The Front Porch Swing

[LindaB220]

I sometimes wonder if living in the country or "on the farm" lends itself to keeping more things around - just in case you need to fix something and then don't need to run into town. My DH worked hard in his shop a couple years ago to clean out things that had accumulated from when his Dad passed away. A lot of things seemed to migrate to our place. I don't think he misses much of what he got rid of, but every now and then he bemoans the fact that he took something to the dump and now he could use that piece to fix something. We've been asking ourselves the same types of questions - what should we get rid of now. 3 or our 4 parents have died and close friends of ours are cleaning out 60 plus years of stuff and clutter from their parents' house. What a lot of work! We don't want our kids to have to go through that. And yet if we get rid of everything old, we end up spending money to replace it when something breaks. There must be a balance out there somewhere and the hard part is finding it. The big thing is not to look down on others that don't think the same way as us. We're all on different journeys and like Bee mentioned earlier, what we have lived through or whom we've been close to impacts how we see "stuff".
Hope you all have a wonderful Sunday!

My mom died 3 yrs ago and I decided to sell up and move to an apt. I got rid of most of my things and what I wanted I took to the apt. There is no way i could look at all of Mama's memorabilia and junk and not want to "save" it. No way. So daughter Aimee and I talked about it. She would handle the estate sale and I would stay away. Seriously, I didn't see anything go. It would have killed me. This is all the stuff left from my house next door and her 65 yrs accumulation. Ever since I still think "Oh, I should have saved this or that" But at the time it was the only way to accomplish it. And we're fine.

 

[Triple Willow]

YEP! This is what I notice about a lot of controlling people ... it's a desperate attempt to externalize their internal chaos. A coping mechanism. They need/want everything around them to be their version of "perfect" so they can pretend that when they inevitably loose it they won't get quite as damaged as they would if things weren't properly arranged. 

I've got one of those controlling people in my life, controlling to the max! It has got to where I absolutely can not stand to be around them and I won't be around them if I can possibly get around it. When they start their attempt at controlling everything and everybody my anger level tops out and it is best that we part company. Pretty sad.

 

[Beekissed]

My mom died 3 yrs ago and I decided to sell up and move to an apt. I got rid of most of my things and what I wanted I took to the apt. There is no way i could look at all of Mama's memorabilia and junk and not want to "save" it. No way. So daughter Aimee and I talked about it. She would handle the estate sale and I would stay away. Seriously, I didn't see anything go. It would have killed me. This is all the stuff left from my house next door and her 65 yrs accumulation. Ever since I still think "Oh, I should have saved this or that" But at the time it was the only way to accomplish it. And we're fine.

That's why we are having a Picture Party this month, as family pictures seem to be the most desired family memorabilia. We are buying several albums, inviting some of Mom's kids(my sibs, of course) and my kids and we are going to sit around and sort, distribute and also place pics in albums. Anyone wanting their baby/childhood pics and family pics can take them, if not they go into albums that can be easily divvied up when we are gone.

We are tired of pics sitting around in totes and boxes, never seeing the light of day, but we still have to move those boxes around as we clean around them.

My grandma put little stickers on all the underside of her things with the names of who they should go to...even all the little, silly things.

 

[Searsmom]

I've got one of those controlling people in my life, controlling to the max! It has got to where I absolutely can not stand to be around them and I won't be around them if I can possibly get around it. When they start their attempt at controlling everything and everybody my anger level tops out and it is best that we part company. Pretty sad.

Sadly I have a sister like that. We communicate - I deliver eggs, etc...but we don't talk. We spend limited time around each other. From my point of view it's to decrease my anxiety about being around her - from her point of view it's because I don't follow her advice when she gives it - I know this because she's told me. Side note - it's pretty materialistic advice.

 

[Triple Willow]

My mom died 3 yrs ago and I decided to sell up and move to an apt.  I got rid of most of my things and what I wanted I took to the apt.  There is no way i could look at all of Mama's memorabilia and junk and not want to "save" it.  No way.  So daughter Aimee and I talked about it.  She would handle the estate sale and I would stay away.  Seriously, I didn't see anything go.  It would have killed me.  This is all the stuff left from my house next door and her 65 yrs accumulation.  Ever since I still think "Oh, I should have saved this or that"   But at the time it was the only way to accomplish it.  And we're fine. 

