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Wednesday, August 31, 2011

38. Re-arrange/ re-decorate my bedroom, or Anti- Nesting? Cleaning?

Since Mac's left for college, I've become a freak about a cleaning project. The attic that Mac and I shared was full of our stuff, huge piles of my parent's stuff, piles of my Bro's stuff, and then stuff that no one would claim so I guess it was piles of strangers' stuff. When I moved in the attic didn't look to bad except the closet was a catch all for... everything. And Daddy-O canNOT say that he stuck things in the closet since I moved in. There was stuff in that closet that hadn't seen the light of day since 1996! And in one corner, behind some furniture, were boxes and piles of... other stuff.

Mac and I lived in between the stuff.

Until now.

A week ago Sunday, I decided to clean that room. I was sick of looking at the mess and with some of Mac's junk gone, I thought I could at least tackle it. And, in complete honesty here, Mac would never help when I asked so I was usually pissed when I thought about doing it before; I was pissed that he would turn around and make it messy again, and finally, because his 45" flat screen tv is now gone and I don't have to worry about bumping it.

So, I started, with the help of ITSam, last Sunday.

First, I had to clean out the closet because some of the piles of stuff behind Mac's bed were going in my closet. So I had to do that first. I found lots of Christmas things, an old set of barbells, some of my Bro's knives, half missing pieced puzzles, and numerous other items that went straight into the trash, or to Goodwill, depending. The closet took about 3 hours to clean. This is a huge closet- it's the width between a twin and full sized bed and is about 12 feet long. Yes, a closet around the size of a room, but it's totally a closet. ITSam and I lugged crap up and down stairs, to and from the garage, and to the trash and the car.

Next, I tackled the piles behind Mac's bed- stuff went into the closet and then to all the other aforementioned locations. I even found some of my mom's old paperwork from when she was a social worker, which was about 6 years old, according the the dates on the papers (we shredded these and then tossed 'em.). I gave my SisIL in a box of my Bro's knives. Things you think you'll never say: "hey, thanks for the loaning me the book. By the way, take home this huge box of Bro's knives, would ya please?"

Then last week, we work a few evenings: vacuuming and taking bags of trash downstairs.

Then last night and tonight, we kicked the room's butt. We took down my Christmas trees (I love my pink trees and they make me happy so I leave them up all the time but I needed to take them down for this project!), we vacuumed, we dusted, we moved all the furniture around, we dusted some more, I cleaned off the dresser tops and clean out my jewelry armoire, we vacuumed and dusted SOME MORE, we moved a bookcase upstairs and filled it with all my books and magazines, we put away laundry, sorted the piles I found under Mac's bed, and did I mention we dusted and vacuumed all over the place?

Now there are no piles of anything. There's space for Greco-Roman Wrestling in the middle of the floor, according to ITSam's sense of humor, or for a couch, according to Daddy-O! I think neither because I just want to revel in the open space of it all. I don't have to climb over piles of laundry or weave in and out of a path of boxes, dirty clothes, Rock Band instruments, barbels, or a globe. Everything has a place.

This would've been the best post for before and after pictures. I have none of each. I didn't think to take pictures of before and without 'before' the after doesn't seem like such a huge deal.

And to think, Mac and I lived in this huge space that was made tiny because we looked like an episode of Hoarders and now I feel like I'm living in a ballroom. All after he left. Weird.

I don't think I was ever so obsessed with a cleaning and organizing project as I was with this one. I can't even explain it. I just HAD to clean it. I do think, however, several things:
  • My mom always said to leave a place in better shape than I found it. I'm not planning on leaving the attic anytime soon (sorry Daddy-O)!) but it will be easy to follow her advise if I were.
  • Mac is sharing a 12x12 room with another teenage boy at college. Now when he comes home on the weekends and sees his part of the attic- his part is 15x15- it will be really clean and he'll be able to spread out, even though he's still sharing it with me (the whole thing is about 15x33 so each of us have about 15x15. the other 3 can be the stairs!) so he might feel more at ease
  • I needed to declutter and control something.
Ah, yes.... use your best Freud voice here: "You need to be in control of something?"

Yeah, well.... like I said, do we call it de-nesting with the kid leaves home and mom goes on a cleaning frenzy? Or do we just call it cleaning?

I'm counting this as a 40 before 40 item because it was a LOT of work!

Mags

3 comments:

Curley said...

Can't wait to see it. I know it is really hard to live in just one room and keep everything cleaned up. Then to put 2 people in that space, makes it even harder. Great job.

Jimmie Earl said...

In all fairness to me, your mom and I did use it for storage...it's an attic! Sorry it was such a mess when you moved in. Even though I spent hours and hours up there getting ready for you.
My hat is off to you and ITSam, though. You guys did a remarkable job. It looks great. And thank you for all your hard work and getting rid of some crap that I didn't know what to do with. Now I won't have to think about it whenever you go. LOL!
Dad

Maggie said...

Curly- I can't wait for you to see it since you had a visual of the before! I hope Mac's excited, too!

JE- I swear I wasn't complaining about how it looked at all!!!!! You didn't plan on having me, let alone Mac move into your attic, and then stay forever! I hope you didn't think I was complaining or bitching about you! And I know, it was an attic- where else are you supposed to put stuff?

I'm thrilled you cleaned and got 2 beds in there and dressers and a place for my clothes, etc.

I'm also happy we could clean it up for you so when I do leave, you have a rockin' area to do crafts again!