Tuesday, April 28, 2009

More Room - Less Stuff

We live in a townhouse. A townhouse built in 1974. It was pretty progressive for its time. Three floors, open stairwell (stair with treads, no risers, which the cats adore!), 4 bedrooms, 3 1/2 baths. But not a lot of useful storage space. My last house had two huge storage closets, a pantry, a garage, and a storage shed. Can you tell I miss them?

Now you would think that this should be enough space for a family of four. And in reality it is. But I do have some horrid pack rat tendencies that I come by genetically. In the 20 years we moved around courtesy of the US Army, I managed to tame my tendencies. I'd have a massive "we're moving, time to get rid of the unnecessary stuff" garage sale, donate, and throw out adventure.

I've continued to donate and sell since moving here. Freecycle, craigslist, and the Salvation Army are my friends.

But somehow it seems like there's always just a little bit too much stuff. Right now I'm fighting the battle of soon to move out college kids who might need X, Y, or Z when setting up their first apartments. My children have the same pack rat tendencies. My husband - not so much - but his complications are paperwork that he never looks at again, magazines, and electronics.

I did make my way through the laundry/storage room yesterday. I can see the floor! And there's room to dance. But there's more to do in there as we're going to purchase a larger tool chest and ditch the two smaller things we have. And then I can move the washer and dryer and finish painting the walls. Not too much to accomplish.

Someone is coming to take away the kegerator, with luck, this week. That will help when it comes to reorganizing the bar. (It came with the house. Both the bar and the kegerator.) Not that I don't like beer. I do. But the two of us don't need a keg at a time.

I may call the Salvation Army today for a pick up. I've got two IKEA chairs that no one on craigslist seems to want to purchase, along with a student desk and a nightstand.

Then I can continue organizing my stitching and crafts supplies.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

We moved 7 times in 7 years courtesy of the Navy. Bleah. I found it easier to purge as I was unpacking rather than trying to do it before hand, since I had to touch everything and find room for it as we unpacked. Until we remodeled here in DC, we had a microwave cart that we only needed in every other place we lived. I hated storing it during the times we didn't need it, but I was too cheap to plan to buy a new one for the next place.

I too come from a family of packrats.

Angela said...

Good luck with the clearout. When my husband first moved in he brought a ton of stuff with him that he apparantly couldn't live without. After a few years gathering dust in the loft he finally got rid of it all.

Like you I moved around a lot because of the RAF and found it a very useful way of preventing an accumulation of junk.

Good luck with the children moving out to college, my daughter is just about to finish college and will be moving back home with far more stuff than she left with. The only good point about that was she had to clear out her bedroom when she was home for Easter or she wouldn't fit into it when she returns in the summer.