That had to be so hard to deal with. I dread the thought of it.

 

[Triple Willow]

Sadly I have a sister like that. We communicate - I deliver eggs, etc...but we don't talk. We spend limited time around each other. From my point of view it's to decrease my anxiety about being around her - from her point of view it's because I don't follow her advice when she gives it - I know this because she's told me. Side note - it's pretty materialistic advice.

I understand and you're right, it is very sad.

 

[luvblues7]

It is absolutely beautiful here today. A perfect spring day. The temps are in the lower to mid 60's. The sun is shing bright and the birds are singing their spring songs so I have decided after church to take the babies outside for the first time. They are so funny running and flying eating what green stuff they can find and rolling in the dirt. There are 10 Partridge Rocks 11 speckled Sussex and 9 "box of chocolate" bantams. Life is good ......

Carolyn.

 

[Gldnrose]

Cross your fingers - we are putting in an offer on a place. DH just looked at it and is excited about it.

Fingers crossed for you. I hope you get it.

 

[Beekissed]

It is absolutely beautiful here today. A perfect spring day. The temps are in the lower to mid 60's. The sun is shing bright and the birds are singing their spring songs so I have decided after church to take the babies outside for the first time. They are so funny running and flying eating what green stuff they can find and rolling in the dirt. There are 10 Partridge Rocks 11 speckled Sussex and 9 "box of chocolate" bantams. Life is good ......

Carolyn.

It is!!! Such a lovely flock you have! Watching birds out on green grass grows a little addictive and now I can't bear to see them confined in any way...too much of everything that is good for a chicken is outside the coop/pen.

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

I'm more of a procedural freak than a clutter freak. I like procedures to be a efficient as possible, and I'm a stickler for designing "quality" into a procedure. I'm always on the lookout for a "better" way to do things, and love the zing of an inspiration about that.

I can't deal with a lot of unexplained clutter very well, like "decorations." Decorations make me itchy, like literally. But I will leave "work" things "out" that I use all the time rather than adding two steps to a procedure (put something away, get it back out again). I have a large-ish house, so I have "zones" for various activities, and I like to "batch" projects as I find the hardest part about any job is STARTING it ... so I design procedures so you don't have to start things any more than necessary, and then I try to turn those procedures into habits so I don't have to think about it first to motivate myself ... it becomes automatic.

When I've lived in smaller spaces I have found it more "efficient" to always put everything away, so I didn't have to start every project by clearing a spot to work. That is always a depressing step to me.

When some other people come to visit this house they can't stand to see dishes drying beside the sink. Air-drying saves effort AND it's more sanitary. So I air dry. But oh how the sight of that pushes some people over the edge!

When I "moved home" there was absolutely no place to put anything down. That made starting the de-cluttering SO difficult. I'd pick something up because I couldn't stand to look at it/move around it any more, then have no place to put it except maybe the garbage. But my mom died very shortly after I moved home, and Dad went through a phase of freaking out about anything going into the garbage, so I spent years being exceptionally sneaky about even that.

I got very creative finding places to "donate" anything that might be useful as Dad seemed to be able to cope with that. And I boxed up a lot of stuff that wasn't good enough to donate. Since then, I've been going through boxes ... slowly ... as I/we feel strong enough to face that.

I sent ONE box to my sister to deal with, and she had a total meltdown over it. Going through family stuff can be extremely difficult, emotionally. I often find myself completely overwhelmed by a particular batch of stuff, and that feeling can really block my progress.

Luckily, there are PLENTY of things to do in a day, so I can just put the ongoing de-cluttering on the back burner for a bit until I get an inspiration about how to deal with that specific "mess." Once inspired I can move pretty fast. Without inspiration, a simple task can never end. For me, the planning is not only enjoyable, it is essential.

Now that I've got some basic areas cleared out I'm "comfortable" with the pace of my progress through the house. But I'm sure motivated to keep my own stuff to a bare minimum.