I spent the majority of the day in Caitlin's room, cleaning it out.
OH
MY
GOD!
That child has a lot of stuff!
I threw out 3 bags of trash, plus 4 assorted shoe boxes. That wasn't even dealing with broken toys (she's been really good about that, actually) or outgrown clothing - just trash! She is prolific with the cutting and pasting of the paper and the drawing and the making of random objects from other objects. It all had to go. I'm glad she wasn't here while I was doing it, otherwise I'd have had to justify throwing out 20 tubes of black construction paper "telescopes" that she'd made. Why? Because she's five!
I have organized the hell out of the jewelry making gear, Barbies, Calico Critters (we have boatloads!), stuffed animals and assorted other tiny little bits. The best part? It's guaranteed to remain clean for at least 3 days!
Until she gets back from camp, at any rate.
She had stuff jammed in the corner and jammed in the bottom of her closet. I still haven't gone through her clothes to get rid of all of the winter stuff yet, but I'll get to that tomorrow. I have come to the conclusion that the child is a packrat and that she comes by it honestly. Her parents are packrats and her grandparents are packrats. The Packing Away of The Stuff is the natural condition. I'd kind of hoped she'd miss that gene sequence, but it must be attached to the Unnatural Fondness for Reading sequence. Oy!
On the bright side, after going through her room, I'm now motivated to go through mine! Yes, I know, teaching by example. Unfortunately, this teacher is tired!
Oh and I now know how I want to decorate the nursery. Bright yellow on 2 walls, bright green on the other two, deep blue on the ceiling with yellow stars (paint stamps), moons and spaceships, deep blue and deep purple stamps of I-don't-know-what-yet across the yellow and green walls in a wavy diagonal-ish line. And a new fan, probably in white. Confused? Trust me! It will be cool! Tomorrow Eric will be working on cleaning out the closet in that room.
Let the nesting begin!
Update: I spent another 2 hours in there today (Thursday) going through her winter/summer/too small clothes. Now I'm done! Yay! Room for summer clothing! Oh and then I fell off a stepstool (Only 1 foot high. Whaaat?) onto a small cardboard toybox, crushing it somewhat and breaking my fall on my left side. I think I'm fine....
Oh and of course I'll do before and after pictures on the new nursery. Would I leave you out of the process? Never!
4 comments:
I hope you post some pictures of the nursery when it is finished it sounds great!
I was so glad to hear that I am not the only mother whose child has difficulty determining the difference between trash and...well not trash. We recently cleaned out both kids rooms and while I usually send the kids off somewhere for this type of purging I did not have that luxury this time. It was extremely painful for both of us, and I don't plan to repeat the experience.
yes before and after pics would've been nice!
It's scary how emotionally attached they can be to the telescope they created 2 weeks ago, that has been stuffed down the back of their closet, that they had no interest in, until you went to throw it out.
Argh!
You make me feel better too, that it's not just Caitlin. I highly recommend the week away with Grammy to get some serious purging done!
Before and after of the new nursery or of Caitlin's pit?
Too late on the pit, but I will do before and after on the nursery! Never fear!
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