Getting the Garbage Out and Enjoying New Life

Each year our family comes up with something we'd like as a focus for the year. Last year it was reducing screen time. We probably could have done better with that one but we did make improvements.

This year we have decided that our focus will be "Getting the Garbage Out and Enjoying New Life". I tend to be somewhat of a packrat, it's something that I've struggled with my entire life. Fortunately, I married someone who doesn't keep a lot of things. Unfortunately, he is often stressed by the amount of clutter that builds up in our home.

Over the past couple years I've made a few realizations. One major one is that the less stuff I have, the less time it takes for me to take care of it. Basically, if I get rid of half of the things I own, I'll have half the amount of work to do to keep the house in order. Another realization is that I have so much stuff (particularly craft stuff) that I end up not doing anything with it. It's too overwhelming to find what I need for a particular craft so I don't even bother. If I had less stuff, I would probably do more. The other one I want to mention is that the homes I like to visit the most are the ones that aren't cluttered. Why are they not cluttered? Because they don't have a lot of things to make it cluttered.

Having made these realizations I'm now much more mentally prepared to tackle our home and get rid of the things I no longer need/want. I actually started a few months ago by simply not adding anything to our already full house. I cut out pretty much all expenses except for food. I even bought very few (and well thought out) items for Christmas. I figure that the first step for getting rid of the junk is to stop the inflow. Now it's time to increase the outflow.

One of my motivations for getting this done now has to do with the "Enjoying New Life" part of our focus. In a few short months we will be welcoming our fourth child to our family. I want to be able to welcome our new baby into a home where we can all relax. I want to spend my time with my new baby, not with my clutter.

So I know what I want to do and why I want to do it. Now it's just figuring out how to do it, that's the tricky part. Over the next few days I'll be outlining my plan. Part of the reason for starting this blog is simply to keep me accountable. It will also help me to see what seems to be working and what isn't working. So, wish me luck!