“Stuff”

Happy Halloween?

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I have to admit I’ve never really understood the obsession with Halloween.  I love autumn; it’s my absolute favorite time of year, and fall “stuff” sucks me in each and every time it rolls around.  (One of the biggest reasons I’ll never make it as a true minimalist:  fall decor.)  I’m relieved when the temp starts to cool; I love the bite in the air each morning and bundling up in jackets as we head out the door to school.  I love the changing leaves; though for all the huge trees in our yard we really only have two pretty ones.  I love crunching through the fallen leaves as we walk out to get the paper, or the mail…in spite of the fact that our neighbors on either side keep fastidious lawns that manage to make ours look more than a little unkempt.  (I believe the word is “trashy.” lol)

What I don’t get is the gore.  The desire to “decorate” with corpses and zombies and skeletons…..and I’m always struck, each year, at how we as Americans wail about the cost of everything, and yet people will shell out their hard-earned dollars for things like inflatable spiders to sit in their front yard.

I don’t get it.

October is the time where I’m finally willing to start walking to and from school….and it’s also the month where I had to change the route we took when my kids were younger, because there’s a house on one street with zombies overtaking the front yard.  I don’t mean a few scary items; I mean the entire front yard is covered with creatures….it truly looks like a graveyard come to life.  They have to have over thirty creepies on their lawn, including a large Satan-like creature suspended above their front door.  Each year as it goes up I realize how grateful I am that our neighbors at our last house got into Christmas instead of Halloween.  (To their credit, the whole mob scene is taken down promptly on November 1st.  No lingering zombies hanging out for Thanksgiving dinner or anything.)

That’s the stuff I don’t get.

Time magazine states that this year, “Americans are expected to spend a record $8 billion on Halloween-related products and activities this year, up 17% from 2011.” (From “More Trick Than Treat,” October 29th issue).

$8 billion….

I don’t get it.

We got costumes for the kids; my daughter’s was actually her birthday present.  I bought not even $20 worth of candy, which might not sound like much, but it’s a ton; trust me.  I think we’re covered.  I’m calling it good.

Because there’s loads of other things I’d rather spend my money on.

 

 

2600 miles, 7 states, 5 parks, 11 days

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Or, “Pursuing Enough” pursues more than enough….

 

It’s been awhile.  It’s been so long and I’m still so off-kilter that I’m not even sure I’m quite ready to start writing again…but I felt the need to check in after such a long absence.  Our family got back Monday night from an eleven-day (road) trip to Disneyworld and Legoland, sponsored very generously by my parents.  Six people in a twelve-passenger van; three days down, two days home (you know it’s a long trip when driving through five states is a good day).  Monday through Saturday we spent at all the different parks.

Overwhelming?  Yes.  Wonderful?  Absolutely.

The drive didn’t go nearly as badly as I anticipated; portable DVD players are beautiful things…and bringing along all the kids schoolwork they were missing out on helped, too.  (Full disclosure:  due to our school district’s quirky calendar, we were able to take an eleven day trip with the kids only missing three days of school.  We were NOT the only people to jump on that opportunity.)  My dad and husband sat up front and took turns driving, continually arguing with the GPS system and making her angry (“Recalculating!”).  The rest of us spread out in back, switching places when needed, since siblings can only sit together for so long.

Our time in the parks was great…my daughter met everyone she wanted to meet, including Tinkerbell, and my son rode all the coasters he wanted to ride.  My husband quickly learned how to work the Fast-Pass system (and I mean really work it), which meant that we didn’t have to wait in line more than twenty minutes for any ride we did.  (It also meant blisters for my poor husband as he ran the parks to collect the things…)

And then….Monday night at 7:30 home, Tuesday morning at 8:00 back to school.  There’s a nice jolt of reality for you.

I think, three days later, I’m just now starting to feel like things are getting a little back to normal; although with my son’s birthday plans this weekend (9 years old today!  Happy birthday, sweet boy!) and the relentless talk of getting a new dog now that we’re home, I’m still not quite feeling settled.  October is one of my favorite months of the year.  I think it’s time I slowed down a minute and tried to enjoy it.

One last thought on vacations and returning home:  I know that technically, what we come “home” to is just a bunch of wood and siding and insulation and metal, etc.  I know that really, it’s just a bunch of “stuff” that shouldn’t really matter all that much.  But after you’ve been gone for eleven days, it becomes much more than that.  It’s what it represents:  home base, safety, the comfort of the familiar, the “normal,” Home.  Night after night of sleeping in hotel beds gives you a new appreciation for your own bed; night after night of sleeping in hotel rooms gives you a new appreciation for your own room, which my children disappeared into the moment they got home, introducing their new stuffed animals to their old ones.  Right now I’m so grateful for this house, this home, and for the comfort of (slowly) getting back into a routine.

