Alice Goes KonMari
Update: Still decluttering around here. This happy joy joy life changing process is taking a while, because there’s so much stuff and I rapidly vacillate from wanting to throw it all away in a blaze of glory, to wanting to gather my stuff in my hands and spit “My preciousss!” into imaginary cameras.
Alice neeeedsth her DVDsss!
I’ve seen a lot of complaints about Marie Kondo (see that older post) and other organizing gurus and how this whole minimalism concept and the idea of throwing out extra consumer crap is only for rich people because poor people can’t afford stuff. The writers of these articles have clearly never met a poor person. As if you have to have money for stuff! I’ve never had a great deal of money, but I’ve always had stuff. People love giving you stuff, because they redecorated or they just watched Netflix and now they have a spare entertainment center, or couch, or bed, or recliner, or T.V., or child. And yes we’ve gotten every one of those things given to us – except the child. Our children were DIY projects.
But I digress. Time to begin.
Step One: Clothes
If you still have legwarmers, you’ve waited way too long to declutter.
We’ve also been given hand-me-down clothes – so many clothes – by well meaning people. Thing One gets clothes, and Thing Two gets clothes, then Thing Two gets the clothes that Thing One just outgrew. So she gets twice the clothes, and guess what? They almost all spark joy in this kid, so she doesn’t like giving them up. It’s hard to complain since my children have dressed like I spent hours in the dark searching Ambercrombie and Fitch when in fact I shop at Walmart where I can get shirts for a dollar. One dollar shirts, guys. Did I need the shirt? Did they? Well, not exactly, but hey you can wait a month to do laundry!
Typical laundry day.
Maybe not the best plan. I honestly thought I didn’t hold on to clothes that much before I started all of this, but it turns out I don’t really hold onto clothes so much as I just lose them in various places. I have also changed size over the years, so I have clothes in various sizes because I might lose weight, or I might gain it. You just never know. The forties are fun! I’ve gotten rid of bags of clothes, though, and lots of extra bed linens because there is no way I’m folding more than two sets of fitted sheets. I’m also not using Marie’s cute little vertical napkin folding technique because it takes too damn long and I hang up most of my stuff. Unless it’s a fitted sheet. Then I properly cram it into my bottom dresser drawer in one giant wad, the way God intended.
Wrong / Right
Our town has made giving stuff away much easier by installing lots of dumpsters painted bright colors that are marked for the Children’s Home. This is awesome because I can drop my junk off and not have to show my face or talk to anyone. It’s just like I’m throwing it away, only I’m not, I’m doing a good deed just like all those people did for me! The only problem is that you can only dump clothes or shoes into it, not appliances or electronics or children – which you’d think they’d want being a Children’s Home and all. I do wonder if they get unwanted stuff dumped in there anyway. For instance, I heard that someone once dumped a live chicken into the book drop at the downtown library. It sure sounds like a hilarious idea – I mean a terrible thing to do. Thank goodness they now have cameras to keep people from this kind of mayhem.
We never had a chicken in the library. Bats, snakes, hornets, sure . . .
So I’ve gone through my clothes once, and Thing Two volunteered a bag of clothes in exchange for four new clothing items at JC Penny’s where we were supposed to be shopping for dress shoes for her sister’s prom. I wasn’t going to let her get them, but then she showed me that they were three to five dollars, marked down from forty dollars, so of course I was suckered into it. She’s smart, that Thing Two. There isn’t a thing in her closet at the moment, but the clothes make a nice, comfy carpet, so there’s that at least. You are not supposed to “Konmari” someone else’s items, unless you can be super crafty about it so they don’t find out. So I still have the kids’ clothes left. My husband has few clothes, so that’s not a problem. The extra cars and car parts might be, since I can’t lift those into dumpsters. Not super crafty like anyway.
I didn’t think I’d find pics of whole cars in dumpsters. I clearly underestimated the American people.
So does my house look better? Not a whole lot, but I’m making progress. Of some sort. While waiting for your house to transform you, I invite you to check out a different perspective on cleaning. Jennifer McCartney (author of “The Joy of Leaving Your Sh*t All Over the House”) is the real deal. She is sarcastic and funny and gets paid for it, which means I should hate her on principal, but I still enjoyed her books. If only I could get my parodies to market faster. Maybe if I marked them “Twilight Sexy Times Declutter Wars”.
Anyone else spring cleaning in April? Let me know. Also, do you want some stuff?
~ Alice
How Do You Blog?
Recently I wrote a post on Canvas on overwhelmation. And I am definitely feeling it now. Pretty soon, they’re going to expect me to go back to work. I’m better, much, much better, but still when I go to the bookstore, I’m good for about ten, fifteen minutes tops before my body says “Holy crap, go home!” So I’m thinking if fifteen minutes is hard, eight hours might be slightly harder. There is also the process of working out sick leave (like not having any) and if I qualify for something called sick leave pool, the logistics of which probably inspired the book Catch-22.
My employee handbook
So I was thinking stressing on this and Thing Two started coughing. And then running fever. And I said, “Oh, crap.” (I say this a lot.) I guess I was just hoping the powers that be or whatever would give me say enough time to quit being sick myself before striking a kid. Yeah, not so much. Even better, she has the ability to go from lying still (freaky for this kid) to bouncing about while chattering non-stop until my brains threaten to explode within minutes.
