Here we are. It's March, and we're about to hit the one year mark of living in a different world. For a lot, this has been a year of being at home more than ever before. For some, this has been a year of working harder than you ever imagined possible. For too many, this has been a year of unimaginable loss. For all of us, "essential …
figuring myself out
Help: How it Happens and How to Accept It
I accidentally wrote a blog post, even though I'm on my summer break. (This year is weird.) I was sharing on Instagram about some amazing and unexpected help we received decluttering our front yard, and ended up writing a whole big thing. I have big thoughts on this subject: help. I shared the first two “before” and “better” photos in a …
The Worst Decluttering Strategy Ever
Today, I’m sharing what is (in my personal-turned-professional opinion) the absolute worst decluttering strategy ever. For me. Don’t separate those two things. The thing about it being the absolute worst, and the part about it being the worst for me. I finally started making real, lasting, bigtime decluttering progress when I stopped …
Ideal Cleaning Vs Actual Cleaning
"We want this to happen organically." Organically is a word of this millennium. I know it existed pre-2000, but its meaning has enhanced over the past 20 years. Without actually looking up its definition, I think that when used in reference to food, it's supposed to mean the food has been grown without unnatural help. Without being …
Always and Never
My mother once told me (once that I remember) to stop saying always and never. Evidently, I said those words often. And incorrectly. I’m sure she made this suggestion after I told an overly dramatic story that didn’t actually meet the qualifications of always and never. Since very few things meet those qualifications. I’m 44 now, and …
Stating the Obvious
Recently, I created storage space by clearing a cabinet of things we no longer use. As I moved a box, I uncovered a printed piece of paper and had a sudden memory of this post from my first year of blogging. The post was about running across a cleaning schedule that was a handout at a moms' group I attended when my boys were babies. I found …
One Thing that’s WAY Over My Clutter Threshold
My Clutter Threshold is the point at which I have more stuff than I can handle. Or I have specific things I personally can't handle. Everyone has a Clutter Threshold and each person's threshold is different. I had a great idea recently. An idea with the noble goal of saving my still-newish couch from the teenage boys who sit on it. I bought a …
Grieving the Me I Assumed I Would Be
See that? It’s a breakfast casserole. Hot and cheesy and sausage-ey. And not typically an emotional thing. I balanced it on my lap as we drove to church on a recent Sunday morning. I took a picture because of the twinge I felt. The twinge came in a moment of grief over the woman I assumed I would be at this point in my life. I thought I …
Add This to: Things Hubby Would Never Do
I don't technically have a list called Things I Do That Hubby Would Never (Ever) Even Consider Doing. But I could. And it would be a long one. Rather than seeing these lovely differences in our personalities as problems, I try to look at them as ways to understand myself better. Here's an example: That's my coffee cup from this …
