Minimizing

The worlds biggest fan of maximalism is possibly turning minimalist. A little bit. Maybe. Or maybe a lot.

I have been obsessing about minimizing stuff in my house for three to four years. A few years ago I felt I was drowning in stuff. My cupboards, closets, and walls had so much stuff I couldn't find anything it. I was endlessly dusting and reorganizing all my stuff. Since then, I have gotten rid of SO MUCH STUFF. I can't believe it myself. In 2016 I read Marie Kondo's book The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up  and got rid of truck loads of stuff. It literally changed my life and I have NEVER gone back to owning that much. It changed my whole thinking on how to buy things too. Does it spark joy?


Then I got rid of that book and started reading more and more about minimalism. I found The Minimalists and started following them trying to understand the whole concept. I have played the #minsgame (Click here for description of game) 4 1/2 times. Plus any other challenge I come across I do.

Last January was the last time I tried playing the #minsgame (Click here for description) and I only made it to 266 items and had to quit. So I thought I was maybe done. But oh no, I'm still finding stuff to get rid of! My letting go muscles have gotten very strong. It's getting easier and easier to part with things.

So easy it was kind of scary. I loved the feeling of space opening in my home more than things. Out went my childhood doll. Out went lots of personal mementos and cherished things. Or. Things I THOUGHT I had cherished. There is a difference.

After I got rid of many beloved things that I didn't need or even use I really got strong.

My purchasing habits have gotten stronger too. I rarely buy things and when I do, I will take days (garlic press), months, even a couple of years (Lazyboy) before I buy something.  It depends on how much something costs and how big it is.

But lately I've been developing a fear. What if I turn into a REAL minimalist. Am I heading that way? How can I stop myself before that happens?

And I'm wondering why that scares me. What if I get rid of all my decorations? Will I start wearing only black and gray clothes?

I don't know. I seriously doubt it.

Then I read an article.   The Difference Between Decluttering and Minimalism by Sarah Anne Hayes  And it helped me relax SO much. That even a minimalist can look around their home and feel overwhelmed by excess. So I will just carry on because as {{{the minimalists say}}} -If it feels like too much it is. And the other very big reason is.... I have not regretted ONE THING that I have gotten rid of in the last 3 years. Or ever actually. I only feel freer and lighter.

It's 2019!

A fresh new year with endless possibilities. 

In the past, I've frequently tried to choose a word to focus on in the new year. This year I really struggled. I was reading THIS SITE and trying to narrow it down and I just couldn't. Only ONE WORD???? I need lots of words. And color. And cheerfulness....

So this is what I came up with. 

Everything kind of falls under three categories. A lot of the things I have chosen I started incorporating last year and I just kept them because they are important to me and I want to focus on still.

Creativity.

Continue setting aside time to be creative every day but this year I want to add in painting.

Goals.

Plan out some time on the calendar for exploring in the jeep, going on short road trips with our camper, and pick a new area of the U.S. to fly to and then drive around and explore for a week.
 Setting specific limits for how much time I spend in the internet.
 Continue eating lots of fresh vegetables and also continue my new passion of finding lots of new recipes to make that are fresh and healthy.

Habits. 

Two parts on "just do it"- stop procrastinating about chores and also to not be scared to challenge myself with new things to learn/try.
Continue working on making my muscles stronger.
Talk nicely to myself and focus on the things I have done instead of what I didn't get done that day.

And minimalism will continue to be big.

Fall Decorating

I usually just hang a simple garland but this year I also have a painting I made!

In the kitchen I added a faux leaf and berries to a real pumpkin.

I also have faux flowers in my copper pitcher and a runner from the store. 

When I was at Walmart looking for a leaf garland, I saw a little display with things to craft with.

I added the little welcome sign to my front door wreath.

And made a leaf garland for above my organ.

Well, that's it for my fall decorating. I've really toned it down from what I used to do. I have just enough for my house to feel like fall. I have a couple more things waiting until it's closer to Thanksgiving time.

Happy Fall, Y'all!

House Remodel

Well. It's been awhile since I posted..... (August 2015) haha!

But I really miss writing so I am just going to do this for myself.

We did a huge house remodel last spring.

This was our tiny home in our backyard for three weeks. It was actually very fun and I am so thankful we had a camper to live in!

