After my recent "enough is enough!" -moment sparked by my need to urgently reduce my fabric stash to make room for what I was actually doing now, painting - I went through the whole house like a whirlwind.
So, why was my house starting to feel way too cluttered? I identified a few reasons:
-I had to bring home the leftovers from my business, lots of fabrics and some other things like rolls of wallpaper. I have donated a ton of fabrics before, but there was quite a bit. And you know, there are still some at a previous retailer's basement!
-After being on my own, alone with DD in an old house and the coronavirus and lastly the energy crisis fear mongering made me feel insecure. What if something happens? I need to be prepared! Yes, to an extent. But I also have family and neighbors close by, and the limits of my house and my closets are limits, not guidelines.
- I had overly optimistic ideas about how much produce I would be drying, freezing and preparing in other ways, resulting in too many items related to all that, relative to my restricted storage space.
-I got a bit too excited about decorating my house as the renovation progressed. DD hates a white, stark home, we wanted it to be cozy here. But cozy doesn't have to be cluttered and hard to clean.
-My weight changed yet again, leading to having to get new clothes, and still wanting to hold on to some I really liked and were quite new (some are now being used by DD and rest are donated), also not wearing some of my own print clothes but nor wanting to get rid of them, because you know, they are unique and maybe I will want to wear them again later.. Also they were a little bit small. But indecision struck and I kept them until now. (Now my Crohn's disease is in an acute phase again and I had to go on a specific diet for it.. so I may end up losing weight again. But luckily my dresses and tops and even skirts will probably work even if I lost up to 15 kilos. DD can wear many of my clothes even though she is 3 sizes smaller.)
-Starting to paint again, even though I had almost given up hope at one point that I would ever get back to it. This lead to having art stuff around, and also thinking about things as potential props for paintings. Oh no! Here is where I got in trouble, but also it made me remember why I love minimalism, ever since 2010! Or actually even before that. My student apartment was super minimal, in 1998! I have this picture I took after decluttering my apartment. It's a bit too stark for my current taste (and for DD's taste) but I loved it then! I remember decluttering my sieve, and then having to buy one again after noticing it was impossible to drain rice with just using a kettle lid, and spaghetti was a bit slippery too :D
After moving together with my husband, I couldn't stay that minimal, but got back to it later when I noticed myself being really overwhelmed and unhappy with so much stuff, and I got my husband onboard simplifying.
Anyway, what happened now, is that I thought, and rightly so, that our old house suits a quirky, artistic decor. And DD hates white walls, and likes wallpaper.
And I happened to stumble upon some pretty rare, cool antiques. I thought I could use them as props for painting, maybe keep some, and sell the rest. What I got wrong, was to forget that the walls don't stretch and the space is what it is, and that I hate cleaning and I have a very low clutter threshold. I just can't cope with it. I also forgot that I hate having extra stuff lying around, or even neatly corralled into a cabinet, just waiting to leave my house. I really, really hate it! So before digging myself deeper into that hole, I promptly put a stop on it. I decided to try and sell the items, but if it is not getting sold in a relatively short time, I would just donate all of it and call it a lesson learned. It seems I need quite many lessons before I learn (sigh).
I still think our old house suits the style we have going on here, but a few special decor items and artworks make a much bigger impression if they are let to stand out instead of hidden among a lot of things happening everywhere. Also, wallpaper and art on walls adds color and quirk and coziness without adding things to move around and clean.
I have been going through everything, the art and craft supplies, the food pantry, the dishes, the linens, the clothes and shoes, the bathroom products, the office supplies, everything. I still need to go through tools, and take another look at the pantry. Then there are a couple of bags in the attic spaces (which are mostly empty, some old paintings are stored there) which have my old business place decor which needs to be donated.
Garden stuff is still a work in progress, I need to go through the tiny shed. Thankfully it is small and doesn't house that much junk. And I already got rid of a bunch of stuff that was there, when I noticed I wasn't going to need them. So it's more than half way done already.
I have a spot at a fleamarket currently, and I have another spot reserved next month, if I can stand the bags of stuff around until then. I need to clear out this spot on Monday evening and I will decide then whether to cancel the second one and take everything to a donation place, or to keep it around and do the pricing stuff for a second spot, which is the most time consuming thing in this fleamarket selling. It's at the end of the month, so it means I would have to keep the stuff for a few more weeks. On one hand, time goes by really quickly, and I could price everything and pile the bags in a place where they are not in my way too much, or even the car some time before actually taking them to the flea market. On the other hand I would love to have all the extra clutter out of my house as soon as possible! Making myself sell at the fleamarket is kind of a way to pay a penance, eh. And to remind myself that while it is super easy to bring home stuff, getting rid of it is another kind of hassle!
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