It’s good to be back.

“A little folding of the hands to rest…”

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Any flat surface...

Any flat surface…

Technically, the verse doesn’t exactly fit.

The entire proverb actually reads, “A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest–and poverty will come on you like a bandit and scarcity like an armed man.”  (Proverbs 6:10, NIV)

Every Monday morning, though, as I begin to pick up and try to help our home recover from the weekend, I think of this verse.  A couple of days off, I think.  Just a couple of days where I didn’t do (fill-in-the-blank) and now look at this mess.  Each time a Saturday rolls around, I feel like slacking a bit (it’s the weekend, after all), and then Sunday comes, with the get-ready-and-get-out-the-door morning crunch, when things get left undone or half-done… And then it’s another Monday morning, where I look around and shake my head and wonder, how did this happen?

Oh, yeah… a little folding of the hands to rest.

Our problem isn’t scarcity or poverty…it’s just “stuff,” stuff that gets piled on any available flat surface “for now,” somehow leaving me to deal with it each Monday morning.  Our lack of routine come Friday night is screamingly apparent by Monday morning; any other day of the week I’d be on top of all this, but apparently the weekends are “playtime” and not “worktime” around here.

I’m not a huge photo-blog person; the only other photo I’ve included so far was for a guest post I wrote, whose site always used photos.  But I had to include a picture with this.  On the raised hearth of our fireplace sits a basket for library books.  Most of the time, that is the only thing sitting on the hearth (although an assortment of things might end up in the basket).  Every Monday morning, though, I come downstairs and realize that “stuff” has been sneakily accumulating over the weekend.

Every Monday morning.

Maybe it’s time to rest a bit less on the weekends…..

I was wrong

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I’ve had a line for ages–a joke, really, but I sort of believed it–that “you can never have too many Legos.”  Art supplies and Legos were two categories I truly didn’t mind drowning in.  I’m quite organized and have stayed on top of both for years now, in spite of the constant influx of more.

But I was wrong.

The art supplies are still manageable, although as my kids have gotten older the things are migrating up to bedrooms.  (As old as my kids are now, I don’t feel the need to constantly supervise crayons and markers…I can trust them not to draw on walls.)  The Legos, however….I think we’ve crossed a line.

My son has a tall bookcase in his room that I put in there specifically to display his Lego “stuff.”  It was arranged beautifully for a long time, but Legos (of course) are meant to be played with, and piece by piece would be taken off the shelf to be used.  Good!  I’m all for things being used.  Since the dining room table is our normal “Lego play area,” the pieces appeared on it to play with.  Then my daughter’s Legos arrived, apparently hungry for company, and the kids spent many afternoons during the summer playing Legos in the dining room together.  (Full disclosure:  the dining room table is Lego-covered 90% of the time, until the birthday/holiday season arrives and we need the dining room quite often.  My kitchen table, however, is always empty.  Thank you very much.)

Unfortunately….while the Legos were spreading out all over the dining room table, and buckets were appearing in the corner of that room, they were also still upstairs, spreading out all over my son’s bookcase.  (Is there a law of physics somewhere, about objects expanding to fill the allotted space?)  They were also spreading out into one corner of his bedroom; which unfortunately is the corner behind the laundry basket, which is making life difficult on a fairly regular basis.

So this morning, when I started putting Legos back in his room (there was so much stuff I split the job with him), I had nowhere to put them.  Nowhere.  The shelves of the bookcase appeared full, although lots of scooting things around freed up some space.  The buckets in the corner of his room are being stacked upon, which I guarantee is going to end badly.  I have absolutely no idea where he’s going to put the things I left for him to put away.

When we’d started tackling the table last night, I mentioned that he might have, maybe, too many Legos.  And he agreed with me.  (You know it’s bad when the kid agrees with you.)  I broached the subject of giving some away, especially since we are headed into birthday season and there will most likely be even more Legos in his future.  And he agreed with me.  (Pick jaw up off floor.)  His comment?  “We could give them to the library.  They’re looking for Legos for their Lego club.”  (Sit down before I start hyperventilating.)

If he is on board, I am happy to help.  Hopefully sometime during the next week, we’ll go through all this stuff–a shelf at a time, a bin at a time, or ten minutes at a time.  I don’t know how long his willingness to pass things on will last, but I hope to make the most of it.

