Sorting, culling, ordering
I've been busy.
Weekend-before-last the kids and I went though their books. First Andrew and I went through his shelves and pulled anything he no longer wanted. We put all those into Rachel's pile (her book collection had expanded past the one small shelf she had), and then did the same kind of sort with her. All the books that they've both outgrown or no longer want are in a box by the door. I need to take them to the Campfire office at some point soon - one of the high school kids is collecting book donations for People's Community Clinic (they give out kid's books instead of lollipops after a doctor's visit).
Last weekend Rachel and I went through all her stuffed animals. We pulled out just shy of a laundry basket's worth of stuffed animals that she no longer wanted, and I dropped them off at Goodwill today, along with the (now-unneeded) Diaper Genie and and old plastic tricycle. Also last weekend, Lynne met me and the kids after church at Ikea (where we randomly ran into Mom, her friend Loraine, and Lily's entire family, but that's another matter). We had lunch there, and Lynne helped me bring home two new white bookcases. I added the height extension, and glass doors on both the extension and the main cases, so it was a bit of a project for Ken and me to assemble. Lynne kept an eye on the kids, both ours and Britney and McKenzie, during construction, but they mostly kept each other busy. We moved the old white bookcase into Rachel's room, and now she has a place to put her books, as well as a number of toys that had been on the floor.
I've been working on slowly bringing some semblance of order to the library. The new bookcases helped a lot, both because they added storage, and because we had to rearrange the furniture in the room to accommodate them, so all my piles of junk were being moved around anyway. Ken had vacation today, but he mostly played video games (Paper Mario and Mario Galaxy, both on the Wii) while I sorted and put dates on the many, many piles of kids' artwork (dating back to 2006 in some cases). I am greatly aided in this task by the fact that the daycare has the month printed on all the little worksheets / coloring pages the kids do, so I can get a sense of when the nearby items are from as well. I have scrapbooks for the kids' artwork, but it's been over a year since I've put anything in them, so it's really piled up. I hope to get it whittled down over the next few weeks. Then I'll actually have the use of my drafting table again! It's been an artwork dumping ground for over a year, and I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed seeing the library full of clean, uncluttered horizontal surfaces.
Once the library is under control, I'll do some work on the kids' closets, then I'll start on my and Ken's closet. We have maybe a dozen paper boxes (like, the cardboard boxes that reams of paper are shipped in) filled with the books that were once on the white bookcases now used by Andrew and Rachel. Some of those books will eventually come back out onto the new bookcases. Others will be given away (or sold at Half Price if nobody I know wants them). Part of the reason why they've sat in the boxes is so I could come back later and figure out "ok, am I ready to let go of this now?" Since we boxed them up about three years ago, I've only needed to go back and get out one or two of the books, so it's not like they're in active use. I even made a detailed inventory of the books, and organized the boxes by subject, so I could find them easily if they were needed.
Weekend-before-last the kids and I went though their books. First Andrew and I went through his shelves and pulled anything he no longer wanted. We put all those into Rachel's pile (her book collection had expanded past the one small shelf she had), and then did the same kind of sort with her. All the books that they've both outgrown or no longer want are in a box by the door. I need to take them to the Campfire office at some point soon - one of the high school kids is collecting book donations for People's Community Clinic (they give out kid's books instead of lollipops after a doctor's visit).
Last weekend Rachel and I went through all her stuffed animals. We pulled out just shy of a laundry basket's worth of stuffed animals that she no longer wanted, and I dropped them off at Goodwill today, along with the (now-unneeded) Diaper Genie and and old plastic tricycle. Also last weekend, Lynne met me and the kids after church at Ikea (where we randomly ran into Mom, her friend Loraine, and Lily's entire family, but that's another matter). We had lunch there, and Lynne helped me bring home two new white bookcases. I added the height extension, and glass doors on both the extension and the main cases, so it was a bit of a project for Ken and me to assemble. Lynne kept an eye on the kids, both ours and Britney and McKenzie, during construction, but they mostly kept each other busy. We moved the old white bookcase into Rachel's room, and now she has a place to put her books, as well as a number of toys that had been on the floor.
I've been working on slowly bringing some semblance of order to the library. The new bookcases helped a lot, both because they added storage, and because we had to rearrange the furniture in the room to accommodate them, so all my piles of junk were being moved around anyway. Ken had vacation today, but he mostly played video games (Paper Mario and Mario Galaxy, both on the Wii) while I sorted and put dates on the many, many piles of kids' artwork (dating back to 2006 in some cases). I am greatly aided in this task by the fact that the daycare has the month printed on all the little worksheets / coloring pages the kids do, so I can get a sense of when the nearby items are from as well. I have scrapbooks for the kids' artwork, but it's been over a year since I've put anything in them, so it's really piled up. I hope to get it whittled down over the next few weeks. Then I'll actually have the use of my drafting table again! It's been an artwork dumping ground for over a year, and I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed seeing the library full of clean, uncluttered horizontal surfaces.
Once the library is under control, I'll do some work on the kids' closets, then I'll start on my and Ken's closet. We have maybe a dozen paper boxes (like, the cardboard boxes that reams of paper are shipped in) filled with the books that were once on the white bookcases now used by Andrew and Rachel. Some of those books will eventually come back out onto the new bookcases. Others will be given away (or sold at Half Price if nobody I know wants them). Part of the reason why they've sat in the boxes is so I could come back later and figure out "ok, am I ready to let go of this now?" Since we boxed them up about three years ago, I've only needed to go back and get out one or two of the books, so it's not like they're in active use. I even made a detailed inventory of the books, and organized the boxes by subject, so I could find them easily if they were needed.