Friday, February 20, 2009

Random piles

I use to not have so many piles of stuff.  Decluttering (a la FlyLady) wasn't a factor for me as I didn't really have anything to declutter, we used everything we had.  Not now.  Somehow, someway, I have more junk here, there, and everywhere and I don't know where it all came from.

Having five kids doesn't help.  They all want a space to keep their "treasures."  But boy oh boy, those "treasures" need to be weeded out and thrown away!  Not to mention my own piles, like that one over there.....Why don't I just throw away those baskets.  I'm not using them, they simply collect dust and other junk.

Or that one over there......boxes of old vcr tapes.  Do I really need to keep vcr tapes of college pom routines or  that high school Jr. Miss Pageant?  And since the answer is "no" why can't I just toss them in the garbage?

Or the totes and piles of clothes in the kids' bedrooms?  I put off switching over their closets from summer to fall and we've been living with the piles all winter.  Why don't I just take the time to put what gets donated into bags and what gets saved into totes and in their proper place in the basement?

Instead I simply live with the piles, moving them from here to there, adding to them, putting off thinking about them, until finally I have to make a decision about what to do with them before I go insane.

I think I may have missed the mark this time.


4 comments:

Laura said...

You should see my piles! We purge every summer...closets, bedrooms, the basement. I never get to it during the school year...I am a working mom. Just keep moving them until the urge becomes so great to get rid of them you can ignore it no longer. :)

Karin said...

Uh, yes. I totally agree with Laura. This tendency towards avoiding these piles seems to go with life amoungst my homeschooling friends. Intense time with my kids tends to leave me not wanting to face the piles but a little future sunshine, windows open, temptation to clean will come before I know it so I buckle down now with the kids and hope for the best. You ARE a working mom!

Glenda said...

You're both right Laura and Karin, and know what is funny? I'm not really going as insane with the piles this year like years past.
Last summer I did major cleaning and it felt soooo good to focus only on that. Now we're focusing really hard on school work and to say "we're done" come June will make focusing on deep-cleaning, pile-throwing, major organization so much easier.
We've never been "done" just always on "break" and that made it so hard for me to ever feel like anything could ever be labeled, "done." Now, I simply have made myself think "this now, that later" and label it "done."

But what is really funny to me is that with some of the piles they would be really easy to take care of - seconds, yet I just keep walking by. It is like that episode of "Everybody Loves Raymond" when neither Ray nor Deborah put away the suitcase.

Anonymous said...

I do believe, Glenda, that part of the piles comes from staying in one place for awhile. That moving every year we all did way back when really allowed us to minimize and prioritize, but now with our hubbies staying put...well...it just keeps growing and growing and GROWING!
Love ya! Diane