If only houses had elastic waistbands…
Aug 8th 2008
Karen RoseOn Writing!
It’s too bad houses aren’t expandable. Like luggage, or elastic waistbands. What prompts this? you ask. Well, I will tell you. Today I was interviewed by my local paper here in my house - there will be a feature article with photographs in next week’s book section.
Woot! you might think, and yes, I was very excited. But my second thought after reading the initial email from my publicist was, HOLY CRAP. I HAVE TO CLEAN MY HOUSE! I emailed my publicist back and said, “Can’t we meet in a pleasant coffeeshop or something?” to which she replied, “No. They want to see where you work.”
HOLY CRAP. My office was worse than my house! So, panicking, I called DH from SanFran last week - “We have to clean the house.” Of course I was 3000 miles away, so WE meant HE. (Some might say I planned this, but even I am not that evil, LOL.) DH is a Good Man. So when I returned from SF, my house was pretty clean. Cool. 
But my office was not. Sigh. And in a pile next to my bed were boxes filled with Things DH Did Not Know What To Do With. Yes, I ended that with a preposition. Grammar was the last thing on my mind as the days rolled by and my office got no cleaner on its own, no matter how much I glared at it as I plodded through page proofs on my new book. But the newspaper people were coming …
The net of it is, I cleaned my office. I even dusted, kind of. I vacuumed and you can see my carpet! (I’m not sure how I’m going to work in here.) It’s CLEAN, except for the boxes filled with stuff I Didn’t Know What To Do With, which are now on top of the boxes DH piled in our bedroom last week. I’d put them somewhere, but I realized my closets are already full of boxes of stuff … wait for it … that I Didn’t Know What To Do With over the last few years. I need an elasticized house, to fit all the boxes. 
I can’t get into bed without tripping over the dang things. Needless to say, my bedroom was closed off to the newspaper folks today. It’s dangerous, and scary.
As my house does not have elasticized closets, I have but one choice. Wait for oldest daughter to go away to college in a few weeks, then move all the boxes into her room! HA! I bet you thought I was going to actually go through all those boxes and throw stuff away. Suckers…
Do you have expandable closets? Piles of boxes? What do you do with the stuff you don’t know what to do with? Be honest now, or Zeus will zap you with a lightning bolt.
72 Comments »
72 Responses to “If only houses had elastic waistbands…”
LisaK on 08 Aug 2008 at 2:05 am #
Karen, LOL about that blog, it’s great!
Well, I’m actually a very tidy person but we’re moving in two weeks into a much smaller flat and so we had to go into the cellar and pick out the things we don’t need any longer. And, well, there I discovered that on the surface I might be very tidy, but deep inside, I’m NOT. Oh my, the boxes almost killed me as they fell out of the shelf when I only touched them because they were so full and packed not very cleverly. Then they almost killed me as I opened them and saw what a chaos was inside. Seems like everything that bothers me in my little room is thrown into a box in the cellar never to be seen again. Well, yeah. I think I have to change that…
TinaLouiseF on 08 Aug 2008 at 2:21 am #
Most of my storage shed is filled with books, so the other things that should be there are in the middle of my living room. Some things are in my kitchen and around my bed. I have trails, sometimes I have to step over things.
Shashi on 08 Aug 2008 at 3:47 am #
Hi Karen! Yes, I totally understand your pain. My mother is a stuff-collector, and our house is often exploding with it. Normally when visitors arrived, all the stuff gets put into the laundry and my bedroom, and the doors are shut and no one is allowed to open it. When that fails to suffice, she has recently resorted to putting everything in the boot of the car while visitors are over, and then replacing it back in the house once the visitors have left.
However, we have recently resorted to getting a storage shed nearby, and wow! It solves alot of the problems
Good luck with those boxes by the way
Gillian on 08 Aug 2008 at 5:32 am #
I thought that’s why God made basements that occasionally flood….so you can store all that “really important stuff that I’m totally going to sort through really soon”, and then when it’s ruined you can lament the the loss for an hour or two before tossing the heap and starting over.
Karen Hawkins on 08 Aug 2008 at 6:33 am #
Gillian, I love your flood idea! Bring it on!
That was the biggest culture shock I suffered when I moved from TN to FL. In TN, we had these things called ‘Basements,’ which are like an attic, only lower and muuuuch larger. Here, I have one tiny attic area over the garage for Stuff I Don’t Know What To Do With and by the time I put the Christmas ornaments up there, there’s no room for anything else.