We had some simple meals...

It was a lot of fun cooking on a gas stove.
I've always wanted one but no home we have lived in has had gas hook-ups.

All of our furniture and stuff lived on the patio for awhile.

Here are some before & after pictures of our house. We replaced the carpet and tile with laminate flooring (the bathrooms got new tile), replaced all of the trim, replaced all of the interior and exterior doors, and remodeled both bathrooms.

The new back door is similar to our old one but notice the trim change.... 

I just love it...We did this style trim for the exterior doors.

This is our extra room.

I also have been really working on minimizing our belongings.

Here is the new interior door style we chose.

The black door knobs weren't on yet.

Here is the only room in the house with color on the walls.

And the ceramic tile looks like old bricks.

I can't find a picture right now of the former master bath. But it had the same 1970's yellow tiles in the shower and the same particleboard vanity that was in the old main bath. Both the remodeled bathtub surround and our shower have this same new hexagon style tile.

***

I found a really old picture of the master bath....

***

We added new 4 inch baseboards throughout the house.

And we added black toe kicks in the kitchen.

Well, that's enough for now. 

It also looks like I'm going to have to figure out how to edit my blog and update the blogs I follow at least. I'll try post some more about things soon....like fall decorating, my minimalism journey, and my new passion of cooking new recipes every week.   

#minsgame Purge Results

I DID IT !!!!!

I don't know if anyone can even remember but almost a month ago I posted about a new purging challenge I decided to do.

(My post: A New Decluttering Challenge)

The challenge is called: http://www.theminimalists.com/game/  

In that post I told about the first two weeks..... then I planned on posting the final results Friday, July 31st. Well, it's been lollygagging in my drafts bin since then. So I decided to finally crank it out today.  

Week 3

Week 4

Week 5

I got rid of the challenged 496 things-

plus 7 extra items!!!!!

AND.... get this.
I actually finished in 3 weeks because we were leaving on vacation July 22nd. I was worried I would lose momentum if I waited to finish after. (And I guess I did!- speedy gonzalez on posting! :/ )
Since I knew exact future numbers, as I was going through stuff and I would find lots of one type of thing, I would count them up and save them for that date; like the cat toys. Ha! And no worries! My cats still have about a dozen toys to play with!

And early on I set aside 14 paper clips to use 'just in case'. Well, it was the night before vacation and I was finding things for the last date I needed (the 27th) and it was time to start supper so....paper clips to the rescue!!!!

One big thing I learned doing this is that I was overlooking some of my clutter because it easily fit in somewhere. It was really eye-opening to see how much clutter was lurking all over.


AND.

Believe me or believe me not.

It was easy!

It never took more than 10 minutes to find stuff for each day. Granted, I was always watching for stuff I could add to a future day so that helped a lot. Also, I would look at their instagram (link found on this page: http://www.theminimalists.com/minsgame/) for ideas. I do not feel bad about sometimes counting sets of things individually because other people were. In fact, some people count their garbage/recycling containers of used up items!

By the way, I didn't touch anything of my husband's or daughter's. FLY Lady says their stuff is none of my business- I can only take care of my own. I was also surprised how much of the stuff I found needed to go straight in the garbage. Way more than I had ever imagined. I also gave some stuff to my daughters and I'm donating the rest to the ReStore.

I was all gung-ho to start it again for August but I decided to wait until vacation season was over. But I will definitely be doing this again in the fall!

A New Decluttering Challenge!

In June I was trying to do another round of decluttering and I was so disappointed. I did get rid of a lot of stuff but not NEARLY as much as I was hoping for. As I was reading online about things to try and help me with it, I ran across a game. It's called (link) The Minimalists Game. The idea is, on the first day of the month, you get rid of one thing. Then on the 2nd day, two things. On the 3rd day, three things. Etc., etc. 

So I decided that on June 1st, I would start.

IT'S WORKING!

I don't know how....maybe because it put me in a different mindset?
Or that I just like a challenge?

Whatever it is, I am so happy!

Here are the first two weeks of July:

Week 1

Week 2

Notice? I have actually been able to get rid of some kitchen stuff!!!

