Oh, the layers of procrastination that exist in this project.
First, I received a lovely set of glasses for Christmas.
In 2012.
They were beautiful, appreciated, and perfect.
And they sat in the bottom of my kitchen pantry for the next eight months . . .
In the box.
Even though I was glad to have them, there was the whole matter of washing them.
Which meant an extra load of dishes!?!?!?
And putting them away.
Which meant decluttering my cabinet of all my mismatched (and totally lame) cups and glasses so there would actually be room?!?!?
Oh my. It was like the Perfect Procrastination Storm.
Then, over the summer, while I was on my blogging break, I made some of the world’s greatest cinnamon toast for my kids. They declared I MUST blog about it so children all over the world could enjoy it too. The picture was a little bleh, so I pulled out a single clear glass from the box, hand-washed it and filled it with milk to make the photo more interesting.
Once that glass was in the rotation, I saw that it immediately became a fought-over family favorite. Everyone loved drinking from the fancy (totally plain) glass cup, sans comic book characters.
It just felt . . . couth. (Evidently, couth is not a word, even though uncouth is. Whatever, Webster. I’m usin’ it.)
So on the first day of school, as I was back to blogging and getting my house under control, I ran that single extra load of dishes and washed ALL of the glasses. And made a webisode. Which I just edited last weekend. Which was mid-October.
Click here if you can’t see the video.
Anyway, it’s done. We’ve been drinking out of fancy-schmancy glasses for almost two months now and life is good. We don’t miss our plastic cups, even the ones that caused Hubby to narrow his eyes at me when he saw them sitting in the donate box.
Yes. We even got rid of our Disney cups. Wonderful memories, not-so-wonderful cups.
I accepted that they were the LAST cups we ever used. And the handles made them unstackable and difficult to store.
And that was basically how this project went. Overall, I followed my One In One Out rule. There simply was not enough room for us to have a full set of grown-up glasses and keep our hodge-podge of random cups. Pre-blog, I would have thought this meant we needed another cabinet. (Maybe a full-kitchen remodel.) Now I know it’s okay to part with a Hulk Hogan cup from the 80s. (No matter how much I love it.)
I used the box the grown-up glasses came in to safely pack up the glass glasses were donating. The plastic ones got piled on top.
And there is the after picture. Yes. I kept a few favorite plastic cups and I’m glad. My ice melts too quickly in the glasses.
Yea! Looks great. I’d like to use real, big-people glasses, but my husband is the epitome of the phrase “this is why we can’t have nice things” so the plastic stays. Ah well.
Um… That Hulk Hogan cup is AWESOME. I want to give one to my brother. Are you telling me you didn’t hold on to it so that you could still “Take your vitamins, say your prayers, and be a Hulkamaniac”?! (I’ve just shown my age group. Lol)
Love that you were able to get rid of all of the mismatched glasses, especially the tall mug kind. I hate those cups. They might be handy for traveling, but they’re a major pain to wash and find room for.
I would love to have grownup glasses again, and might actually have a set in the two cupboards that are too high for me to reach without a stool (the cupboards I haven’t seen the inside of since moving into the house almost six years ago), but my family has a knack for breaking anything made of glass. They can even break Corelle. Maybe someday though.
Since I know you’re super busy, when do you find time to this kind of stuff?? I’ve been watching your webisodes recently and have gotten quite inspired to tackle my master bedroom. But with three little ones still at home while three others are at school, after my daily chores it’s always time to pick everyone up :/ I feel like I’m just treading water
Since I know you’re super busy, when do you find time to this kind of stuff?? I’ve been watching your webisodes recently and have gotten quite inspired to tackle my master bedroom. But with three little ones still at home while three others are at school, after my daily chores it’s always time to pick everyone up :/ I feel like I’m just treading water. By the way, I’m still nursing which is when I watch and read your stuff 😉
Ooops I’m so sorry, I don’t even know how I did that 🙁 ↑↑↑↑
Honestly, most of my decluttering projects (unlike my master bedroom saga) take me around 15-30 minutes. I have the extra motivation of needing something to write about, but I’m constantly amazed at how much progress can be made in such a short time as long as I’m following my take-it-there-right-now rule and the visibility rule.