Possessions are a burden in some ways. My grandmother left me some things — many of which I treasure — but some of them I don’t really know what to do with (a collection of antique mustache cups from the victorian?) or how to display them (a huge, ugly-old dresser made of a wood I can only describe as ‘flat brown’?) and so they just get shuttled here and there.
We bought a storage shed for our backyard and that gave us an extra storage closet off the front porch, but gee, I have a lot of things-that-don’t-belong-anywhere.
Beth C. on 08 Aug 2008 at 7:01 am #
I thought that was what a garage was for. I hear some people put cars in them, but nope mine has all the boxes of stuff DH and I haven’t gone through/obviously not important if they are still boxed 4 years after we moved into the house.
Congrats on cleaning up.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 7:40 am #
Beth, I failed to mention that the garage is full of boxes, too. I have to step over stuff to get to my freezer and my Jenny Craig food. I’ll never forget years ago when my oldest was only five or six. (Sniffle! She’s 18 and going away in 2 weeks!) Anyway, she’d gone to a friend’s house from school and came home, eyes big as saucers.
“Mommy, they keep their CAR in their GARAGE!” I nearly died laughing. Once, years later, we kept our cars in the garage - and that house didn’t have a basement either. It did, however, have a huge attic, and we didn’t live there long enough to grow any good habits, LOL.
KarenH - what the heck are mustache cups? I have a vision of cups with faces with large mustaches. I’m sure that’s not right.
Gillian - dittoing Karen H - I also live in FL and have no basement, but your idea sounds inspired.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 7:42 am #
TinaLouise - I had trails in my office. I’d grown accustomed to them. Now they are gone, but I now have trails in my bedroom, one room over, so it’s all good.
LisaK - yep, that’s exactly what happens to me! Most of the stuff in boxes is stufff that should be filed or pitched. I just have to take the time to do it but when I look at that stack of boxes, it terrifies me worse than any of my evil villains.
Claudia Dain on 08 Aug 2008 at 7:43 am #
You could always throw it out. But that’s my solution to everything, so you can’t really listen to me.
Nothing gives me a charge like throwing things out. I feel like I can breathe again, like the world has opened up and anything is possible. Like I could fly!
Knowing that I have this ‘affliction’, DH is always checking the trash cans to see what I’ve been up to and what he feels compelled to rescue and bring back to safety in the house. In that way, our house is elastic; I toss it out, he brings it back.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 7:45 am #
See, I knew I liked your husband, Claudia
BTW, I wore the grey flowing Japanese silk thingie you picked out in SF for my interview yesterday. Hope the pics turn out fine!
Lisa H on 08 Aug 2008 at 7:53 am #
LOL! Karen R - Do you want to know what we’re doing with all our (now I’ll use the technical term) CRAP? We are putting on a huge addition! Yes, its true, we have so much crap we cannot live without, we must expand our house! LOL!
Honestly, there are things which have no real place, like old photo albums, your wedding dress, shoes that might come back into style, a purse you might one day need, a pretty basket your best friend gave you that would go perfect in the luxury bathroom of your imagination!
I really do try the old addage, “one thing in, one thing out” but it never works. There is no way I will ever throw away or give away a book.
Freedom Writer on 08 Aug 2008 at 7:54 am #
I have a large basement, thank you God, because all 4 of my children and my granddaughter currently live with us and they have brought with them alot of Stuff we don’t know what to do with, but maybe needed IF they ever move out again.
I try to keep my office clutter fairly organized and out of sight. It is a great way to procrastinate when I should be writing.
As for the basement, I encourage my family to keep things in plastic, and to every so often sort through and decide what they no longer need or want. This pile of clothes and other goods then get sorted into 2 piles. One pile goes in the garbage and one pile goes to St Vinnie’s or Goodwill.
I do like Gillian’s plan as well, but since my mother had drainage tile put in a decade ago the basement gets very little water in it, even during heavy rain.
Kari on 08 Aug 2008 at 7:59 am #
My “expandable closet” is my garage. It’s kinda funny because things start out being in boxes in the bedroom. After a while they get shifted to my office. They linger there for a while then when I finally get the spark under my fanny to deep clean my office, the boxes find their way into the garage.
(I’m a Florida girl too so a basement is not an option. )
After the boxes have sat in the garage for a while, dh has the notion to clean the garage. Sooooo, the boxes either get the heeve ho to the curb OR they make the circut in the house again by going back into the bedroom. It’s anyones guess.
Isn’t it fun to go through the boxes after a period of time and find stuff you forgot you had. It’s like finding a buried treasure. For me anyway.