At first I thought it was going to be so hard but then I looked at their Instagram where people post the items that they got rid of and as I was looking at the pictures, I saw similar stuff I had and thought- OH! I can get rid of that too! So far I have spent less than 5 minutes a day gathering things. If ever a day comes where I have no idea where to start, I look at their Instagram and right away get inspiration and off I go!

Instagram link: #minsgame

When you're playing this game you are supposed to upload your pictures to their Instagram but since I don't have an account they get to be shared on my blog. Oh lucky you!

Incredibly, so far,

I have gotten rid of 105 THINGS!!!!!

And it's still FUN. We shall see when the 20's start rolling around....

Porch Steps Decisions and Calculations

We need some porch steps.

I may have finally found some pavers I like for them!!!  I have looked all around at places and there are SO many choices and styles.  I think these will work and look the best.

source: Lowe's

They measure roughly 15x24 inches.

Now I just need to figure out how many I need. 

I found this cool site: (link: http://www.gardengatemagazine.com/64stepchart/) that had a handy dandy chart to easily figure out treads and risers.  I want my treads to be 15 inches wide so my risers need to be between 5½-6 inches high and I would like the whole thing to be 6 feet wide.

Ok.  Got that figured out.

Now to figure out how many steps there will be.

On this site (link: http://www.wikihow.com/Build-Porch-Steps) I found this:

source

And since I couldn't really measure the height because of the slope of rocks,

I decided to check out this site,

(link: http://inspectapedia.com/Stairs/Stair_Calculations.php).

I read this section called 

The Mathematical Approach to Building Stairs Spanning Uneven Ground

This is how it started out:

Quote: The geometry approach to calculating stair rise and run over rough terrain when you have only two measurements works correctly provided you know enough triangular geometry to convert between your sloped-line measurement (the hypotenuse of the triangle) and the triangle's other sides that form the rise & run dimensions. Using a calculator and it's square root function, and the most basic knowledge of geometry is not enough - we also need a table of sine and cosine values, functions readily found these days online. [45]

 a2 =b2 +c2 - the square of the length of the hypotenuse (a) equals the squares of the lengths of the opposite sides of a right triangle (b) and (c).

And I said- Oh yes!  That is as clear as mud!
My eyes totally glazed over and I stopped reading right there.

  AND I ACTUALLY TOOK CALCULUS AND TRIG AT SCHOOL.

Must have been about a hundred years ago though because I can't remember A THING.  I guess I will be going forward with rough eyeball estimates.  If I start out at the top and go down I can always adapt the dirt at the bottom to be higher or lower.  Right??????  Much easier than math.

Then I reread the article and they were only kidding. 

They actually say to do this:

source

Ok.  Whew!  Much more sensible!!!

Who knew engineers had a sense of humor.

I need to find some long boards.
I know what plumb means but to achieve it????
Might take awhile....

Now I also need to figure out what the risers need to be made out of....

For some reason I thought I would be able to whip these out in a couple of days. 

Tumbleweeds

Living in the west as we do, we have tumbling tumbleweeds.  Last year some came rolling across our property. They left a few trails of seeds and with all the rain we've been having they've been having a grand ole time.

Last Saturday morning we picked tumbleweeds.

Some places, there would be just one scattered here and there.

Other places they were thick and heavy.  Get 'em while they're young.  Before they start to scatter more seeds.  How come they are so romantic sounding in stories and songs but in real life they are so miserable... 

 They were in this tree area....

And scattered through this open area. Our property goes a little past those trees you see across that dirt. It was daunting.

Bill and his cowboy hat and me and my sombrero picked tumbleweeds.

Bill said we picked HUNDREDS of them.

Pretty sure we picked a bushel....

....and a peck.

But there probably isn't a market for them, alas.

June Purge- Week 2

I have a LOT of kitchen utensils...

A LOT.

3 Drawers full.

Here are the BEFORE pictures:

They say to help your problem you first need to ADMIT you have a problem.

And here is the AFTER:

Hahahahahahaha!

I didn't get rid of ONE thing!

They all fit my criteria of bringing me joy and making my life easier. :) 

 Hee hee.
I love my gadgets.
Maybe next January I will try to look at everything with a critical eye.

The rest my kitchen was pretty much fine because I did a huge purge in January and it has still been working- I just fine tuned some areas and cleaned everything.

These are the only things I got rid of this time.