My Laundry Room has a wonderful feature.
It’s called a door.
A solid one. And it closes.
I use this feature all the time. Doorbell ringing soon? Throw it in the Laundry Room. Not sure where that goes? Throw it in the Laundry Room.
Know I’ll use that someday but just don’t have time to deal with it right now??? Throw that sucker in the LAUNDRY ROOM, baby!!
Here are a few things I found in the most recent excavation:
A carbon monoxide detector. I grabbed this at Costco when they were on sale. I intended to get a new smoke detector, but when I saw these, the thing that happens to me a lot happened. A headline went through my brain.
“Mom is too cheap to buy a carbon monoxide detector even when they were on SALE just weeks before entire family (and their dog) die of carbon monoxide poisoning.”
Carbon monoxide poisoning is serious. I spent the money and felt better about myself. I hadn’t given in to my tendency to not buy things we really really need because I’m ridiculously frugal/cheap.
I did, however, give in to my tendency to throw things in the laundry room instead of taking the time to rip open a difficult-to-rip-open package.
Money.
Yay for laundry money. Double yay for five whole dollars of laundry money.
An outgrown, hole-ey gymnastics leotard.
We paid a LOT of money for that thing, y’all. When you have to get a certain one, you CAN’T be frugal. I’m pretty sure the expense was the reason I made my daughter keep wearing it after she randomly snipped a hole in the front while cutting something.
And I’m pretty sure the expense was the reason I didn’t throw it away once it was outgrown and no longer needed (since we’d stopped gymnastics).
And I didn’t stick it in the Donate Box because it had a hole in it.
It’s a vicious cycle.
So I threw it away.
And last, but not least (definitely not least), my long-lost iPad.
I’m guessing I was listening to podcasts (<– linking to my own even though I don’t just listen to my own!) while folding laundry straight out of the dryer and it slid down and under and such. Thankfully, it was unharmed.
(Unharmed when I found it. It was soon dropped and very much harmed after that photo was taken.)
What have you unearthed lately?
You DON’T want to know! an OPEN bottle of Coke that had rolled under the couch (courtesy of my hubs that had fallen asleep), my wide magic marker that got buried on the kitchen island, and 32 cents under the same couch with the Coke.
What WANT to find is my planner – yes, that calendar that contains my LIFE. It’s got to be around here somewhere, right?!
I just finished reading your blog from Day 1. I feel bereft at the completion of my free time project. My slob brain is rebelling at the thought I have to make reading your blog a… a… ROUTINE! Sigh. Grumble. Sputter.
This makes me so happy! But also sad for you, as I KNOW that rebellion struggle!
Better yet, I hope the brain tells you to implement some of these strategies. Because just reading the blog won’t clean the house or declutter it. Sad, but true.
You definitely want to get that carbon monoxide detector up. That’s nothing to mess around with because the odds are better than good you won’t know it’s a problem until it’s too late. But for the grace of God, we’d have been one of those statistics.
About fifteen years ago, my kids and I had been feeling kind of sick for a few days, but it was cold and flu season in Michigan so I didn’t think much of it. Around that same time, I had to schedule an appointment with the power company to update the meter and they would need to get into the basement to rewire something. So I chose the first of three available dates. When the technician got there, he shut the furnace off within minutes and told me to open ALL of the windows. In 30 degree weather? Yeah. He said if I’d chosen either of the other two dates, we’d probably all have been dead. Can we say miracle? A detector was put up that same day, along with the furnace being fixed. The scariest thing – other than finding out we’d been that close to dying – is that after having the windows open for a couple of hours, there were still detectable levels of carbon monoxide six feet off the floor (which is where we were advised to hang the detector).
Now we own a house that’s all electric. While I don’t like the heating bills at all, I’m glad we don’t have to worry about anything like that happening again.
That is so scary! I’m so glad you all are safe, and that you got it taken care of right away!
Thank you. And yes, it was terrifying. I’ve never forgotten it. There was a family of six who lived not too far from us. They all died of carbon monoxide poisoning in February. Stories like that always, always make me grateful that I chose that first appointment.
Praise God that you were all ok. It is a miracle that you scheduled that appointment just in time. Little blessings in the right circumstances can have MAJOR outcomes! A lesson to all of us to have carbon monoxide detectors and to DOUBLE check batteries on a regular basis. I am off to check them my detectors now.
And I’ve learned that regardless of whether the batteries work, the gadget needs to be replaced every 10 years. Perhaps that should be part of the package warning.
I went through a big pile of papers that had been sitting on my “mail” table (or underneath it) for about two years, and found two (two!) checks to me that hadn’t been cashed. For a total of more than $400! Fortunately, they weren’t expired yet.
I had lost my little handy bag that I keep my ear buds and phone charger type things in. It was lost for a year. I found it under ….correction, my DAUGHTER found it under…a pile up papers next to my genealogy desk. oops. But also, OhhhhhhHHHHHhhhhhhh!