Tired of the Mess

 If you ask most people who know me well, they will tell you that I am a perfectionist or as my husband says—anal-retentive. I don’t disagree. I am not as bad as I used to be (you can’t be with nine children!), but I am still very much particular about where things go, how things are done, etc.

That being said, my house has been known to be a mess (and I don’t just mean because I have nine children!). We just have too much “stuff”. Before we built our addition, we looked like we were busting at the seams. I would often “declutter” things, but I never did enough. People say that if you don’t have a place for an item, then don’t bring it home. Well, that is something I should live by, but don’t.

I have finally come to a point where I am just tired of the mess. With more things in the house, the easier it is to make it messy. Our family loves watching Little House on the Prairie and I am often reminded of how little they actually have and yet they are happy.
Before you go off and say, “But that is just television”, remind yourself that the show is based on the books which are based on Laura Ingalls Wilder’s life. They truly didn’t have much, but they were happy. The few times they took things out on credit from the store, they learned that it wasn’t a smart thing to do and learned to do without until they had the cash to pay for it.

I am starting off by working in the office, the room of my house which has been a sore spot with me for years. I don’t know why it has taken so long for me to do something about it, but I am ready to tackle it. I began by going through books I have been keeping for home schooling and really thinking about whether or not I will actually use them. After coming up with a box to get rid of, I started listing things for sale on Ebay. Looking at my shelves that were starting to look nicer, I decided to tackle my other books—books I have already read or even those I am hoping to read some day. I came up with another stack for me to list on Ebay. While this is only the start of getting rid of the mess in the office, I feel good about it.

I can't believe I am going to do this, but I will post pictures of what our office/school room looks like right now. I am going to give myself a month to get it de-cluttered and organized and then hopefully I'll remember to post pictures. For some reason, one of the pictures I took didn't load. It was of three five-shelf bookcases that are overcrowded with books and other things stacked on top of them.