Louisa Cornell on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:12 am #
I feel your pain, Karen R! You would think living alone I would not have these problems. HA! I currently have one room that is STUFFED TO THE GILLS with boxes of stuff I don’t know what to do with. I have lived in a variety of places - large and small. Large was better. Unfortunately the boxes in the “spare” room are beginning to migrate into my writing studio. Apparently the books in those boxes want to be with the books in my writing studio.
Believe it or not I have a two car garage on my property. Why a two car garage was needed for a property with a trailer on it, I don’t know. Instead of storage I attached two dog runs to said garage so that some of my rescue dogs have the luxury of an entire room in which to lounge instead of a mere doghouse.
The sad part? I have a 40 pound box of books coming from San Francisco!
elsiehogarth on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:25 am #
Karen, I knew why I loved you….I too keep things in boxes but I number them and label them. I also have a list of what is in them. I keep boxes in a walk in closet(books), in the garage(books), in any available closet(books) in the house and the shed(books). I guess what I am really saying is that I have things in boxes but what I really wish for is a library with shelves from floor to ceiling. That would be heaven.
Jessie on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:30 am #
At my house we have a basement and an unfinished “Bonus Room” where we store all sorts of things. Recently my mom and I went through the Bonus Room and tossed a lot of stuff out. Fortunately, I’m not that sentimental and don’t mind throwing out stuff from my childhood. My whole problem is I always say, “But one day I might need this!” even though I haven’t needed whatever it is in 5 years. There’s always a possibility!
KarenH, I’m with you. Sometimes possessions are a burden. My grandmother collected Barbies and she left me more than 200 dolls. I still live with my parents, so I can’t put them out here. When I move on my own, I won’t have the room, and when I move to a bigger house, well, will I want to put 200 Barbie dolls up? Probably not. But I loved my grandmother, so I would never get rid of them. What can you do except store them in boxes and let them clutter your house.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:39 am #
Louisa, I have a friend who often says she would like to be reincarnated as one of her dogs, as they live the good life. Sounds like one could say the same about your dogs!
Aw, Jessie, that’s sweet, keeping your Grandmother’s Barbies.
My DH has collections of baseball cards and movie posters. Most of these, well some of these, are mounted on the walls of our house and thus, don’t take up much space. But some of the boxes are his. Maybe 15%.
Elsie, you do what I always SAY I’m going to do - write on the boxes what’s in them. I did this once, but then reused the boxes. I opened up one thinking it would be “Winter Clothes” as that was written on the side. But it was old computer keyboards. Now I need to find which box has the winter clothes (as I sometimes travel beyond FL borders in the winter). Or I could just buy new stuff
Oooh, I like that.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:42 am #
Kari - my boxes migrate, too. I think it’s an instinct of boxes, to migrate - and to congregate.
See, it’s not our fault at all. It’s instinct. It’s Mother Nature. Nobody wants to mess with her.
Aemelia on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:47 am #
Oh my, I can so relate…I have a storage shed full of “stuff I don’t know what to do with” or more “stuff I can’t find a place for”
Judy F on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:51 am #
Karen you know if you keep those boxes to close together they will fool around and make more boxes. LOL
I mostly have books all over the place. I have stuff in my closets. Living in an apartment I don’t have much room.
Now Karen when you get old your kids will have the lovely chore of going through your collection. We have been doing that since my parents aren’t in the best of health anymore. I thought my mom was a pack rat but dad is worse. He kept everything.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:55 am #
Judy - you mean if I hold onto all this CRAP that one day my kids will be forced to clean MY room?
I like that, too. I like that very much!
SuzyQ on 08 Aug 2008 at 8:55 am #
Most of my stuff goes in the attic. But, I am soon going to have a dilemma as my dh wants to get central air, which is going to take up a portion of the attic space. We have a shed, but that is not an option because one year we had mice that got in there and ruined everything. I guess it’s like the flooding basement that Gillian mentioned. I was upset but I ended up chucking it all out.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:15 am #
We once had a shed. This is a True Story.
It was winter, 1989 and we lived in this cute little house in Cinci. All our outdoor stuff - shovels, lawn mower, bicycles, GARDEN HOSES were in the outside storage shed. As were cans of paint, thinner, turpentine… You can see where this is going.
DH and I were relaxing in our basement (we had one then) watching TV, when there was a frantic knocking at our door! Our storage shed was ON FIRE. Panicked, I called 911 while DH ran out to the shed and opened the door. Bad Move. The oxygen fed the fire and it went WHOOSH into the sky. Maybe 30 or 40 feet from our house.
