Winter Cleaning

Yesterday was a momentuous day! You all know that we moved into a new house last November. Well, I'm sure you can relate when I say that even after putting all of our stuff in the new house, there were still boxes left unpacked filled with MORE stuff that needed to be put away. Now I'm not one to hang on to junk. I have absolutely no problem throwing un-necessary items away. My kids don't like this fact at all. Niether does Larry. I was hoping that most of the junk could be thrown away, given away or recycled, but I had Larry and Alliah to help me. The two hoarders. Those two like to keep every piece of paper, every little thing that they "might" need later on. I don't know how many times I said, "No, we don't need that...THROW it AWAY!" All afternoon I heard, "Aw...we need to keep this" and "Ohhhh, look....we gotta put this away." Nope. My theory is that if we haven't used it in the last year (six months if I could get away with it) then we don't need it. Yes, there are some sentimental things we should keep, but they can go overboard. I'm all for keeping photos and drawings the kids made at school, but rusted out barbecue forks? Toys the kids played with when they were three? A hundred pens? A phone book from 2004? Nevertheless, we got it done. The boxes were all sorted through, and everything that we kept was organized in storage bins and put away. We found clothes that WE USE in boxes that were not unpacked yet. I found all my shoes, my purses, more of Grace's clothes, extra bed sheets and more blankets. You know, the important stuff. I KNEW I had stuff missing! So I sit here so thankful that we got the job done. Next is the front yard. We've got plants to plant, grass to put in....then to our home office. It never ends!!! :D