Lately Casa Rebuelita has become a bit of a disaster zone, and for a while I've been wanting to deep clean my apartment & just purge a lot of stuff I don't need/want anymore. So I decided that today is the day...(or rather this weekend is the weekend) but it starts now. Now I realize that this is far from the most exciting thing out there in the blogosphere (that is my new favorite not-a-word word btw), but I'm hoping that posting before & after pictures will inspire me to actually do it*. Plus...it might make the rest of you feel much better about the state of your homes!
Danger-zone #1
The dining room / office / sewing room.
This multifunctional 'nook' is currently the hub of activity at Casa Rebuelita. Please note Sally getting into the theme of the evening by giving herself a little bath. That's the spirit Sally... when you're done with that do you want to help with the laundry?Danger zone #2
Entertainment / Education / Entrance area
Please note my: work bag, tutoring bag, knitting bag (one of them anyway two more are out of sight!); and my work out back-pack. Not only am I a crazy cat lady, I am one shopping cart away from being a bag-lady. Not promising. Something must be done.
In the entertainment center and on the shelf beside it I have a rather large collection of VHS tapes. Which is unfortunate because my tape player doesn't actually function with my TV (not even with the adapter) =( As I've lived with this situation for a while, and have started replacing my video tapes with DVDs, I just need to say good bye to them.
On the bookshelf you'll find a wide variety of books both read & unread, but most disturbingly my Introduction to Psychology textbook circa 1993. =? and several other books from college. Now it was conceivable, when I graduated, that I would one day have a job that would utilize my incredibly overpriced education and that these textbooks would be valuable resources for years to come. But yeah... that pipe dream is over... really over. So I think it's well past time to get rid of them.
Danger zone #3
The craft room / coat closet.
Complete chaos, I tell you! I have no idea what that thing in front is, but it's big & loud & Sally runs away whenever it's on, which can't be a good thing. On the right you can see a stack of boxes at least waist high - that's a portion of my yarn stash... but by no means all of it. It is in serious need of reorganization!
Danger zone #4
This is by far the most inefficient use of space in my entire 550 sq. ft. apartment! And is probably my best entry for a "junk drawer."
The desk itself was purchased at Goodwill (circa 1998 but who knows how old it was then!), cleaned up & given a nice coat of paint. The drawer was not entirely in tact when I bought the drawer and over the years I've tried my best to repair it using tape and real actual nails. But the runner thingies that it should slide into just no longer exist. It's time to, at the very least, get rid of the drawer. Oh... and that thing on top is called a "monitor", beside the desk on the right is an antique known as a "CPU" back in the olden days before laptops, computers & monitors were *separate*! Scary, I know. This beauty has Windows 95 on it, and is almost functional. For the longest time I intended to transfer the files to my new laptop but never got around to it. When I did make an attempt I came to the unhappy realization that the two were not even remotely compatible. The old computer uses 3" (not so) floppy disks... which my new computer does not. The old computer has a CD Rom drive, but can't write to it. I actually found a USB port and got excited, until I actually plugged my flash drive into it and an error message came up. "What is this strange object with which you are violating me? Remove it at once!" OK... that's probably not what it said... but close enough. In theory one could email the files from one computer to the other... but in theory one has lightening fast cable internet. Alas... in reality one has dial up. =(
So I think I'll finally break down and call some computer repair folks and see if they can do anything for me. There's not a lot of urgent stuff on it... but several pictures that I'd rather not lose to the ether.
Noticeably absent from these photos are the kitchen, bathroom & bedroom. I clean the bathroom pretty regularly. That's priority #1 when I do feel like cleaning. And thanks almost entirely to my dishwasher, the kitchen stays relatively tidy. Plus there's absolutely loads of cupboard space so there's a place for even all of my kitchen gadgets. My bedroom stays more or less tidy because I spend so little time in there, let alone conscious.
So that's the starting point... I'm giving myself until Sunday to straighten everything up, then ready or not I'll take pictures again. Any tips or encouragement would be most appreciated. =)
5 comments:
Go you!! Ok, it's Saturday, what's done LOL! ;)
Go, Go, Go! That's my encouraging chant for you :-) There are so many things that are more fun than cleaning up, so I applaud your burst of motivation!
I highly support doing a thorough goodwill purge. I just got rid of a bunch of VHS tapes, clothes, and other random stuff, and my apartment already feels cleaner. Hey, and you don't even have to take it to goodwill right away...my giveaway pile is in a box in the trunk of DWE's car right now.
Your post is inspiring me a bit too...I still have some stuff that never found a home after I moved in, not to mention how desperately the living room needs to be swept (wood floors are weird).
Join a Freecycle group! We had bags and piles of stuff that was earmarked for Goodwill, but never made it to the car. We posted it on Freecycle, and people came to pick it up! It's an awesome tool for uncluttering.
Good Luck!
If you purge any fabric, I call dibs.
: )
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