Week Five: More Clothes Than You Can Shake a Stick At (Reveal?)

Hangers (Photo credit: notashamed)

In spite of a few minor set-backs and miscalculations, I am fairly happy with the outcome of this week’s 4-Day Challenge project. Together, My Sweetheart and I made some real and tangible progress. Is the task 100% complete? No, but I can say with more than a little bit of relief that I now believe that the light at the end of our wardrobe/laundry/clothing tunnel is sunshine rather than a train coming down the track.

I know I am supposed to be posting a photo for you to ooh and aah over, but for the life of me I can’t seem to figure out where I put the camera down after I snapped a few progress pics. I have a sneaking suspicion that I managed to scoop it up with some of the clothes that were bound for either a drawer or the donation pile, but I am too exhausted to mount a search for it tonight. I hope you don’t mind the suspense…

In the meantime, I thought I would share an article with you that I discovered on the Etsy blog a day or two ago about the fate of donated clothing Americans drop off every year and the impact of our used clothing on the rest of the world. It’s somewhat eye-opening, especially for me, as I sift and sort my way through the ocean of fabric items that have been accumulated by my household in just 4 or 5 short months! The post just so happens to be from my favorite Etsy blogger, Chappell Ellison, so that’s an added bonus I am happy to pass along to those of you who haven’t been reading the Etsy blog.

If the statistics in Chappell’s post cause you to re-think plans you have for donating clothing no longer useful to your household, but what can you do with unwanted clothes other than drop them at the donation center? Sell them in a garage sale? Sure… but that’s not the most efficient alternative (unless you are already making plans for your next sale event). You could also refashion, reconstruct, redesign or (your preferred buzz word for recycling unwanted clothing into stylish swag here) your cast-offs. But not everyone has the inclination, time and skill to put that idea into action. Is there another option? I’m happy to tell you that not only is there another option, if you are in Dallas, there’s an option that can put some change in your pocket as well as make room in your closets! Even better, you don’t have to look any further than CraigsList to find this option.

If you have at least 10 bags of clothing, according to this ad, Charity Shoes and Clothing, LLC is interested in buying the lot from you. Check out their website here.

Another listing may be better for you if you don’t have 10 bags of clothing you no longer need. This one offers cash for your untorn and unwanted clothing items and you don’t even have to leave the house to earn it; this buyer will come to your place and buy your unwanted things. How great is that?

I haven’t yet decided the ultimate fate for all of the clothes weeded out of our closet (and laundry cycle) by this week’s challenge, but I have a feeling that I am going to exercise more than one of these newly discovered alternatives to donation drop-spots.

I’ll be sure to post the farewell photos as our rejects hit the road, but for now… Zzzzzzzzzz….

Contents Under Pressure

I have a one-year-old chihuahua named LB (“Lightning Bolt”–I’ll tell you that story another time) Wilbur III, Esquire. I adore LB to pieces and baby him way more than I should most of the time. Today, LB is being a moody little pain in the butt and growls and barks his head off at the whole family every time one of us so much as moves an inch. I have told him a dozen times or more to knock it off, but I might as well have been talking to a stump (a barking, growling stump), because when My Sweetheart came into the living room from the warehouse a little while ago LB went off like a freakin’ siren.

And so did I.

I got nose-to-nose with a (usually) sweet, little 4 pound dog and yelled my head off at him to stop it, Stop It, STOP IT! like an insane person. And I hurt the little guy’s feelings. Poor baby boy. I never even talk ugly to him, so he was totally unprepared for me to go off like that. I feel like a bad person for it.

The reason I lost my cool, I suppose, is the fact that I had been struggling over this post for–oh, I don’t know–close to an hour, maybe, and I had nothing to show for it at all. The reason I am, or was, stuck is I feel like I really have a lot to say here today and all of those thoughts are crushing up against each other trying to get out and building more and more pressure the more I try grab onto just one of those thoughts. My thought process has all the qualities of a warm, 2-liter bottle of Big Red soda that someone just dropped on the hot pavement. Not a good thing.

I was thinking about this post yesterday. The possibility that I would be blocked like I have been wasn’t even a consideration. In fact, I spent a lot of time thinking about this post and expected it to just flow right on through my fingers and into the internet then onto your screen almost effortlessly.  Just like I told you on Thursday that I was all fired up to kick the 4-day challenge meme in the patootie (yes, I said “patootie”), yesterday I was all fired up to tell you that the desk I had planned on moving out of the office for a complete surprise repurpose in another part of the warehouse had been given a stay of execution because I am not going to complete that project this week.

I know, I know… I am not doing so great with these challenges, am I? Not even a little bit.