I actually have my plastic coffee mugs stored in my office area… LOL… yeah most of them are going to go too… two huge ones were given from FIL to my kids… they are huge plastic ice mugs from when my MIL was in the hospital… I guess he had a connection to them and thought it would be fun for the kids. I thought it was weird to say the least. MIL died from lung cancer around 2007… we received the cups this last spring (I think it was spring). They are used and it just doesn’t seem right to me so I hid them. If he asks for them someday I will just tell him I don’t know where they went. I’m starting to feel bad for people that hold on to things like this. Is that normal???
Oh and we seem to break glasses easily… so we accumulate these plastic cups as we go along through out the year… now I clean the plastic cups out when we buy new glasses. I have extra mugs that I cycle through too… holiday etc… I’m starting to donate the ones I really don’t love. But my bought me extra for my set and I think I will put them away with my holiday mugs…so when I break one I can bring one down…but this way I will have more room in my cupboard for things I use daily. Thanks for the inspiration.
Oh man, that Hulk Hogan glass was great. I would have kept it and repurposed it to hold pens & pencils. I have a planet of the apes cups that I use that way.
I have a set of those blue cups from walmart. They are actually my favorite. I’m avoiding being a grown up and boxed up all my glass cups and just keep plastic for now. It is all organized though.
They are beautiful! But like some others writing, we can’t do glass because our kids will break them.
I love how this decluttering task came out! You are more of a hero than the Hulk! My hubby and I are a bit of a slobs by nature, so we became minimalists. We used a gift set of glass cups to determine how many would be needed full time. After a year of adult guests breaking them (never the kids!?), we determined that we needed 8 tall glasses and 8 smaller ones. Now, we get ours from IKEA, because when one breaks, it’s easy and cheap to replace from their open stock. Even as minimalists, things do get out of hand in the plastic cup department. Like why do we have 24 sippy cups and 3 lids??? You’ve inspired me to recycle those colorful cups that my “slob vision” (to quote your most perfect term!) has overlooked.
woo hoo!!! what an exciting milestone!!! and I do love the ‘Nony Pink’ color reflecting back at us, so cheerful. Off to view your webisode now, I’ve missed them!
I about gasped when you pulled out the Christmas cups that all the green and red dots are missing from. Sadly, they are part of my cup collection. They look horrible and are getting white spots on them. ugh. this must be a sign to throw them out. Although I have a 3 year old and me and my middle son are both clumsy so we will not be getting nice glass ones. The colored coke glasses from mickey d’s will have to do for now. Enjoy your blog! Cassandra in FL
O my gosh…that’s exactly what my cupboards used to look like until my kids were in their late teens! LOL Noo excuse by then to not use “grown up” glasses! Now, I’m sharing a house with my daughter, her husband and my granddaughter who is 6 and they own maybe 2 “grown up” glasses but actually USE only the plastic! LOL And by the way…you are HILARIOUS! I came across your blog via a post that a friend of mine shared. It’s definitely worth more reading! =) I should get my husband to read it as well…he is a clutter-holic!! I once vowed to never pick up his clutter again and in a week, could no longer find any clean counter, let alone floor! I think he does it just to make me crazy! =P
But again, great blog/vlog and I look forward to reading and watching more.
I started using big perso. Glasses and plates a couple years ago I have kept two smaller plastic cups for visiting little ones ..but I used our travel mugs corelleware and extra silver ware in our camper! Your posts are inspiring me one project ar a time!! Also for the spots on glasses as we have reallu hard water I use a bleach tablet (I get them at walmart ) in the dishwasher ..no more build up or white spots!
After reading so many of your articles and listening to your podcast I realized that I am you and you are me. I do all the same things.