We’ve entered into February and, as is typical for any project I take on, I’m taking longer to finish this task than I had anticipated. Though I guess you should never really stop paring down your stuff, I had hoped to power through this by giving myself a deadline because I didn’t want to lose steam or have my motivation wane as the weeks went on and it got progressively more difficult to part with my precious things. And it really did get progressively more difficult to part with my precious things.
{Side note: I wanted to insert a photo of Gollum from Lord of The Rings here…. my precious… but I just couldn’t look at him. Too scary and I don’t want self-induced nightmares}
Even though the month is over, I haven’t been able to tackle all of the ‘areas’ of my home, so I’m not bailing on this until the very end {If you’re just joining me, you can read about my adventure with self-reduction here}. I’ve still been trucking along, tackling each room and space a little at a time. Closets, drawers, toy bins, under the beds, the scary junk drawer…. no area is safe. It has taken me a while to make it into each room because I keep getting side-tracked with random jobs that must be completed that instant. Like today, when I happened to notice how yucky the inside of our dishwasher was becoming. Have you ever really looked in your dishwasher? You’re supposed to clean it occasionally, and I feel like I have to clean ours more frequently than most because our washer is probably 80 human years old. All I can say is YUCK. I gagged three times. There is a little section where the door hinges that doesn’t ever get washed by the water so it is like Fear Factor up in there! Each time it gets yucky from now on I’ll just throw the washer out and buy a new one like the good American consumer I am.
Recently I’ve been focused on Peep’s bedroom, half of which was also designated as my ‘office’ which included all my therapy materials and our personal filing cabinets. I’ve uncovered some long lost memories while going through these bins of random junk and it was straight up terrifying to get rid of my old graduate school notes. Don’t ask me why, since I haven’t referenced any of it in 6 years {thank you Lord for the internet}.
This week I said adios to:
Manuals. You guys. Don’t be like this. THOW AWAY THE MANUALS. If it makes you feel better you can check to make sure a particular manual is online before tossing the paper, but don’t harbor these space suckers.

Therapy materials. It’s hard to toss something you’ve made or something you ‘might want to reference in the future’. Guess what? That’s what the internet is for. And also my brain. I conjured up this social script for a patient of mine once before, I can do it again.

I had been harboring so many old therapy materials and books that I just can’t use anymore. It’s nice to make space for the things I actually do use.
I also purged half the contents of my linen closet. I mean, look at this ridiculously tiny closet. It’s definitely not a normal size. What is this, a closet for ants? It was pretty easy to let go of a lot of things in here because most of it was expired medicine, a crib sheet that’s lost its elasticity, six tubes of sunscreen, and fifty thousand bandaids. With all that extra junk gone I can find my essential oils with ease!

Also this week:
Charlie got ‘tired’ from shopping. What?!  #notmychild

We discovered I have an obsession with bunny slippers. Charlie decided on an interpretive dance to wish them well in their next home.

I rewarded my winning month of purging with a pretty new throw for our bed. I struggle with keeping our room clean and orderly and I think part of that is because I hate being in there. We’ve had the most horrendous dark dark teal carpet in our master bedroom since moving into this house 6 years ago. We don’t have the budget to re-carpet right now, so I’m embracing the color and bringing more teal things into the room. Loving what I put into my room will help me stay on top of clearing out the clutter; I don’t want to allow our room to continue to be the ‘spare room’ where all the random stuff goes to die. The teal throw was approved by Charlie.

Are you still going strong with paring down your stuff? Don’t quit just because January is gone. You’ll feel your burden becoming lighter with each bag of stuff you toss or donate.
Make space for the things you truly love and enjoy and are using regularly.
Xoxo,
Ashley