Something never before seen in my house...

A C.L.E.A.N. and decluttered closet!

I tried on every pair of black and gray pants I own, and put 1/2 of them in a pile to donate!  HALF of them!  I hung the rest of them on nice pants hangers, along with the 2 brown pairs I own and hung them on the left side of the closet.  I took out all the heavy winter sweaters and left a few lightweight and mediumweight sweaters there for the rest of winter/early spring.  I took out the jackets I won't be wearing because they're for winter, not spring, and cleaned out the sweatshirts and t-shirts and casual clothes.  I packed up what I won't be using until next winter, made a giant bag to donate, and will begin working on shoes and bring down spring clothes later in the week.

I have been feeling heavy lately, not only pound-wise but stuff-wise.  I have been saying I want to discard it all and start new, but realistically I know we can't do that.  So I've decided to just get rid of what I don't want, need, or wear, or haven't worn in 2 or 3 years or more (yes, I have clothes that old that I take out and put away each season).  I will be hanging frames, with or without pictures, because if the frames are on the wall in the hallway, I won't want them to all be empty and that will force me to choose and mat my pictures.

I have already gone through our collection of water bottles and gotten rid of NINE of them!  And I still have probably a 1/2 dozen in the cabinet!  Next on the kitchen list is mugs.  I have publisher mugs, movie mugs, coffee mugs from my mother-in-law, mugs both J and I bought when we lived alone.

I will be choosing a project a week, perhaps the junk drawer, perhaps the pantry, perhaps my lingerie drawer - no matter what, I will be spring cleaning to beat the band, until I am lighter in more ways than pounds!!!

Yay, me!!!

Home Re-Do - in My Dreams...

Oh, my, someday, when I can do whatever I want to do in my house, decorating-wise, without having to explain to my husband "why" I want to do it, I'm going to do this:  painted wood floors  [For some reason although I was able to save a photo or two from her blog to my desktop, I am having trouble posting it here so please click through to her blog and look at her painted floor project.]

I LOVE IT!

Although most times my traditional decor leanings have been in line with J's, lately I find myself wanting to go either the cottage route (see painted floors above) or the neat and clean and more modern look of the Petersiks (Young House Love).  Oh, my, all that white and gray with pops of color around the house!!!  See here for an example of what I mean:  Tea Time - and to top it all off?  NO CLUTTER

It took YEARS to get color on my walls and now I sort of want to go white again?  Go figure.

It must be the impending onset of menopause...

(That may ALSO be the reason I am itching to just throw out everything I own and start all over...)

My Word for 2010 (Thanks to Spell with flickr)

You may have noticed the addition to my page, up there, above the boring "About me."

Declutter.

I posted about this previously.

So far I've made two donations to the VietNam Veterans Association, and seriously? If it isn't nailed down, it's fair game! Clothes, small appliances, home decor, books I really don't think I'll ever look at again, stuff of all shapes and sizes...

So far, though, you'll all be glad to hear, Jack's made the cut! He's a keeper, I know, and I can joke about it, but I would never, ever get rid of him!!! I'm one lucky girl! (And no, he doesn't read this blog, so I'm really not kissing up for any reason!)

If I could, I would seriously give thought to emptying my house and starting over from scratch. From colors and trim to cabinets and furniture - I'm craving a clean, uncluttered, bright style. I absolutely ADORE natural wood, but to lighten up my house and in turn, make ME feel lighter? I could live with bright white trim and lots of contrasting colors like yellow and orange and red and green and blue...

I'll keep you posted on how much I "lighten my load" since it's a real priority for me this calendar year!

De-Clutter

You know, there are many blogs online where you can register your "word" for the year, try to "live" your word. And most wonderful, thoughtful, deep people are choosing words like "nurture," or "story," or "blessing," or "peace," or "hope."

Me? Not so deep. My word is De-Clutter. Capitalized just like that. Hyphenated just like that. Emphasis on the "De."

My house is full of stuff. Important stuff, sure, stuff that neither Jack nor I would want to lose or give up for all the tea in China.

But it's full of a lot of other kinds of "stuff." Stuff we don't need, don't want, never needed, shouldn't have kept, shouldn't have bought, should have passed up... Get the picture? "Stuff" that's making me short of breath, "stuff" that's overwhelming me, "stuff" that's collecting dust, "stuff" that needs to be De-Cluttered. Now. ASAP.

When I cleaned for the holidays, I took lots of "stuff" that didn't belong on the first floor, in the living room, kitchen, dining room or library, and dumped it into Rubbermaid bins and piled them high in the computer room. I promised myself I'd go through them with a hard heart and throw out or donate whatever didn't have a home and/or whatever I didn't want/need. Jack and I dipped our toe into the De-Cluttering project on Saturday. We started a bit of cleaning, and so far I have two small boxes/bags to be donated to the VVA (they pick up at the house and they take clothes and small household items). We didn't overtire ourselves, just puttered around for a half-hour or so in the middle of the afternoon, and BOY-HOWDY, did I feel accomplished when I saw two bags of trash and two boxes/bags for donation!

2010 is going to the be year I De-Clutter. I will be De-Cluttering my life, my house, my bookshelves, my drawers, my closets, whatever can be De-Cluttered will be De-Cluttered.

I swear. I promise. I pinky-swear. (Yup, this is for real, folks!)