One of the benefits of living in my old house is the huge attic. It runs the length of the house and provides oodles and oodles of storage space. A blessing and a curse.
Being a frugal Yankee I am a firm believer in hand-me-downs. In my perfect world all I would have to do is walk up into my attic, locate the bin labeled "girls winter size 4/5". If I were a perfect person. A neat freak. Which I am not.
The clothes are in bins but are not labeled which means I have to route through them and read the faded tags.
Add to that the fact the my children have taken to throwing any clothes that no longer fit up into the attic. Neatly folded? NO! They walk halfway up the attic stairs and heave them in the general direction of the floor.
Once a year I ascend into the chaos and attempt to put it to rights. It is one of my least favorite chores. The attic is either hot and stuffy or cold and drafty. The lighting is poor. And without fail I bash my head on the eves at least twice during my labors.
I spent three hours up there today. Will someone tell my how I have ended up with 11 mittens that don't have mates? Socks I can understand. The dryer eats them. But mittens? Do you think the kids will mind mismatched mittens? Me neither.
And how in all that is holy did I end up with 19 pairs of sneakers, 12 pairs of rain boots and 7 pairs of snow boots? Never mind the sandals and "dress up shoes". My Yankee frugality has come back to bite me on the butt.
Tomorrow I plan to get real and create a mountain of things for Goodwill. Keeping items of clothing and footwear for younger sibs is all well and good. Keeping everything forever leads to madness.
If you don't hear from me again...send help. I'll be the gibbering fool sitting in the middle of a pile of children's clothing....
Monday, August 28, 2006
An Attic Day
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9 comments:
Ziplock makes a plastic bag that serves as a clear heavy storage bag. I label it, shove it in the closet, and toss whatever doesn't fit right into the bag. It saves me from dredging up the stairs and pulling down the bin only to push it back up into the attic on our rickety old ladder. It works better for me then a bin because bins take up so much space. This method would leave you with large bags to sort out, but much easier then reading tags.
This gave me a good chuckle! Thanks. I have a basement full of such things, only they belong to my daughter, because she doesn't have space in her house (3 doors down). She was down there Sunday trying to find clothes for the kiddoes to wear, because it turned from summer to fall all of a sudden! My husband is not happy about their stuff being in our space, but oh, well!
The bags are 2 ft by 1.7 ft. I fit all of her 18 month winter clothes in one, but your kids are a lot larger then mine.
That does not sound like a fun chore. You could probably keep the kids busy, though, by offering cash for finding the missing mittens!
I do believe household stuff as well as clothing has babies without our knowledge. I too try my best to keep things trimmed down, but sometimes...and I don't know how...they multiply on me.
And, then there are the things that you CANNOT throw out - the toys that someone made by hand, the dealy loved (and worn) books, the clothes that were knitted/sewn by you or someone close to you. They simply cannot be given to Goodwill -- and so they multiply. I Like tallgirl's suggestion. I might venture into the basement and try sorting plastic bags into bins!
However I noticed a lack of discussion of wine or chocolate in this post. Are you not telling or not indulging?
As a self-proclaimed neat freak, I am proud of you for giving it a shot. I don't like organizing stuff - I am just driven, constantly, to do it. My daughter, on the other hand, is a great fan of "heaving in the general direction," as you say. Her closet is a nightmare. She frequently warns me not to even look in there (and usually, I obey - because it makes me want to cry).
I don't have an attic or a basement, so I have to make do with the limited shelving at the tops of closets. I suppose this helps keep the baffling multiplication of household objects and clothing to a minimum. It has nowhere to hide!
I have one suggestion, though. Keep a goodwill box or bag (or space on the attic floor, lol), where you guys can immediately put stuff that you know you'll never use again. (I run by the goodwill every month or so, and drop off a grocery bag or two of stuff.)
Good luck! Wish I was closer - I could help you sort, and then we could get to the wine and chocolate Linda mentioned...
Good luck. You are funny. If I had an attic, I am sure that is what it would look like!
Lisa
Lots and lots of good ideas offered here. I LOVE the big Ziploc bags,they are awesome. And you can see through them so that makes the whole-where-in-the-hell-did-I-put-those-jeans-Trent-grew-out-of job that much easier. And I also keep a box for Goodwill at the ready, that way as I am folding clean clothes and see something that resembles a speedo while my boys are wearing it I can just dump it in the Goodwill box and we're good to go. :)
Wine and choclate?!?! Where do i sign up??
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