2025

 Another year gone.

But so much stuff has been done! I have taken 11 loads to Goodwill, gotten rid of lots of unwanted furniture. Lots of garbage thrown out. Only 2 more pieces of furniture to go, but those have to be replaced with different sized items. One is a too large bathroom vanity and the other is a too small tv stand. The vanity is best gotten rid of in the summer  also the tv stand. They will go to a furniture rehab place and hopefully I can pick up a used tv stand that is the right size there. 

I am thinking without the furniture that is leaving there will still be about 15 more loads to leave this house.  I am looking for somewhere between what I have now and what a minimalist would have.

I did have someone come with a truck in fall and clear out all the junk around the yard and the outside of the garage. I will need him to come back in the summer to get rid of the unwanted stuff in the garage.

I AM making progress!

Almost October

 I have progressed to the point when the to do list is shorted then the done list. That is good. The bathroom is now done, The spare bedroom will be done when my sewing/craft room is done, as things from the bedroom will be going into the sewing/craft room.

I emptied a bookcase from the second floor and brought it down to the dining room, and put all the books I have purchased to read in it. If I see the books I read them. If I don't they sort of get lost in everything else. I got rid of that ugly desk I hated and in it's place now is a glass curio cabinet. Takes up half the space the desk did. I really do not need a desk. They just turn into a place to keep stuff that should have been thrown out in the first place.

I have emptied the china cabinet and the buffet, and am waiting for someone to bring a trailer to haul it away. I have plans for that space, another item in the bedroom will be moving to where that stuff was. In time the bedroom will just be a bed room and nothing else.

Still have not finished the sun room, started it, but that was about as far as I got. I am thinking maybe 2 days and it will be done.

Finished the outdoor markets for the year, now just indoor shows. So I can put everything I no longer need away.

Went and got a collection of empty boxes to box more stuff up to donate. I had run out of boxes. Tomorrow I will go get some more. If I have too many, then I will just give them to someone else. Everyone is always looking for boxes.

This was going to be a clean the sun room day, but turned into a bookkeeping day. That has to be done too, and now I think everything from the markets is ready for the end of the year.

Still have to attack that rose bush, started on it, but have now decided to just cut it down to about a foot off the ground. It will lose about 8 feet of height. It has really gotten out of control. Hoping it does not rain next week as that is the time I have set aside for the outdoor work.

Summer is almost done

 I really did not get all I wanted to get done this summer done. I did get a lot done, but not everything I wanted to. I cleared out both walk in attics, they are now completely empty. I have emptied the office out and turned it into a spare bedroom. My printer is the only thing left in there from the office, oh, and the treadmill. I can not say the room looks bigger with it's new look, but it is different.

The kitchen, my sewing room and the sun room are about half done. I have decided what furniture is staying and what will be replaced. With the addition of new furniture it should look different in here.

I also want to put a couple new floors in. But that will have to wait for next year.  I would like to lose the pack rat look completely, I am thinking that will take probably till the end of 2025.

With all the rain and bad weather I have not gotten to spend a lot of time outside in the gazebo this year. I must just take my projects out there. I have electric out there so that is not the problem.

Today I spent most of the day saving stuff off my laptop. I think it's days are numbered. Most everything is now saved on a different laptop and on USB sticks. If this laptop were to die tomorrow I would not really miss it. I will be taking stuff off it, which hopefully will free up space and maybe lengthen it life a bit. Will see how that goes.

As I am cleaning up, the house just seems to look more messy till I get finished with an area. Need to keep on top of things so that it always looks company clean, even though I am decluttering an area.

What I would like to know is, WHERE DID ALL THIS CLUTTER COME FROM? It just seemed to multiply out of nothing.

Sometimes It Pays to be a Pack Rat

 With the prices of stuff today, it pays to be a pack rat and be able to dig into a stash, and find the one thing I am looking for. It is getting hard to find some stuff in stores, and when I do find it, the price makes me wonder how much I really want it.

My next project is to organize all my "Stuff" and get it into totes and label those totes. That way I can find stuff more easily when I or one of my friends needs something. It is good to have "pack rat" friends. we can share things we have.

This next year is my year of change, so many things have changed so far, and there will be more changes in the future.

Change is sometimes a good thing. 

Christmas week, ( Christmas Eve to New Year's Day), I will catch up on reading some of the books I got and never really had time to read, watch movies, and only do fun things. Then on the second of January work again will begin. There is so much more yet to do, but it will get done, this time it will get done. Circumstances are different now.

 

Still a Semi Packart

 Maybe Packrat is not the right term. I don't think anyone starts out to be a packrat. But things just seem to multiply. It seems I can throw out bags and bags of stuff, and those empty places just seem to find new items. 

I must say there is a lot less this year than last year. I think I have almost gotten everyone's stuff back to them. There is still a toy cabinet from when the kids were small. It has all been here so long, I am wondering if it should just stay a bit longer. I wonder how much those old toys would be worth on Ebay?

Did you every notice when you tear a room apart to clean it, it looks worse than what it did before you started? That is, till it is finished. Oh, to have a week, with no interruptions to just go from one end of the house to the other and get rid of stuff. It is those interruptions that get one.

As I get ready for spring markets, and get everything together for that, then I can clean the sun room, as the market stuff will be in the truck. That will give me room to sort and shift and get rid of.

Also the spring/summer yard decorations will be outside in the yard. More room in the house. When I get the basement done, I will be dividing it into sections. The work room with all the power tools will stay, but the work bench will be clean. I am saving the 23+ gallon ice cream buckets I have found so far, to sort the stuff on the work bench. When everything is back in it's place, the bench will be clean. The paint room will also be clean, as I have found out how to get rid of all those old cans of paint. Come summer they will go outside and I will take the lids off and dry them out and then they can go right in the garbage can. I am only saving cans of paint less than 5 years old, and paint that actually matches something in or on the house.

Before I can do the rummage, I have to straighten out the garage, but of course I have to wait for warmer weather to do that. That should only take about half a day. A lot of that will also be thrown out. I did the shed last year. Now it only has 4 items in it. One of which will go on the rummage, one that has to be tested to see if it still works, if not, out it goes. When the garage is cleaned, those last 2 items can go in the garage. All the lawn and garden stuff can then either go in the shed or in the garage. I would like to get rid of that shed. It is metal. I keep hoping with every wind storm we get that it falls over. Maybe it needs a bit of help? lol The idea is not to get caught helping it.

 

A Do Over

 I had taken a good look at my blog, and decided it was really boring, so I am starting over.