The fire dept had not arrived, five minutes later, but half the neighborhood had. Because it was winter, our garden hose was IN THE SHED. Duh. But we had an old one connected to the house, without a sprayer thingie, and DH used this to battle the blaze, his thumb over the end of the hose to direct the water. cont…
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:19 am #
Because 10 minutes later the Fire Dept still had not arrived. They were only 1 mile from our house. It had been a Selling Point of the real estate agent. Everyone in the neighborhood had called 911. DH and a nice neighbor were still battling the blaze with garden hoses. Remember all those flammable things that were in the shed? They burned, baby. Boy did they burn.
TWENTY MINUTES after I first called 911, the fire dept arrived. Turns out they were a voluntary fire dept (who knew) and had to have a certain number of men on the truck before they could depart. They hooked their hoses up to the hydrants, but someone had not done their job and there was no pressure! So they hooked the hoses up to the truck and proceeded to tromp around in their big boots and put the fire out.
Then the pressure built up in the hydrants and, because they had forgotten to close the valves, flooded the street. (In winter. In Ohio.)
Punchline coming…
Sabrina Jeffries on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:19 am #
See, I’m with Lisa H. The solution is just to buy a bigger house. If you can afford it. Eventually I will fill up this house, but I think I’ve finally found a house big enough so I can maintain the level of crap comfortably. I need to be like Claudia, pitching stuff right and left. I just can’t. I do pitch stuff–just not fast enough to keep up. I’m trying to do better, though. Most things DO have a place.
Oh, and last night when I SHOULD have been cleaning house I was finishing the very scary book of a certain very scary author. I got 6 hours of sleep while waiting for the serial killer to drag me off to his lair. Gee, thanks, Karen “Killer-Inventor” Rose! Scared the bejesus out of me. GREAT book!
Thank God it’s finally daylight.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:24 am #
So the next morning, DH and I were outside inspecting the considerable damage, when the insurance dude drove up - complaining about the ice on the street.
Snicker. Punchline coming…
So we are looking at our damaged wordly outside goods. The bicycles were a solid mass of melted metal with a pedal sticking out. Shovels, gone. Garden hoses, gone. Two gorgeous fruit trees - mature - that had been next to the shed, gone.
THe insurance dude picks up a stack of floor tiles - our leftover kitchen tiles. THey are flame retardent (which is good as I set a fire in the kitchen once trying to cook), which they were designed to be.
Then he toed a scrap of paper and began to laugh. I thought he’d have a heart attack he laughed so hard. It was the wrapper for the store brand charcoal briquets. They were still coal black! Ha!!!!
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:25 am #
The fire Melted our Bicycles and the briquets hadn’t even started to turn white!!
He said we should have taken a picture and sent it to the Kingsford Charcoal COmpany. We should have - or maybe to the store we’d bought it from as blackmail.
Get it? Charcoal briquets…blackmail?
Oh well, the moral of this story is, garden sheds are bad.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:26 am #
Thanks, Sabrina!!!!
Bwahahahaha….
LisaK on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:31 am #
Karen, that is HILARIOUS! Sure you don’t wanna write a story about your life?
Charcoal briquets - blackmail. *bigfatgrin*
I love that.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:35 am #
Lisa, darling, nobody would believe it! I couldn’t make up stuff like this.
Wait… Maybe I could. But this is a True Story. DH will vouch. Still one of my favorites. Ha!
Kim on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:42 am #
OMG, the brickets didn’t even light up?? Get a refund! LOL
We have a basement where boxes migrate but occasionally we go through the house and just do a mass get-rid-of. I box stuff up and freecycle it or we set it out on the curb and our scavenger neighbors take it.
KarenR–is that the outfit you wore to the lit signing?? I LOVED that on you! You looked awesome.
Lisa H on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:44 am #
Oh Karen, these are the stories that make me pee pee! Too funny. So in addition to your husband’s other charms, he is also a hose weilding fireman! Very Sexy!
Kay on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:49 am #
OK KarenR, Don’t be so funny in the morning. I had to change shirts & coffee is difficult to get out of white. At least I missed the keyboard. LOL
When I was growing up, we moved every 3 - 4 years, because of my dad’s job, so my parents were ruthless about throwing out junk. This turned me into the world’s biggest packrat. Or so I thought, until I met my DH. He”s super packrat.
When we moved into our house in 1993, we had SO MUCH SPACE & SUCH BIG CLOSETS. Now, we have piles & boxes and TOO MUCH STUFF. This will soon change.
We start a huge remodel project in October. EVERYTHING must be moved out of the basement. Were talking going down to the subfloor & wall studs. And none of it is going into the garage. This is the perfect time to TOSS.
Oh how I need goddess Claudia to help.
