this would be ok if it translated into mopping the floors, washing the clothes, or even re-organising the pantry.
but no.
i want to re-arrange the entire house.
partly this is necessity. theres a lot of stuff in the house that needs to GO, and we really do need to re-arrange some things to all the furniture fits.
but for some reason, the most pressing thing in my mind is the linen closet. it does desperately need clearing out though, so this might end up being A Good Thing.
most people have a linen closet of some sort. a cupboard somewhere that is full of sheets and towels and table linens. ours is next to the bathroom, and since there is almost no cupboard space IN the bathroom, it also contains things like toilet paper, tissues, and feminine products.it is a decent size, buuuuuuuuut only the middle panel is a door, which means theres a lot of stuff hidden around the corners thats hard to reach. and please ignore the colour.. my mother picked it out nearly 10 years ago. it will be re-painted (probably white) sometime in the hopefully not too distant future.
once the doors are opened however, we see that in this house, that decent size is NOT BIG ENOUGH. i come from a family of packrats. i turned 26 last year, and we still have terry-towel nappies (diapers) that my mother used ON ME WHEN I WAS BORN.see that shelf of towels? remember what i said about there being more space either side of the door? ALSO PACKED FULL OF TOWELS. there are no sheets there. no tablecloths, no boxes of tissues, no more toilet paper (i stock up when its cheap. that toilet paper goes all the way to the edge wall). JUST TOWELS. it is an absolute nightmare trying to get anything out, or put anything in, or find the towels we need. some of those are probably 20 years old. some of them havent been used for at least 10 years. packrats, i tell you. as well as the big bath towels you can see, there are also teatowels and face cloths hidden in there. i can never find them. im not even sure what they look like anymore.
you may be thinking the top shelf looks comparatively empty. i cleared it out a while ago, and threw away, among other things, boxes of tampons bought in 1993. there is now nothing over a year old up there, and most of what IS up there is toilet paper and tissues, stocked up when cheap.
other than a hot water bottle and a blanket, im really not too sure whats on the bottom shelf. there are some more blankets, probably a doona or two, and possibly a tarp. i think there was some more hot water bottles? and since its my mothers house, sheets. i dread looking for things on the bottom shelf, because everything down there is so bulky. its nearly as hard to get anything out as the towel shelf, and harder to make them fit back in again.and before someone wonders why we need so many blankets, let me assure you, THAT IS NOT ALL. we also have a blanket box that is so full it wont even close. and another blanket in my room because i cant find room for it anywhere else (although with the crazy weather the past week we've actually been using it), and 2-3 kid size blankets in the kid's room. oh and another doona or three in my mother's wardrobe. dont ask. i dont. it makes my head hurt.
again, you may be wondering at the relative emptiness of the next shelf up - where you can see yet another blanket, by the way - containing, as it does, only one layer of things. well i forgot to take a photo before i cleared out that shelf. i took everything out, and put back only tablecloths/napkins, one set of sheets, and the pillowcases that got washed without their matching sheets. then i shoved the cloth nappies in the corner while we waited for the new drawers/change table to be delivered. but do not fear!! for your eye-gouging pleasure, i took a photo of the pile of sheets that used to be in there, and are currently sitting in my mothers room, so i can ask her when she gets here on the weekend if she reeeeeeeeeeeeeeally needs them all, and which ones can be safely thrown away.
TADA!!!!!!
ALLLLLLLLLLL those sheets where on that one shelf. all of them. none came from the surrounding shelves. this is why i can never find anything. i discovered pillowcases my sister and i used before we were in bunk beds. which means they're at least 15 years old. i discovered sheets i'd never seen before. i found a fitted sheet im not even going to bother to ask about because the elastic disintegrated when i opened it to fold it neatly.
there are un-attached pillowcases. there's a queen sized doona cover with only 3 pillowcases. there are sheets so stained i wouldnt use them as an underlay. i understand the need for spare sheets. my bed has 3 sets - two lovely silky-feeling lightweight summer sets, and a totally ridiculously luxuriant 1000 thread count set that i got mega-super-cheap. the kid's bed has three sets (two simply wasnt enough when toilet training). the baby will have a few, because i know from experience that 2 is not enough for a baby. but there are at least 5 doona-cover sets in there, and only one bed with a doona. which has another set on it. there are also at least 3 single sheet sets, and no single beds in the house.
i dont have much energy these days, and i have a million other things to do besides my nesting-clearout, but i will be posting pictures of the progress as i finally get this mess sorted out.
wish me luck!!
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