Mommy, what are you doing? I want a buffalo for Christmas! I was reading this story and it was about this and this and this and are you listening Mommy and my buddy said that I was weird and I don’t like bullies why do people bully it isn’t nice and it’s against school policy and that’s not fair and what’s on T.V.? I think I might throw up. No, false alarm, it’s a burp and do you want to play dolls?
So this, and work, and sick, and laundry, and whatever the hell else I’m supposed to be doing has not made it any easier to sleep at night. Well, that and sleeping during the day, which you get used to when you feel too crappy to do anything else, and then it’s hard to break the cycle. So since I can’t sleep, I get up and write. And then it occurs to me (and look we’re getting to the supposed point of this post) that maybe I should try to set some sort of boundaries on my blogging. Boundaries I’d like to set other places, like work (not so many hours) or parenting (not so many hours) or laundry (Why are there so many clothes and where the frack are the socks?)
Husband: So like I’m not supposed to dry your underwire bras in the dryer?
Wife: I’m going to kill you.
Thing is, I love feedback. Love, love, love it. I am extremely susceptible to compliments. I feed on good press, and then I’m compelled to do more, more, more! But then I lie awake at night and along with everything else think – am I doing too much posting? Am I annoying? Am I pressable? What if I write something and they think I’m not funny? You know, like Sinatra when his voice started going but he kept singing and no one wanted to tell him to shut up? Wait, I forgot what point I was trying to make here.
There’s a point here somewhere . . .
Oh, yeah, insecurity. I has it. And night time is a great time to think about this. Which is why insomnia really sucks, unless you are just dying to catch up on infomercials. Like this one for this leaf blower that is apparently more awesome than Jesus. Maybe it’s powered by Jesus. Or possibly the people in the commercial are on drugs. They are very, very happy about this leaf blower. And after a while, I’m thinking, I should get that leaf blower. Then I too could blow away spider webs with the force of a helicopter taking off.
Wait, that’s not a leaf blower – he’s a freaking Ghostbuster!
Anyway, I’m hoping to get my sleep cycles out of “infant” and back to “semi-adult”. But even when I do, I still have to decide how to balance my life. Get it? Balance. Hahahaha. As if mothers, whether SAHMS or working moms, can ever balance their lives. I mean, unless they’re like Ann Romney and have servants and crap. But I should probably try to balance the blogging. So here’s the question. How do you blog? Do you blog every day? Once a week? Twice a week? Randomly? Do you keep a schedule? Do you remember where your children are, or who they are? Have you bathed lately, because I can smell you from here, I’m just sayin’.
I dunno, do you think you should be juggling the baby?
I’d appreciate the feedback on this, because I’m trying to figure out some way to balance at least one tiny part of my life but I’m unsure how to do it. I mean, I realize it’s up to me, but I’ve got Sinatra complex, and also ideas running about my head like mad, which makes it hard to make any decision, including what I’m going to have for supper. So tell me how you blog, and how you came to that decision, and how long you’ve been doing it, and how you paid off those WordPress people in order to get pressed. I really want to know. And then maybe I can figure out how I blog as well.
I don’t get it.
Where are their faces???
Also, wtf with the jerky-I’m-gonna-take-my-sweet-time crap going on while writing and editing your posts on WordPress lately? Huh? It’s annoying.
As Always,
Alice
My To-Do List
I wrote a post earlier about Time Management in which I proved that I know nothing about what that is. I’ve got a lot of stuff that needs doing, but I keep forgetting because of ADHD or possibly just laziness or – hey is that a meerkat?
He is SO sneaky.
Anyway, I decided I would type up a list and post it here in hopes that I will be held accountable by fellow bloggers who are also avoiding work by reading blogs. It’s a rock solid idea. Here we go.
To-Do
Try to accomplish something at work.
1. So far I have confused and misdirected several students and written this list. Score.
Laundry
Even Barbie has to do her own flipping laundry.
1. Sort that strange pile that I swear I saw move the other day.
2. Re-wash clothes that have been in the washer for three days
3. Re-dry clothes that have been wadded in the dryer for three days.
- One could use an iron for this, but that would ruin the lovely damage to the environment. Plus I would have to find the iron. Saying I even have one.
4. Wash and dry other clothes and try to actually remove them when they are done.
Dishes
Angry bean guy makes me want to leave my cup in the sink just because.
1. Ignore them until the pile is high and smells like death in hopes that either husband or the dish fairy will finally wash them.
Allergy Shot
1. Have the doctor purposefully inject me with stuff I’m allergic to in hopes of curing me of allergies by making arm swell up. Try not to die.
Pick up meds
Let’s see, so the pink pills go in that bottle, and the blue ones . . . wait, where did I put them? Eh, nevermind.
1. Pick up prescription from the pharmacy. Saying they finally get it in. And it’s the right one.
Call Doctor
1. Figure out what the heck is up with the medicine the pharmacy never got in. Be directed back to the pharmacy. And back to the doctor. Do the hokey pokey and turn self around.
Help child(ren) with homework.
1. Hope that 6th grade Math is not too advanced yet, because boy did I feel like a dork when I didn’t know where half the states were in 5th grade Geography last year.
The largest state in America? C-a-n-a-d-a.
Feed children
1. Most likely something with lots of nitrates that comes in a bag or a can and ends with “o’s”
Force children to bathe.
Force children to get out of the bath.
Hey, we’re clean.
Read to children
1. Children’s author, Rick Riordan, has double-crossed me by making his chapters progressively longer with each book.
Yeah, I saw you skip the last two pages, Mom.
Mess around on blog and facebook (I might as well put this in because you know I’ll be doing this for sure.)
aliceatwonderland 