I Lied.

In my last post, I said I was moving on (finally!) from writing about decluttering, to give more attention to the neglected aspects of my project. For the last few weeks, I’ve been feeling smug because it’s been much easier to keep the house neat. There’s a lot less stuff in the house in general, which makes it easier to find homes for things we need, and in turn, those things aren’t strewn about the house. Since I pared down my wardrobe, putting away my clean laundry is faster. Meal planning has been paying off. I even tossed $10 in Kohl’s cash (which I really should have passed to a friend) because I decided I didn’t need or want anything.

Last weekend, instead of alternating between purging clutter and staring at it in frustration,  I was able to pull out my sewing machine, and finished a couple pillows. It’s not a stretch to say I’ve been feeling damned pleased with myself.

So, as a consequence, it’s been easy to forget I still have to deal with this:junk1

And this:junk3

And this:junk2

My affection for throwing stuff in baskets to deal with later is coming back to bite me. My recent focus on maintaining the house has made it easy to forget other things I need to deal with. Each day, after school, I go around to the assorted flat surfaces and put things away, and repeat the process before bed. It only take a few minutes. But last night, I caught a glimpse of one of those Baskets of Crap and was like, “oh yeah, you.” Doing a quick sweep of the house takes very little time, but by the end of each day I haven’t had the fortitude to deal with even one of these.

I’m still planning to bake this weekend, but I’m going to do deal with these contained little messes too.