The reason the desk is staying put is because poor prior planning promotes piss-poor performance and I had failed to take in the big picture when I posted the challenge set-up this week. Yesterday when I was ready to roll up my sleeves and get to clutter-busting the desk, I headed into the warehouse to clear the spot for the desk to start its new life as a major component in my new dressing/sewing room (construction pending). There’s no missing the big picture in the warehouse… It looked like this:

And there is no room there for my desk to find a new purpose…

So, I upgraded my challenge. This is the progress so far:

Wow! That pressure isn’t as strong as it was a little while ago. I think I will be able to get some more work done out in the warehouse before I make the next post.

Oh… And btw… I made up with my baby boy before I even made this post. I picked him up and held him close. he even rolled on his backand let me hold him like a baby and rub his tummy (a position in which he usually is pretty insecure staying for long) for as long as I wanted. But I didn’t kiss him on his cute little head, although I was quite tempted… LB does not being the recipient of kisses.

LB Wilbur III, Esquire

The 4-Day DeClutter Challenge (week 4)

If you read my response to MrsJ’s comments yesterday, you surely caught my reference to the 4-day challenge. I know that there are hoards of you hoarders out there poised and ready to shamelessly flaunt your clutter for all the world to see. I know you are all beside yourselves waiting and watching for me to publish this post so you can link the rest of us to the photos of your little corner of insanity.

I also know that after so many weeks of inactivity the likelihood that I am talking to an empty room is pretty high. Am I gonna let that get me down? You better believe it!

I joke. I joke!

I’m all fired up to kick this meme in the patootie, so here we go! (And I’m going to pick up on the week number as if we didn’t go weeks without a single round. It’s my blog… I can do that. :-D)

Instructions/Rules: (for those who would like to play along)

1. Identify an area of your life that is overrun with clutter (could be a room in your home or workshop, your desk, your car, your purse, your wallet, a drawer… Even your file folders in your computer, your email inbox or to-do list… any type of clutter that you have been trying to ignore or overlook or work around is fair game for this meme)
2. Get a photo of that clutter.
3. Post your photo on your blog or Facebook or twitter or any place you are able to share images online and give the post the same title as this thread, The 4-Day DeClutter Challenge (week 4)
4. Come back to this post and leave a comment that includes a link to the clutter photo you posted in step #3.
5. Enjoy the rest of this week and the coming weekend any way you would like, but on Monday, take another photo of the area you photographed in step #2 and post it as you did in step #3 with the same title + the word “REVEAL”
6. Come back to this blog again and keep an eye out for my REVEAL post and add a link to the post you made in step #5 in my comments.

The goal over the time between this post and the one on Monday is the de-cluttering of your featured area, but don’t forget the other goals of finding some inner and outer peace while meeting new people and having a little fun!

I guess there’s nothing left for me to say about the rules of the challenge at this point, so I guess it’s time to jump on in!

My area of clutter for week #4 is this desk: 

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This piece of furniture is a wreck in the room it is being moved from. In this space, it is a horrible catch-all that really does have just about the whole world thrown at it or on it on any given day, so it is out of here! No, not out of my life, just out of it’s current location and into a more practical place. What a relief it will be to be rid of this eye-sore in the main chillin’ zone of the entire warehouse!

Your turn!

**************************UPDATE**************************

PARTICIPATE IN THE CHALLENGE AND ENJOY A 20% DISCOUNT ON ANY ITEM IN MY ETSY SHOP. I’ll send you a coupon code when you post your entry comments.

(Special invites to play are going out to: Not Messy (that’s MrsJ), Minimalism Journey, Janeys Room and my entire team at Upcyclers. Come play with me!!!!)

Stand Up Eight

I don’t know why I let a bit of chaos derail me from this blog (again). As difficult as blogging can become when life starts throwing curve-balls, it is always harder to come back and post after a period of not posting anything at all. The diversions that turned me from the blog some three months ago have been defeated for the better part of the summer and I have been ready to post again, just not ready to bite the bullet. I think part of the avoidance has been a lack of certainty about my Etsy shop and fearing that I might find failure in that endeavor while trying to promote it here. Hopefully I have found the support solution I have been needing for the shop because I am sick and tired of not blogging and I can’t stay away any longer.

I’ve joined an Etsy group (groups are called “teams” on Etsy) and I think membership alone will help drive my shop to success. Luckily, in case I’m wrong about the placebo effect of membership, the Upcyclers team is behind me with lots of help and advice and support. Oh, and I don’t think it will hurt anything that things are going pretty smoothly on the home front and I’ve got lots of merchandise to begin posting in the shop, too. Things are lookin’ up and I am excited about the possibilities and opportunities coming my way. Can’t wait to tell you all about it and get you caught up with all that I’ve been up to!

So, enough about all that for now… What’s been going on with you?