Ten square feet of a clean slate....

Real life returns. We are home from our weekend-away adventures. The kids have returned to school after a four-day hiatus. Valentines Day has come and gone.


All these things add up to a clean slate, as all projects and plans have been completed (V-day and preparing for our road trip being my biggest time suckers in the past 2 weeks), and now I am looking for a project.



That would be our disorganized house. Oh, right.


My drawers, cupboards, closets and storage spaces in general are about to burst with all of the loveliness that I have shoved in there over the years, to give the appearance of order and cleanliness. Which is completely ridiculous, because who among you doesn't know that I am a complete mess?



And let's not kid ourselves here...when I say "organizing" and "project", I really mean cleaning one closet. Maybe two. I cannot handle doing a whole house--and I honestly believe that if I did so, I would fail to exist. I can only throw out so much without feeling as if my entire soul was being ripped from me, memory by memory.


So, today was the boy's closet/changing room. This is a small room/closet that was a general baby catch-all, but let's face it, there are no "babies" left here. No need for a Baby Bjorn (still conveniently hanging in the closet, in case I want to strap 30 extra pounds of Little J on), baby monitors are obsolete (they can scream loud enough now), receiving blankets cover their feet/shins only and I haven't carried a diaper bag since 2004. Yes, I do still have kids in diapers (thank you for reminding me), but we prefer to wing it these days or simply carry ONE diaper on errands (minus the creams, shampoos, nail clippers, band-aids, aspirator, brush, comb and tylenol I once stocked). I used to think Super Mommy was prepared....I now know that this superhero is capable of bathing/changing/clothing a child with grocery bags, spit and paper towels.


Here are some interesting finds:



Shoe inserts...BUT WHERE ARE THE SHOES??? Big J & L have worn orthodic splints in their shoes since their wee-NICU days. They slide nicely into regular tennies, but have to have their insoles removed. Have the insoles, but not the actual footwear. Keep or save?



Knit caps. These puppies were all the rage in the NICU, and our nurses would snag them every time a new batch arrived. Perspective may be lacking in these photos, but they are the tiniest caps you have ever seen, capable of covering 2 pound-baby heads. No way, not parting with them...but wanted you to see the stash we've got.


The Little J stool. Okay, so you now officially know his name, but I don't care, because the letter pieces of this stool have not been reunited in years. I had to dig under furniture and into toy bins to make it happen. A reunion much like New Kids on the Block, only cheaper for me.


Looks pretty good, right? Let me remind you that all of our kid's clothes are in the basement (see this post). So, what we have here is a real hodge-podge of stuff. Mostly too small. Some too big. Long story short...I am just ignoring it, because I am so not in the mood to track down the 12-18 month toddler boy box located in some other horribly unorganized storage space in the house.




And this. I just don't know what to do with this. So for now, I have closed it and plan on ignoring it until I have a better plan. The little stuff kills me. There are at least 10 kinds of diaper cream in here (the results of our search for the one that keeps butts from bleeding). And then there are the travel-sized everythings. Lotions. Q-tips...aren't those illegal now, anyway? And then baby powder, which I can honestly say I have never once used. Ever...but I have 3 bottles of various sizes.

So, I got most of it organized, but FYI, that means it was reboxed and placed in the storage space off of my closet/over our garage. The place where crap goes to die. Just kidding (kind of), but it is a large unfinished (and hidden) space where I store old baby/maternity clothes, luggage, and general baby gear that is past its day with my kids....but that I'm unready to part with! You never know when Dieter Denckhoff will join our crew of kids (REALLY just kidding about the name Dieter...that kid would only listen to German techno-music, dress in black and be a Saturday Night Live Sprocket).

How do you organized people do it??? Don't you have to completely gut your house every couple of years to keep it clutter free? Over here, it seems like we throw away 1 box of junk for ever 100 boxes that enters.

Share your secrets, people.