There are categories, right?

I know I have way too many clothes. I wear my clothes, but because I wear my clothes, I do have more laundry than is necessary. I’ll go through it again. For the umpteenth time. I think it multiplies by itself!

There are like 4,000 books in this house, but Dearest would have kittens if he knew I was discarding any of them. He has his own bookcase and it is full, but his parents’ house burned down when he was out of the country and all of his books went with it. He is very attached. Mostly all of our books came from the library and are library bound, so they are not falling apart and they do not smell musty. I keep them dusted and they grace several gorgeous ceiling-to-floor bookcases that Dearest built to house them. They are a showcase in our home. We will not be purging books during our lifetime, but there are some paperbacks in the back recesses and corners of the cases that could definitely go without anyone being the wiser.

I think I’m ready to get rid of my old teaching supplies. Maybe. Ooh, that’s a hard one. But it’s okay. I can still teach and tutor if needed, and I know how to generate all that stuff again if the occasion should arise. Might as well let someone else use it, since I’m not going back in the classroom with my S.I. joint all messed up. I can’t stand for 6 hours these days.

There’s a lot, lot, LOT of music in this house. I love music, but I think I can go through and find books I’ll never play from, or loose pages of songs that are no longer complete.

And what about the games and puzzles?! I think the puzzles I can just toss in the giveaway box. Once I’ve done them, I don’t need to hang on to them. The games, however, are another story. There are a lot of them. We love to play games. The big hall closet contains some 170-ish games of all shapes and sizes. We have games that aren’t even made anymore. I went through the entire collection a couple of years ago and got rid of any that were broken or had missing parts. I made new tokens and scoresheets. I gathered pencils and printed off new rules from the websites. All the games we own are ready to play at the drop of a hat and they have a place, so they are technically not even part of the problem. I may give a gander at them anyway, just to make sure I truly want them all.

In the garage, I have a sewing cabinet. It’s full of fabric, some of which I’m sure I can get rid of. There are also a few drawers out there filled with sewing patterns from the 1980s. Ha. I think this is a good place to start! I’m so glad I started typing this list! I just thought of those. I could totally fill those drawers with something more useful, like all the craft crap that I cannot yet force myself to part with. 8-P I think I’ll keep the cute stuffed toy and baby patterns, but the out-of-date stuff can all go.

Then there’s the shed. OK, fine. There are some things out there that I won’t be getting rid of, but the stuff that just sits out there? I don’t need that junk. Out it goes! Yay!

Oh! I know what else. The small hall closet is our linen closet. There are 3 twin beds in this house and now that the girls who used to sleep in them don’t live here anymore, we probably don’t need 14 sets of sheets for them. I think I could get by just fine with 6 sets. Even that may be a lot, but some of them are really nice and nearly new. Also, when all the towels are clean, they don’t fit in that closet. Not that I disapprove of having them in the bathroom cabinets, but the point is that we probably have too many towels, too.

So that’s ten or eleven categories. That’s enough to get the idea in my mind of what is taking up too much space in my house, and enough to get a good start on tackling it.