Join Me in Snarkville

Happy New Year, everyone.  (even if it is three days late.)

I’ve been reading up in the blog world, the posts of the year in review (and can I just say, wow.  I read most of these people daily — more than in my sidebar, sorry, I should fix that — and to see what happened in summary was shocking) and then all of the “I resolve…” posts.  There are MANY new resolutions in the blog world and very few of them involve more chocolate, go figure.  I have a feeling that one of the most ambitious ones will be Chris who, with her husband and 7 kids, will not be buying anything for a year (to be fair, the needed food and basics yes; but nothing that collects dust or is ‘optional’).

I get where Chris is coming from.  Prince is scared by this about me.  I go through periods in my life where I wish to pare down our lives.  I’m not talking about going Amish, folks.  I mean weed out the clutter.  My friend Jasmin is doing it as a sanity plan — or to help her sleep.  She rid herself of a wedding dress, a spinning wheel, countless sweaters, and even socks.  I think the dress went to Goodwill, but the other items went to other people who, from my understanding, could not be happier.  That’s the reallocation of the stuff — and maybe my hippie surroundings are getting to me, because it makes me happy.

Frankly, to me this is a returning to my youth.  My parents are wonderfully neat people. And yes, I believe firmly that some of that is natural.  They don’t keep many dust collecting knick-nacks, so cleaning is easier.  (They are capable of resisting the clearance aisles at Target — in some ways, my parents aren’t human.)  My parents have their weaknesses, there is my closet growing up that can’t hold clothing anymore because it has been shelved and filled with cooking and serving supplies.  But back to my youth.  Few things thrill my mother more than cleaning out a room.  I mean taking literally everything out of it, scrubbing it down, and then only putting half of it back.  (My mother’s ‘hall/haul cleaning’ is the basis for shows like Clean Sweep.)  I forget how often she and I would do it, but I remember cleaning my room was a hall filling process.  Oh, it never took more than a day — from the first item in the hall to the room returned to it upright and locked position of clean, it took a few hours.  I would go to bed that night in a tidy space and that pleased me.

So, we fast forward  a few years (don’t try to count them, it makes my head spin).  I’m the wife and mother now.  I’m not *MY* mother, I have to find my own ways of doing things.  (Yes, rebellious still at 34, but wait.)  I collected stuff.  I acted like my clean room youth was oppressive and rebelled against it.  I fail to be immune to clearance aisles and knick-nacks.  And I’ve allowed myself to be aided by my husband and son.  Every so often, I try to do a room cleaning overhaul and every single time I fail because of three basic things:

1. It isn’t all *MY* stuff so I don’t feel completely right to toss, pitch or otherwise give it away.
2. I have let the stuff collection go on to the point that it may not be possible to clean a space in a day — or I overthink, which is a total possibility.
3. I (actually, I’m calling Prince out here too) We may be a little lot lazy.

So, I’ve tried things.  I tried FlyLady with her plan of 15 minutes (and no more a day) and focus (I think I need to see progress faster, plus I think I need some help noticing that dishes need to go in the dishwasher).  I’ve tried to create storage for stuff (um, let me save you time — this plan doesn’t work).  I’ve tried the clearing a room plan (Let’s not discuss the office where I’ve been half done for months, k?).  I want to live a stuff simpler, easier to take care of life — I’m clueless on doing it OR I’m too much of a wuss and lazy to actually do it. I’m thinking it is more of the latter.

Thus, I’ve made my first resolution in years.  I told Prince that this was NOT negotiable, we were doing it and he was getting onboard.  (Note, I didn’t tell him he had to be happy about it.)  Duke doesn’t know it yet, but he’s getting on this train too.  We are clearing out.  I’m putting this out there publicly, so that hopefully I will be shamed into doing it.  But, like Jasmin and probably Chris, my sanity needs some ‘white’ space.  We have so much and I’d really like to enjoy the stuff we have and share the stuff we don’t need anymore.  I’m not putting a halt to all impulse buying, because this is about my space here and perhaps the impulse buying will come.  What I am doing is declaring that the Royal Family will have a castle and not a hovel.

To that end, I’ve got a few rules/plans (this may or may not be the first time Prince is seeing these — be supportive):

1. I get sentimental value.  I get that we all need to save a few things that defy explanation to anyone, even our partner. To that end, there will be a purchase of THREE plastic totes of a reasonable size.  I will put each of our names on one.  If there is an item, that we don’t need/want out, but someone has to keep, it goes in the tote.  I think it is reasonable that we each get one tote of stuff that no one will try to force you to rid yourself of.  (Duke’s tote may be filled by me at this point, but we will see.)
2. I plan to eBay or sell off anything we don’t ‘love’ (FlyLady term for the things that make you happy — since they aren’t clutter).  The money made will go to the ‘owner’ of the stuff.  For example, I’ve collected an artist’s miniature teddy bears for years.  I’ve collected ones I liked, then it became about getting them all.  I have many I don’t really LOVE; and I shall be eBaying those.  My collection is older, and almost every bear I have is retired and thus only available on the secondary market.  I’ll keep you posted on how that goes.  (Prince, I mean it, if you sell off anything of yours, you keep the money.  This might be how you could fund that MacBook Pro, just saying.)
3. Under no circumstances will there be a garage sale.  Not going to happen.  Anything not worth enough to sell off will go to charity.
4. This cleansing will include the garage.  It will not be about making the garage empty, it will be about not carrying with us things we don’t need.
5. I shall knit from stash.  No seriously.  I am resolved to not buy yarn for a year.  Yes, I said a year.  I have Sea Socks in May and may allow myself to ‘cheat’ there, but my rules on this one are very simple.
   1. I will end the year with less yarn that I have right now.
   2. I will allow myself to purchase yarn with two conditions: It has to be yarn I can’t get at home AND I have to traveling.  (This way I can purchase, SMALL amounts of yarn, as ‘memory’ yarn and still bust my stash.)
6. My trash can/recycle bin will be full weekly. And I mean FULL, Prince — FULL.

Ultimately, I want to leave Frankenhouse prepared to enter the next space ready to make it a home.  I will not carry with me the baggage we’ve just been hauling around without reason.  I want to pare and pitch the things we don’t use, love, and have room for.  Frankly, I want to be free to make memories around things that don’t involve having to clean up first.  I want to have time to make memories without thinking I should have cleaned out my office today.

There’s my resolution.  I promise to keep you posted. 2008 will be a year cleansing for the Royals — and frankly, I can’t wait.