After the basement is done, the kitchen, upstairs bathrooms & main bedroom are next. That’s right—everything out of the kitchen. I’m scared to think what is in the back of all of those cabinets
SuzyQ on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:49 am #
Karen that is a great story! LOL!
Kim - we have scavengers too. It’s amazing what people will take. Last weekend we replaced our basement storm door and threw out the old one (which the bottom was in bad shape from years of water, snow and ice). A couple hours later I see a pickup next to our garbage and he’s loading the door in the bed of the truck. I tell my dh and he says “Oh, he probably just wants it for the glass and the screen”. Well, later that day we see he left the glass and screen and just took the door. We just scratched our heads on that one.
Kay on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:50 am #
Soooooo, how was the interview?
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:59 am #
Kim, I once knew a woman who scavenged. She’d go on commando missions in the dead of night, headlights off to take … grass clippings! She’d use it for mulch in her garden.
Now, why she simply didn’t march up to the door and ASK the people if she could have their grass clippings is beyond me. Perhaps the whole dead-of-night commando thing was a thrill for her. Once, though, she came home just a-fussin’. She’d grabbed a bag from the curb, full of actual trash. The NERVE of some people… putting trash on their curbs.
We’re going to do a Good Will run soon. We promise. Soon. Nodding sagely.
(Not gonna happen.)
Yes, Kim, it’s the same outfit! I love it! Claudia is a freaking shopping genius. I bow to her.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:04 am #
Kay, good luck with the basement cleaning thing. I have not seen Kay’s basement. She wouldn’t let me down there. I suspect it’s dangerous and scary down there
Like my bedroom full of boxes.
The interview went very well! The reporter was here an hour, during which my dog barked nearly incessantly. I had to put him in the crate because he’d have loved the reporter lady to death. I can’t say “he’s just a puppy” anymore. He’s big and needs obedience training. Or maybe I do. Cesar Milan would shake his head at me. But the interview went well - she seemed pleased. We’ll see how it goes in teh paper.
The photographer stayed an hour and that was fun, too. We shall see how it goes! I’ll try to find a link if it appears in the online version - it’ll be a week from Sunday.
Claudia Dain on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:04 am #
Karen, not only do I loan myself out to help other women shop for clothes, (that photo will look great!), I also have been asked in to help women throw stuff out.
True story:
Me, staring at a big pile of stuff.
“And then I’m not sure if I should throw this out,” cluttery friend says.
“It’s a bath mat. It looks well worn,” I say politely. “Do you use it now?”
“No, but I might need it someday. For something,” she says. I can tell she means it. I get scared and move closer to the door.
“Like what?” I ask. “Don’t you have bath mats?”
“Yes, but I might need another one. For something.”
“Wouldn’t you just buy another $5 bathmat. If you needed it? For something?”
“You’re right. I’ll throw it out,” she said, looking longingly at the old, tattered mat.
I threw it into the bottom of the trash bag. Who knows where it is now? In her garage? In her attic?
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:25 am #
Claudia, I have pity for that poor woman. I have stuff I know I should throw out, but I don’t, because I’ll need it someday. And I do need it, just often enough to reinforce my can’t-throw-away-itis.
Case in point: Yesterday the photographer from the paper wanted to do a pic of me looking through some books, like in a library, but all of my shelves are mounted to the wall and wouldn’t work. So he casts his eyes around and sees two leftover black presentation cork board pieces that I NEVER THREW AWAY BECAUSE I MIGHT NEED THEM SOMEDAY.
So he uses these boards to make a shelf and takes pic of me peering through my books. Then he uses the boards to create a studio-esque kind of surface so that he could take pics of more books.
Now, what would we have done if I’d thrown those boards away? Tell me this now!
Judy F on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:35 am #
Great story Karen.
Yes if you safe everything your kids will love you to death. My dad had magazines since forever. You know there might be an article he wants to re-read.
He had over the counter meds that had expired years ago. We have found over 300 in gift cards to various places in his drawer. Luckily none had expired. We have even found his wallet that had been missing for months.
Yasmin on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:43 am #
I dont have that problem at home. My mom is a CLEAN FREAK. I clean the house everyday even vaccumm ( even though I hate it). I f for some reason I cheat and dont vaccum SHE KNOWS! We sweep, mop, dust everything everyday. My rm is always filled with books but even them are in their designated bookcase or on the night table. Now…. my sis is a pack rat. She keeps everything. She has enough scrubs to not go wash for at least 1 1/2 months if not more. She keeps every receipt from yrs ago and you should see her purse. She hasnt invaded the rest of the house b/c mom wont let her. Mom even goes into her rm and gives ultimatums since it drives her nuts.
