Hi, All.
Old Mt Woman. Yes, yes, maybe, yes. Yes, you are not the only one. My mother and first mother-in-law were raised on farms and lived through the depression. The MIL kept stuff; like Tissue boxes for the grandkids to use for valentine boxes, empty foam meat trays, etc. I was not around when they went through her house. It would have been an archaeological dig, and I am sure much was thrown out that should have been sold.
I heard about Marie Kondo (?) from you all, but I am not following the KonMari method. Well, sort of. I do like the “spark” idea. I agree with Daisy…it is a fine line between Prepping and Hoarding. My house does not look bad. It is a house that has the souvenirs of “old” folks. Just don’t look into the basement and my sewing/craft room. At nearly the same time we inherited what was left from Hubby’s mother, my father, and Hubby retired from the university and brought all of his research papers home. We moved 8 years ago and all of that is still in boxes. Every once in a while, I will give him one of his mother’s boxes. It takes all day for him to go through it. Too many memories.
Yesterday we purchased three large Sterlite plastic boxes with lids. Two for my yarn, so I can see the colors and style. One is for Hubby to save his favorite things, perhaps that will spur him on to know it is ok to save some things.
I have one box of clothes to go to Salvation Army. I know there will be more. I have some fancy dresses, some I have never worn. Plus some business suits that I will never need…plus that was two sizes ago. But, like Old Mt Woman, I intend to keep some smaller clothes; if SHTF, we will need the smaller sizes. But, for OPSEC, we should wear some old, worn out clothes that are too big to confuse people when we need to leave the house.
Books: I checked with out local library and they only take books that are less than ten years old. So, perhaps the rest that we don’t want go to S.A., too.
There is a “permanent” garage sale in our small town. “Sue’s Garage Sale” in in the basement of a commercial building. She has several rooms filled with stuff. Good stuff! She will allow us a table, for a month, on which to place the things we thing will sell. The bad part, is she takes a 60% commission. But, since we live out of town, and no one will come here, or find us, for a garage sale taking things to her makes sense.
We have been watching Tiny House Nation. I do not want John Weisbarth to come in here and tell me we each only get two plastic containers for our new Tiny House. However, that is a dream of mine- to travel the US in a Tiny House. Hubby is slowly accepting the idea since he also loves to explore. Perhaps with a five acre lot here at home in MN, with a tool and gardening shed, garage, and large enclosed porch, a tiny house would work. So, that is my dream.
Plus, at 69 and 79, how much longer can we realistically live in a 4 bedroom home, on 19 acres, 1/2 mile from the main road and up a hill that is full of ice at the moment? My daughter’s parents-in-law sold the home that had lived in for over 50 years, bought a small one near a lake. They spend winters in TX in a double wide trailer. I was at the estate sale. They had so much junk outside and it did not look like they had even touched the inside of their house. After hearing my son-in-law, Tom, talk about the difficulty of selling, sorting, packing, moving, etc., He called while he was driving one of their trailers to the new house (two hours away) and he was both angry and nearly in tears. I have just the one child, with three grandsons. I do not want to do that to them.
So, my reasons for “death cleaning” as they call it in Scandinavia, is just that. Getting rid of the literal junk so my only child and her family don’t have to. A little bit each day…