Purging

I love getting rid of things. I don't know what it is, I'm not into Feng Shui or anything like that, and I don't have an extreme minimalist house, but whenever I can get rid of something we no longer need it just makes me happy. Recently we've gotten rid of a lot of things - changing pad and Diaper Champ now that Little Man only wears diapers at night, the extra toddler mattress - since Little Hugger does not roll out of her bed, and of course the big one - the crib.

Ok, I didn't entirely get rid of it. I kept the springs to use as a pin board (like this one I found on Pinterest from Iheartorganizing.blogspot.com). I kept one of the sides to hang fabric on after I've ironed it in case I have to stop working on a project. I would have loved to have made a crafting desk for the kids like this one (here's the original site) but I don't have the room. A friend of mine cried the entire time she was taking apart an hauling away her sons' crib when they were done with it. I don't get that. I understand it's a symbol of a part of their life that has passed and never to return again, but it's also a sign of the beginning of a new stage of life.

It's not that I'm not sentimental. I do keep things that the kids make for me (but not every one). I keep cards, have a ton of photo albums. Tons of the songs on my iPod bring back
memories of one kind of another. I just don't feel the need to keep a lot of stuff.

Little Reader is like me. She often asks me to help her organize her stuff and she weeds through papers and things on a regular basis. Actually her room is neater than mine was when I was a kid.

Little Hugger definitely is more of a hoarder. She'll keep little scraps of paper for a craft she has in mind, but often never gets to. Whenever I ask her to organize her stuff and throw some away she often ends in tears. We finally came up with a compromise. She has binders with sheet protectors in them that she can store her assorted crafts and drawings in. Anything too big (or something that is slightly less important but she still wants to remember, I take a picture of it and we put it in a photo album she has.

Twice a year I have them go through their stuff (toys, clothes, books) to find things we can sell at Kid's Sale. If they outgrow things at other times we put it in a bin in the basement until the next sale. It's become such a habit now, even Little Man came up to me with a baseball hat yesterday that no longer fits and asked me to put it in the bin for Kids Sale.

I'm not going to lie and say my house is devoid of clutter, but it's in pretty good shape, and unlike a lot of my friends homes, things have a place and even my junk drawers are pretty well organized.