Karen–I think it was nice of him to clean the house for you while you were away. If that would have happened at home, the house would not have been cleaned. Men in my family are such amnesiacs.
Yasmin on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:49 am #
Karen–If you do get to go through your boxes try some plastic storages ones. Use paper tape to label what you have in them.
terrio on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:55 am #
After way too many moves and moving crap I didn’t need, I’ve finally learned to purge. Don’t get me wrong, I still have a rubbermaid container here or there and I’ve never managed to go through the old boxes of pictures to move the pictures into the (still empty) pretty picture boxes I bought a couple years ago. But I have much less crap than I used to have.
Every summer while Kiddo is gone to her dad’s, I purge her room. She comes back in two weeks and I haven’t started. Eek! Gotta get on that right away. The local thrift store either loves me or hates me once a year. LOL!
Congrats on the article. And kudos to hubby for not strangling you when he got that call. LOL!
Claudia Dain on 08 Aug 2008 at 11:15 am #
Karen, this may shock you, but the photographer would have come up with another solution. Those cork boards are not the answer to the riddle of the universe. Really. LOL
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 11:22 am #
Claudia, so you say… I don’t believe you
My world has been verified.
Julia London on 08 Aug 2008 at 11:42 am #
Jack London keeps every scrap of paper he ever touched, every useless golf or sport gadget, clothes that don’t fit.
I hate clutter. Despise it. Our compromise is that he gets a room. Upstairs, out of my sight, where he can clutter all he wants. The rest of the house, I try and keep de-cluttered, which is becoming increasingly difficult to do with all the Thomas the Train stuff around. How many trains are there on the island of Sodor? Thousands!!
Yasmin on 08 Aug 2008 at 11:47 am #
Julia, your hubby sound just like my sister. One time I decided to be nice and started sorting through a pile of papers of hers. Anything, she got sooooo irrritated that I messed it up. She has her own system going.
colinfirthfan on 08 Aug 2008 at 11:57 am #
Funny story Karen.
I am taking Sabrina’s advice. We are moving in 2 months to a bigger house.
I have started (very slowly) trashing toys and clothes. I will still have to move the 30 big toy trucks coz my kids refuse to part with them. I have been ruthlessly going through their clothes and donating those.
I haven’t gone through any of my stuff and I wish DH would go through his stuff. He has enough clothes not to do laundry for weeks together!!!
I also finally threw out baby bottles, sippy cups etc… that my son hasn’t used in 2 years. Why did I keep it that long….. in case he wanted to use it at some point in his 4 year old life.
Sheridan LA on 08 Aug 2008 at 12:09 pm #
I went from a 2 bedroom house with enclosed garage and storage room.. to a 2 bedroom apt with storage room.. .to a 1 bedroom apartment with no storage room.. needless to say, my place is burstin. I am slowly working on it..
now to top that.. I am headed to Colorado in a few weeks to see my dad.. where I am spending a week of my precious vacation cleaning out his office and the *2* storage rooms of things from my grandmother that have been there.
I am getting tired of all the STUFF.
Heirlooms.. ok.. but there is a ton of CRAP accumulated over 90 years that is sitting there.. and this is just what is left after a big estate sale where she downsized.
2 storage rooms… 10×20′ each. oy.
Kay on 08 Aug 2008 at 12:14 pm #
A friend of mine, who is a neat freak, told me once to, “Keep the memory and toss the STUFF.”
Someday I’ll learn to do that.
Ronlyn on 08 Aug 2008 at 12:55 pm #
oh dear! Do you have the power to view my dining room through your author photos of the books stashed in there? Because HELLO! my dining room has taken on the look of a flea market. It’s insane and we are slowly….very slowly, trying to get rid of the “stuff” that I don’t know what to do with. I’ve given my DH a deadline of October 1st, then I get to decide what to do with it all, which will not be to sell it on craigslist or ebay as he hopes. No, I will donate it all to the local goodwill and call it a day. It’s good “stuff” which is why it’s moved with us. Twice. but it’s time to let go I think. I mean, my boys even rescue the happy meal toys I try to throw away. I’m being over run! LOL
Your DH is a good man to clean so well Karen.
colinfirthfan on 08 Aug 2008 at 3:06 pm #
Ronlyn, if I ask my boys they want always want to keep all the toys. If I find they haven’t played with a Happy Meal toy in a few weeks, I immediately put it in the give away toy pile. They are NOT allowed to look into that box.
