It was whatever killed all those people in "The Stand".

I spent the whole weekend sick in bed. The best thing I can say about it was that THANK GOD the worst was on a weekend when Kevin was home. Publicly I'd like to acknowledge my husband as the domestic rock God that he is - he did two birthday parties, dishes, even weatherstripped our drafty back door. [At one point I was begging him to use the drill to open up pressure holes in my face, but he declined.]

The three of them ate Kix all weekend and are filthy, but WHO CARES. I was in bed watching back to back episodes of "Shahs of Sunset" in my feverish stupor. I could not have done it without that man.

Today is a school holiday, so we can stay at home and I can recover for one more day. My husband, I'm sure, is happy to be headed back to the relative calm of the office, where no one is shouting "But I had it FIRST". Presumably. You never know with lawyers.

My house! I have not updated on my house in way too long. Everything that could be accomplished on our list without using the driveway and yard has been done. I walk from room to room and just wonder where all the extra space came from. There will always be trouble zones where things accumulate, but I'm just so damn proud of us. I really have to acknowledge Stephanie again for providing the list that I worked from. It was simple and effective and broke everything down perfectly for my ADHD brain.

I still want my multi-level home addition, but I can honestly say that without all the extra clutter, I have a vision for how we can make this house work for us in the here and now. I thought I'd take a minute to outline my goals for the next part of my home project - maintaining the glory.

1] Springtime clean out of the garage and basement.
2] Yard sale - whatever does not sell will be dropped off at Goodwill later that day.
3] Redo kids rooms to make them more practical - bunk beds for Vans room and a trundle for Scarlett. Remove extra furniture and sell. Purchase book shelf "slings" for each of their rooms.
4] New furniture for our bedroom that can provide more storage. The old set is beautiful, but inconvenient to say the least. I'd like to sell them and purchase something more practical. Reevaluate our furniture placement and try to maximize space.
5] Redo the art and photos on our walls to make the space seem more finished and decorated.

It's good to have goals.

Toys, Day 1.

Yesterday I spent most of my morning emptying our downstairs toy bins, sorting the contents, returning lost things to their rightful places and discarding broken and mismatched items. I placed some things into a bag for my daughter to go through to decide what she would like to donate, and managed to get all of the trains and tracks happily organized in their own drawers.

I stood back and looked at my work and beamed.

Then my kids got home from school. Dammit.

That was Toys, Day 1. Toys, Day 2 has to wait until tomorrow because today I get to go on a preschool field trip [What a joke that is. I'm expected to drive my child to the site, lose a morning of productivity, AND pay for it. Yay.] The best part is that we will be spending this wintry morning stomping through the woods learning how to tap maple trees.

Did I mention that my son does not like maple syrup? Yes. This will be fun.

Michael's - you complete me. [But don't tell Target, she's a jealous freak.]

I'll let you in on something that no one told me. Kids come with a shit-ton of crafting supplies. Doesn't matter how you resist, you will end up with the Michael's app on your phone, and you WILL get excited when you see a coupon pop up for 25% off your total order.

The craft slash art box had become unmanageable, and had taken up residence on top of a cabinet in the dining room, and I could only really grab the supplies on top. Yesterday the entire bin was emptied and sorted, then all of the crafting supplies were replaced. The art supplies are going to have to find a new container, but they will both be lidded and accessible to children who PROMISE to replace everything when they are done creating.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH.

*whew* Sometimes you just need a good laugh, you know?

I'm slowing down on the list now. There are two major indoor items left to be tackled - the linen closet and the kids toys. I'm looking forward to both, but the former really needs a time while the kids are occupied downstairs with their dad, and the toys need to be done on a morning when both of them are at school. While my daughter is not particularly attached to toys, my son would gladly go to his grave clutching a broken piece of McDonald's Happy Meal crap. He would paint his face blue and scream "You will never take our Victorious hair brush/microphone with the peeling stickers!"

The remainder of the list encompasses the basement and the garage, two places that Kevin and I have agreed that we need to tackle together. At the moment, the wind chill outside is about negative a billion, so I'm willing to give a pass on nagging about the garage for now. FOR NOW.

But she was very excited to wear underpants.

The good news:

The cast is off!

The bad news:

No weight bearing for another 3 weeks.

The good news:

They fitted her for a walker!

The bad news:

She looks drunk when she uses it.

Speaking of, I'm seriously considering taking up alcoholism as a hobby. You know, I sew, I read, I drink. Somehow I suspect the possibility of this no weight bearing rule wasn't mentioned on purpose, because first rule of pediatrics: TRY NOT TO FREAK OUT THE PARENTS. No weight bearing for a 6 year old. Ha.

[Best part of the day yesterday; the techs asked my daughter if she wanted to keep the cast. She said "I don't want to see it, ever again." Amen, sister.]

This time around, she can tell you exactly what she thinks of the cast. Also, we will be doing theatre camp this year.

Bad news. No Hoffa.

Coat closet, done. For someone who claims she hates wearing coats, I sure do own a lot of them. Some went off to the Snooty Fox, the others headed out for donation. You no longer have to live in fear of something falling on your head if you wish to approach the only closet downstairs.

Speaking of consigning things, did you know it takes longer than one week to get people to buy your crap? Me too. I certainly haven't called 3 times.

I'm now one day behind, but all is good. As long as I continue to purge, I am calling it a win. My house will never be a show room, because for every 10 items I remove from my house, I figure at least 2 work their way back in. [Dammit, you children, and your never empty backpacks.] I've developed a smaller goal as I've worked through the list, that for the time being, all I'm purchasing are consumables. But at the end of the 40 days, we should be free of so many things that were just taking up space in our lives.

Jesus, I sound like a hippie. While I recognize the importance of what we are accomplishing in this house, part of me would like to just go to Nordstroms and buy some shoes.

If I knew I was going to find THAT I would have started this years ago.

Cleaned out the big bathroom yesterday. I have been showering with a headless Ariel doll for so long that it doesn't even bother me anymore. Poor Ariel. She just wanted feet and my kids mistook her for Marie Antoinette.

I cleared out a full trash bag of half empty lotions, deodorants, busted hair ties, and icky bath toys. My shelves are functional again. I'm keeping a mental list of my favorite items that are being unearthed as I do this, and yesterday's grab was two sample bottles of La Mer skin products. I haven't shopped at a store that even SELLS La Mer since before Van was born, and unless Target strikes a deal for french cosmetics anytime soon, I'm going to have to savor these little beauties.

Just past the halfway point in this project I have an observation. I'm working upstairs at the moment, and I find that if I let my guard down, the first floor of the house quickly gets overrun again. I realize that the goal of this is rid my home of upwards of 400 items, freeing us from being owned by our stuff. And I love that parts of my house are so much more relaxing - but when you have a busy family of 4 [or 3, or 6, or whatever] things come back into your life very quickly. I really do not want to feel like I've made this colossal effort only to look around in 3 months and wonder where all my lovely surfaces went.

I originally started this post on Tuesday, but unfortunately we had some health issues crop up in my family, and for the first time I had to skip a day while I helped out. Everyone is going to be just fine, and I will hopefully return to my list tomorrow. I have to clean out our main coat closet, and I'm actually a little excited. I expect to find Hoffa. -L.