FYI…my dining room table is beautiful.  It’s so nice to see it again.   🙂

What a bargain!

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I was scrolling through houses on the internet recently, as I am wont to do, and found an astounding price on a home a few miles north of us.  “Astounding” as in $100K cheaper than the other homes for sale in the neighborhood.  I assume it was a foreclosure, and as I scrolled through the photos, I was amazed at how genuinely beautiful the house still was–even with carpeting pulled up, and flooring missing in some rooms, you could see it was going to be a gorgeous home for someone; probably very soon.  Someone, somewhere, is about to get an amazing bargain.

I do wonder about the consequences of that choice, though.  If it’s a family who will slide right into the neighborhood effortlessly, or if it’s a family trying to reach up, just a bit, and finally score a house “in that neighborhood;” a house that would normally be out of reach but which suddenly is surprisingly achievable.  That house purchase could start the dominoes falling…

Now that they have a bigger house, in a nicer neighborhood, they have to furnish it, and fill those extra rooms they didn’t have before.  Then they’re sending their kids to school with other kids who are better off than they are, who have x and y and z, and suddenly they feel the need to get the same for their children.  Every day they’re surrounded by people who have “stuff” they don’t have, “stuff” they aren’t able to afford….but somehow that doesn’t stop them from buying it.

Maybe not.  Maybe the house will be filled with the “just-right” family; a perfect fit.  Or maybe it will be filled with a family who truly doesn’t care to keep up with the Joneses.  I just hope whoever moves in thinks through their decision.  It could be a really expensive bargain.

My new favorite question

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A friend posted a link on Facebook, and the title sucked me in:  Why We Love to Hoard.  It seemed like something right up my alley, so I read it (I encourage you to; it’s a really interesting read).

But towards the end the author wrote a sentence that completely changed how I’m clearing stuff out of our home:

“…for each item I ask myself a simple question: If I didn’t have this, how much effort would I put in to obtain it?”

Wow.  That is the question, isn’t it?  All those things I’m keeping “just in case,” or “for later,” or “for someday”….if I didn’t already have it, would I ever go looking for it?  I’m seeing everything in my home with new eyes.  And it works both ways:  there are some things that are suddenly totally justifiable to me, because yes, I’d go out and buy them again in a heartbeat.  I would buy this again.  Or, the irreplaceable mementos of grandparents; the things you can’t just go out and “buy again” because they don’t exist anymore:  the “keep the quilts that great-grandma made” kind of items.  

Others, though…yeesh.  It feels like I need to go back through the house yet again, from top to bottom, and just weed.  Because heaven knows that there are dozens of things lurking in this home that I would never in a million years actively seek out to “obtain” again.

“Why do we buy movies?”

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Every great once in a while, my son does or says something that makes me think I might be getting through to him.

He recently plowed through his piles of drawings, and all the ones he wanted to keep are now neatly three-hole-punched and gathered together in a binder.  He then tossed the ones he didn’t want into the recycling bin.  That’s huge.  (I don’t think I can stress enough….that’s huge.)

When he came home from a shopping trip with Grammy three T-shirts richer, I informed him that he had to get rid of three he already had.  Which he did–without protest.  (Again….huge.)

The funniest part, though, was a conversation we had in the car as we drove by a video store.  “Mom?” he asked thoughtfully.  “Why do we buy movies?”

He then went on to explain his train of thought:  we always check them out from the library, or we might go to a Redbox or video store (actually, I can’t remember the last time I set foot in a video store), or we record things on the DVR….but why do people bother to buy movies?

That’s a really good question, kiddo….

My response?  “Well, I think they just make really easy gifts.”

I looked through the movies on our shelves (we have 99 DVD’s right now, 76 of which are actually movies*), and they seem to be full of still-wrapped-in-plastic “hey, he really liked this movie–I’ll get it for him for Christmas!” types of things.  Secret Santa gifts from coworkers; birthday gifts from people who don’t know you well enough to know what you really might want….a movie is a safe, easy gift idea.  And we have two shelves full of them.

I’m fairly certain I know what’s next on my list to weed through….

 

 

*What else could there be, you ask?  TV series collections and DVD’s of concerts.  The concerts, I’m quite sure, are staying.  🙂

Basement progress

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Apparently, kids in school all day = official basement clean-out time.

I’ve worked a bit these past few days, ducking downstairs between grocery trips and volunteering in the school library and all the various other things that have to be done.  In the past, I’ve been horrible about procrastinating:  I would work and box things up or bag things up and there they would sit, for months; ready to go out the door and yet still sitting on the basement floor.  So my rule for this round of work was to get it in my car.

