I'm feeling a big "meh." I've had a head cold which of course doesn't help. But even if I felt better I still would rather not get out of the flannel sheets in the morning, and in the evening I feel like going on a kitchen strike. (Why do these people want to eat every day?!)
While I'm always relieved when the holidays are over, I seem to be struggling through a case of the winter blahs.
This is the time of year when most bloggers are reviewing the past year and thinking about goals for the twelve months ahead. But I can't seem to think past my next cup of coffee (that would be cream no sugar, please).
What I'm trying to say is that this is a bad time to talk about planning or organizing, and yet I seem determined to muddle through.
Because muddle is the operative word. A household of four kids and a working single mom never runs super-smoothly at the best of times, and there are just days where my life's not only not magazine pretty, it's sort of a ghastly storm system of shoes, dishes, sheet music, and homework papers that hovers over the household the entire week.
I'm not a naturally neat person, I know (my sister got that gene). And most of the time I consider that to be okay. There's always something I'd rather be doing than cleaning house. Who wouldn't?
That said, the clutter builds up to a point that I am tempted to endorse a simple two-step organization plan:
1. Prop open back door
2. Throw annoying shit out of it.
Doesn't that feel good, just thinking about it?
I don't think our family is any more consumerist than the next American family, which I realize isn't saying much. We live in an incredibly wasteful society. I like to think we are less so. But even with all the best efforts, with four children there is a constant downstream flow of outgrown clothing (this, especially), outgrown books, outgrown toys. And with a house that's got ongoing renovation projects, there's also a lot of building/redecorating refuse. I'd like to get a better handle on this, without resorting to my previously described 2-step system.
Gosh. That sounded like a goal, doesn't it? (It's not a resolution, though. I don't possess the backbone for those.)
I've been heading in that direction for awhile already, like this day in early November where I temporarily destroyed the twins' bedroom in a big clothing weed-out:
Or the items, including an end table, glassware, and artwork, I consigned to a shop in October:
I still liked this, but it just didn't "fit" in my current house or decor plan. Time to let someone else love it.
It's a big relief to move things out the door, whether they are going to consignment, charity, or the curb.
And I want more of the kind of relief I felt getting all this crap out of my garage:
Pitching the clutter makes the remaining items much easier to live with, as I discovered with the hall closet organization that took place earlier last year.
I'd just like to do more of it, and when I'm not in the throes of a tantrum of irritation like I was with the closet.
I'm not sure what form "manage clutter better" will take this year, yet, I just know that the results are worth shooting for, whether it's a cleaner closet, fewer possessions, a more smoothly operating household, or all three.
What have you got on your plate for 2015?