We have organizations that drive by on certain days and pick up your clothes/toys etc.. I just gave away some of my four year olds beautiful sweaters etc.. I wanted to keep it but how many of their old clothes can I keep? So I gave it away. I love giving away my clothes though. Perfect excuse to get new ones.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 3:26 pm #
Yes, Ronlyn, he is a very good man! I’m a lucky goddess.
Kathy/Cookie on 08 Aug 2008 at 3:26 pm #
Hi everyone! I’m back from a self imposed exile from the net. big sigh!
I have piles O crud all over my teeny apt! I call them my messy corners.
My living room is tidy, not that I ever have anyone over that cares about cleanliness- they’re just as messy as me- it’s a selling point of our friendships!
I do have one minimalist friend, but she doesn’t actually come in. we go to her house, where everything has a place and there isn’t one thing OUT of place.lol!
I just laugh at her!
I have to ask for access to the storage part of the basement. my landlord has the key. it’s a smelly old stone floor kind of place. I have one bicycle stored and in the winter he puts my deck furniture there. I haven’t ridden the bike since I bought it at a yard sale 14 yrs ago.
anything that comes up from the basement has mouldy smells attached so I don’t use it.
I sadly still have a basket full of survivor weekend stuff that I have yet to put away. from the end of June.
I can blame my casted hand!
Kathy/Cookie on 08 Aug 2008 at 3:28 pm #
oh and the minimalist friend is the same friend who poo poos my reading of romances!
figures!
Alice Faye on 08 Aug 2008 at 3:29 pm #
I had a friend coming in that I had never met face to face, not to mention she was staying in my house. I work in a grocery store as a cake decorator, so I have easy access to the best boxes…apple and banana boxes. I cleaned out my closets and my bookshelves…called the Kidney foundation. They have a resell store… your overstuffing just might be a blessing for someone else…not to mention a great tax deduction..clothes alone over 2000.00 9 boxes Boxs and kincknacks..2 boxes another 300.00
Trust me when push comes to shove…the Kidney foundation, Salvation Army, help someone while helping yourself!
Alice Faye
Kim on 08 Aug 2008 at 4:16 pm #
Julia–hey, did you ever find Jack London’s fav. golf shirt? Wasn’t that missing a while back along with those super wogging socks? LOL. Do they still make Thomas the Tank Engine toys?? I think we’ve got a box of them around here from when Anthony was in to them.
Karen-this is blog is totally making me get ready for a purge. I can’t stand clutter!
Kathy/Cookie on 08 Aug 2008 at 4:16 pm #
completely off topic, but I watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics this morning live.
WOW !!!
amazing!!!
I highly recommend watching the show tonight!
Margaret Garland on 08 Aug 2008 at 4:35 pm #
Karen R, right off the bat early this morning, your topic brought George Carlin immediately to mind. He had a routine that always cracked me up. It was called “Stuff”. I found it on YouTube and it still cracks me up. The one shown is from the Comic Relief show and is fairly clean. One of the things he mentions is having to get a bigger house so you’ll have a place to put your Stuff.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvgN5gCuLac
I like the hoarders idea of stacking it all up and creating a small path to navigate your space. This solves 2 problems. One is what to do with your Stuff and the other is you don’t have to clean because it’s all covered up with your Stuff.
KarenR, your shed story was pretty funny. But only because it happened to you and not me. LOL
Margaret Garland on 08 Aug 2008 at 4:38 pm #
Kim, my 4 year old gs, Austin, is heavily into Thomas the Tank Engine. Once kids get into school, I never know what their interests are. So, I just give them some long green and let them get what they want. In my case, with 13 grands and 2 great-grands, I have to make it short green. LOL One of my babies turned 7 this past Monday.
freshechelle on 08 Aug 2008 at 4:42 pm #
Oh, KR, two great tales in one blog. Glad your interview went well. Hope you share it with us.
I spent 3 weeks cleaning out my late grandma’s 1 bedroom apt and that taught me to get rid of my own crap. I give away most books because I’ve been toting around my college books for the last 4 apt. Do I really need to brush up on the crusades or the sans-coulottes? I don’y think so. My nephew once visited my place and seemed distrurbed and then settled when he realized my place, unlike his, his grandparents and his aunt’s, wasn’t a shrine to the god of clutter. Now shoe clutter is different.
Fyi, Mrs. Rose, I’m delayed (again) in the columbus airport where I hoped to get a graeter’s ice cream fix, but they’ve got nothin’ here. Why didn’t I get it before I got here?
Margaret Garland on 08 Aug 2008 at 4:45 pm #
Off topic but interesting. I couldn’t sleep last night. So, I checked the Movies on Demand. The free movies since I already bought/watched “27 Dresses” last week.
