find my niche in life. I will admit that I thought I would make beautiful jewelry and have friends, neighbors and family members begging for pieces of jewelry hand crafted by me. The same train of thought applied to the candles, soaps…and so on.
For YEARS I held on to all of this stuff in hopes that something would “spark” inside of me and I’d take it up again. It never happened.
My husband will be the first to say that I hate to throw anything out. I’m not a hoarder, but, I do hold on to more stuff then I should.
Back in November I went through my entire bedroom closet, aka the “catch all”, home to all the stuff we have no place for. I removed clothing, crafting supplies, toys, games and so on. I donated almost everything except for a few things that I gave away on our local Freeshare/Freecycle group. It felt great to “purge” the closet of all that stuff. The closet is still a mess, but at least I can find my socks. Ha Ha.
A few weeks ago I did the same thing, going through the pantries, desks and more, pulling out things I haven’t touched in ages and giving it away, tossing it away or donating it.
Today was the same thing. I purged my book shelves of years and years of wayward ideas.
It actually looks nice seeing the bookcases (I have three in the living room) NOT over flowing with books and magazines. I even went so far as to separate all my books so I know where they are. Cookbooks are on one shelf, reading books on another. I even have my reference books and the crafting books I did keep in their own little sections too. I’m pretty impressed. It was a job well done.
I don’t know why the past few months I have been purging my life of clutter. Is it because I’m getting older and realize I don’t need these material things? Is it because I hate to clean (more stuff equals more things to dust)? Or could it be something else? Maybe I’m changing? Growing up? Gearing up for something bigger and better in my life? Who knows.
For now I’ll just sit back and enjoy the new found emptiness and cleanliness of our home. It actually feels GOOD.
