Cleanse

Yesterday the odds were in my favor as Mr. Knitty was home to help wrangle Maggzilla and he was able to remove all his *stuff* from my "craft room".

This means I was able to get in there (and, since he's unpacked his stuff, I had a number of new boxes) and purge. The craft room has always been a sort of dumping ground for "things I don't know what to do with but can't get rid of". Guess what I filled the boxes with. I just started at one corner of the room and tried to go with my immediate reaction to each thing. When I started to hear the voice in my head say "I have to save this because....." I put it in the box. Each time I filled a box I sealed it, stacked it by the door, and got a new one.

This morning I put all the boxes in my car and my trunk is full. Very full. So full when I open the hatchback everything will probably come piling out on me.

I tried to avoid the trap of "going through boxes". I will do that, but first I wanted to clear the space by getting rid of the things that aren't in boxes. I was able to move Maggie's toy chest and an end table downstairs. I was able to move my sewing table to a nicer location. I was able to put a bookcase where the desk used to be.

I am now ready to move on to "going through boxes". One drawer, one box, one thing at a time. With garbage, recycle, and give away boxes right next to me to make it easy to carry out my decisions.

It feels SO good. So freeing. I am going into the craft room for the first time in my life and SMILING rather than sighing.

I have this kind of guideline for getting rid of stuff. I get rid of:

*Things that I am saving only because someone gave them to me
*Things that I am saving only because I spent money on them.
*Things that I am saving only because I *could* do something with them, even though I haven't in at least a year
*Things that I look at and think "I have to save this". Usually this covers the previous three categories: I have to save this because so & so bought it for me.

Ahhhhhh.