Get rid of things day

That's it.
From now on, Friday (formally known as my day off) is now going to be known as the day that I get rid of stuff. We'll call it "get rid of things" day.

Every Friday I try to chill at home and decompress from the week, but I also try to get some stuff done around the house. I usually do some laundry, cook some food for the week, attempt to do a little homework (haha!) and occasionally, clean... but inevitably I have a break down about how much STUFF we have and how it is everywhere. It doesn't help that our living space is a tad too small for our family size, but that is no excuse. Also, my 5 year old plays all day using his amazing imagination, and he tends to build everywhere... which creates even less space in the house. Don't get me wrong, his stuff is usually pretty amazing but enough is enough!

Today it was the books (again) that did me in. Messy bookshelves make me crazy, and it's really not fair to think that a 5 year old can constantly maintain a neat anything without prompting. So we went through all of his bookcases and filled a huge cloth bag with books to take out of the house. We took some of them to the local used book store and sold them for store credit and only came home with two new books. The rest of the books will go to the book swap at our co-op so that others can take advantage of them if they want them.

After that, I started tackling some of our hallway pile. The truth is, I try to pretend that this pile isn't really there, which is not how I want to be handling it at all. The pile is the result of the big kids cleaning their room out so that they could finally get rid of their bunk bed and install the loft beds that have been waiting for them. The loft beds are great because now they have more space, but getting rid of the clutter was a huge help. However, a lot of that stuff was put in the hallway for me to deal with (clothes to give away to friends or put aside for my youngest, etc.)... and I'm certainly not holding up my end of the bargain.

But now that every Friday is going to be the day that I get rid of things, I hope to have that hallway empty soon! I think the rule will be that I have to get rid of at least one thing, but preferably one BAG of things every week. This absolutely includes physically removing the item or items from the house.

Oh man, I hope this works out!

Meanwhile back on the ranch... we finally have a little bit of winter.

And I can feel a little bit better about all of that snow gear that is taking up space in my home - we actually have a reason for it now... at least for a few days.

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Hey, I know that I haven't been posting much so while I have you, let me tell you about my toothbrush. (Aren't you excited??)

There aren't a lot of toothbrushes out there that aren't plastic and don't come in plastic packaging. I have found a few - you can read about them on this blog post. In the end, I am really happy with my preserve toothbrush that comes in a mail back pack. The toothbrush itself is made from 100% recycled plastic (mostly yogurt containers and other #5 plastics that are sometimes difficult to recycle), and the packaging that it comes in is designed to be saved so that you can slip your toothbrush back in and mail it back to the company... postage paid. The used toothbrushes get ground up and turned into plastic lumber (used for picnic tables and park benches, etc.)

This is how we will be doing things from now on around here.