Day one, I told myself that all I really wanted was to be able to have a clear workbench:  once I had an empty surface on top of my workbench, I could stop.  Once I had that space, though, I wanted to keep going, at least a little.

Day two, I was a bit more vague, but my goal was to have the main area of floor empty.  The entire center of the room, empty.  And that little taste of space, foot by foot, encouraged me to keep working until it was done.

Two trips to Goodwill, one with a trunkful and one with a trunk FULL–plus backseat full–of “stuff” really can make a difference.  The room feels like it weighs less.  I still have an ugly pile on one side of the room, but the change in feeling when you walk in that door is amazing.  I can breathe again…the walls aren’t closing in; instead there’s space and room to roam.  (Well… as much as you can roam in a 11×14 foot storage area.)

Next week I’ll tackle the last pile, and over the next few months it’s time to seriously evaluate the tubs of “seasonal storage.”  In my opinion, seasonal stuff is what basement storage is for, but the amount of tubs we have down there (regardless of how neatly lined up against the wall) is a bit ridiculous.  As I pull things out for fall and Christmas, it’s time to cull.

Pillow problems

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I’m laughing, because I just read a blog post about tossing throw pillows, and I just got new ones.  🙂

The author looks at her pillows through William Morris’ quote:  “Have nothing in your home that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.”  For her, the pillows fit neither criteria.  In our home, however, throw pillows are useful.  Back support in our chairs, propping laptops and books in laps, cozying kids up; especially poor, sick kids, camped out in the living room.  We use those throw pillows; good grief, even the dog uses our throw pillows.  They were so loved and well-used that they needed to be replaced.  They were useful, maybe, but definitely not beautiful.  (You can only wash pillows so many times….)

So I have two sets of two pillows sitting in my laundry room right now (happy birthday to me!).  And I am typing this on a laptop that sits on an old pillow.

Why?

Because they’re new and fresh and clean and too pretty to use.

Yes, even after I wrote an entire post devoted to the idea of “too” stuff, how everything in our house gets used, how we don’t have anything “too” nice or “too” fragile to be used… In the house where I just pulled out my grandmother’s cranberry glassware bowls to use everyday, because they’re a perfect size and why buy new ones if we have ones that work…. I have four pillows stacked neatly, waiting.  Just…waiting.

Time to go get the pillows.  The useful, beautiful pillows.

“What’s THAT room for?”

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My daughter had a friend over to play recently, and this was the question shyly asked about our fourth bedroom upstairs.

I had to laugh, because looking in the room, it was a completely fair question.  I explained that the room used to be an office, and now we were turning it into a bedroom (for our eventual adoption), so right now it was sort of “in-between.”  It was an honest description of the situation.  That being said, it’s been an “in-between” room for a really, really long time.

There are remnants of “office” in there:  a (completely empty) computer armoire, one kitchen chair used for a computer chair, a rocking chair, and a side table.  There’s also a child’s desk and a doll’s “baby care center,” pulled from bedrooms to go to the basement playroom, but somehow stalled out upstairs.  There’s also our stepladder.  At some point, I needed the stepladder upstairs to do something, but it was so long ago I actually don’t remember what it was.  (I’ve seriously thought about this for three days…I have no idea why that stupid thing is up there, it was that long ago.)

Admittedly, lots of things are “trapped” because I need help moving them down the stairs (even the child’s desk I’m not too keen on tackling by myself).  But the room has been in transition for so long that I’ve reached the point of absolutely no excuses.  I won’t even mention the file cabinet and stacks of papers in the closet….

It’s hard to commit myself to working in the room; the uncertainty of what to expect weighs on me as I think about getting started.  Who are we getting the room ready for?  Boy or girl?  How many?  How old?  What will they need?  Instead of anticipation, it’s a feeling of almost frustration–why am I cleaning this out now?  It almost seems like it would be easier to wait:  wait until we could be getting a room “ready for someone,” instead of simply “cleaning it out.”  Building on an attitude of excitement, instead of simply the reality of the unknown.

But here’s the thing:  I know, without a doubt, one thing any child will need will be an EMPTY ROOM.  A room standing ready; able to be filled with them and their things.  Wouldn’t it be easier, wouldn’t it be so much less stressful, to start moving forward on a child (or children) feeling like we’re ready to welcome them in; into a room completely cleared of everything and ready to make their own?

Maybe, just maybe, the next time someone asks me “what’s that room for?” it will be because it’s empty; ready to be filled.