As much as I try to get rid of any extra junk-stuffs, I still have some borderline hoarder (hoarderline? anyone?) tendencies fighting to gain ground. My biggest weakness is the organizing stuffs. Boxes, baskets, even... wait for it... shelves. This particular set of shelves was found at a yard sale two summers agao. It's one of those adjustable deals that attach to the wall with moveable brackets. A whole huge set of them for $2. My mom talked me into buying them (she also loves a good organizational gadget) so home they came. And they took up a huge chunk of my garage for two years. I looked at them probably five times a year and had this dilemma with myself:
I should probably get rid of those.
No I'll keep them.
But I just tripped on the brackets AGAIN.
But what if I need to organize something?
So much wasted space. We're obviously not going to use them at this point.
But organizing.
And so they stayed. Until that fateful day when I had the big "duh" moment that starts most of our projects. Our garage was a mess of disorderly chaos and I looked at Husband and said "we need some shelves in here." *dropped jaw spin move toward pile of shelving* Oh. Like these shelves that have been lying right beside all the other junk for TWO YEARS. And so our scattered piles of wood scraps became this:
Everything up off the floor in a tidy stack. And now that we can actually see what kind of scraps we have, we are actually burning through them. No more buying whole boards when we have a smaller piece that fits the bill. Whew.
We had to put them high enough for our super long car's bumper to fit underneath, which also left enough room on the ends to tuck some of the outside toys away.
Those couple shelves started a garage landslide that lasted an entire afternoon. When we were done, you guys, it was tidy. You know, for a garage anyway.
Complete with clear pathway beside the car. *angels sing*
No more piles of tools on the grill. Which has resulted in much more grilling. Hooray summer!
And those tools have found a tidy home in the cabinets with the help of a few cheapy plastic bins. And yes, those cabinets have always been there. Why did we put the tools on the grill instead of in the empty cupboards. I do not know this. It just happened, okay?
Now that it's cleaned up, maybe hopefully it will please please stay that way. Please. We only used a teensy bit of the huge shelving set and now we're on this whole shelving rampage. We're working on expanding our pantry, and even adding some shelving to our master closet. It's going to be so adjustable around here.
And no. The moral of this story is not that I should become a hoarder and keep all the things. Maybe it's more like "I need to stop watching Lost and put away all the stuffs instead of waiting two years." Because I'm totally watching Lost again. Even though I know I'll hate the ending. Don't judge. In fact I'm going to watch it right now because I have two nappers?!? And as my friend Robin always says, "two sleepers should never be wasted on dishes." Pass the popcorn.
What are you glad you kept for way, way too long? Or have you purged something only to regret it later? How do you find balance between keeping and tossing? And tell me straight, guys, is Lost just as disappointing the second time around?