Guess what I watched? “Pride & Prejudice”. Not with Colin Firth but with Lawrence Olivier. God, he was gorgeous when he was young. 36 yr-old Greer Garson played Elizabeth Bennett and Maureen O’Sullivan played Jane. She’s Mia Farrow’s mom. Of course, it was in b/w.
I liked parts of it. Shocked to my toes when Lady Catherine turned out to be a sweet old lady who was just helping her darling nephew win the love of his life when she visted Elizabeth to warn her off Mr. Darcy. Huh? Totally threw me.
It also jerked from one scene to another. Lots of time would pass in the flick of an eye. I still heart Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 6:02 pm #
I’ve seen the Olivier version and it’s pretty good. But Colin Firth is THE quintessential Mr. Darcy, IMO.
Thanks, everyone! Glad you enjoyed the shed story. It’s one of my favorites. I can still see DH fighting this huge fire with this tiny little garden hose, with no metal thingie on the end. He was so brave! My neighbor’s name was Greg - he was pretty brave, too.
FRESH, no Graeters?!? You poor thing. You’ll have to get a fix off line. I got some for Christmas from DH last year. Black Raspbery Chip ummmmmmmm…..
I can’t go anywhere near Cinci until I make my goal weight. Graeters calls to me!
freshechelle on 08 Aug 2008 at 6:18 pm #
Funny you mention your goal weight on the same day as we discuss boxes of stuff we don’t need. Advice I wished I followed when I lost weight I’ve since found “you never want to lose the same pound twice.”. I apply that to my home “I’ll never move the same box twice.”. If I didn’t open it in the home, what makes me think I’ll need it in the next.
Karen Hawkins on 08 Aug 2008 at 9:02 pm #
Oh my gosh, I’m so glad I’m not the only one with ’storage’ issues. You all should see my office . . . or maybe not. Sigh.
Btw, my guy threw out a carpet one day and left it in a big roll by the curb. That morning, while he was sitting there drinking his coffee by the front window, a preschool van pulled up. The driver hopped out, opened the door, and a bunch of little kids all lined up, heaved the carpet on their shoulders, trudged to the back of the van. loaded it up, then climbed back in the van and off they went. He laughed so hard he almost choked!
evlqn on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:21 pm #
Finally, I have a minute that is unassigned, so I can chime in on the side of OMG I got more stuff than space!
We have so much stuff we could furnish two or three houses with ease.
When we started to redo our office so Elijah could have his own room we went to Castle Storage to help us hide our stuff that came out of our former office. I love Castle Storage, not only are they nice people they have a dragon guarding their tower.
Unfortunately we still have more stuff that needs to be dealt with.
St Vinnie’s and Goodwill are good alternatives but we usually end up going in and finding more stuff.
We have found a way to keep the stuff somewhat contained and we have the USPS to thank for it. We put everything in Priority boxes, and our mailman even delivered them to us and they are free.
Karen Rose on 08 Aug 2008 at 10:53 pm #
Karen - how hilarious! I would have choked laughing at the sight of pint-sized minions hoisting a carpet!
Evqln - what is is this Castle place? I have to see the dragon!
evlqn on 09 Aug 2008 at 12:08 am #
Karen, here is the link to it http://www.castlestorageeugene.com/. I collect dragons so I really love this place.
evlqn on 09 Aug 2008 at 12:12 am #
BTW, if you go to the site you will see Saphira, she is part of the fountian in the back units. But Olphelia is my favorite.
Michelle B on 09 Aug 2008 at 8:29 am #
Just read this blog and all the replies. Wish I would have been here yesterday, but my son injured his ribs in football practice the night before and I spent the night in the ER where they thought he had lacerations on his spleen and liver. We were transferred by ambulance to Children’s Hospital and kept over night. Turns out he just has a rib injury and spleen and liver are fine.
We are pack rats and I am queen of clutter. I am guilty of throwing stuff in boxes when people are coming over. Being military and moving every two years it doesn’t get too bad. You have to go through everything before the packers arrive. The incentive is that you have a weight limit and anything over that limit you pay a large per pound penalty. So out it all goes. I always joke that we don’t have our own house and roots, we have “stuff” instead. Every house we choose gets looked at for how many bedrooms, are there enough cupboards, and is their a storage room. Basements are great…
Michelle B on 09 Aug 2008 at 8:31 am #
but we have lived in many southern homes without them. Attics and garages suffice, just not as good as a basement.
Gwen on 11 Aug 2008 at 11:41 pm #
Karen - Just for you:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvgN5gCuLac
Signed,
Gwen, Queen of Stuff