Monday, June 16, 2014

Change It Up.

There's a saying - a change is as good as a holiday. This may work with rearranging your furniture or finding a new job but for other things a holiday is needed so a change can happen.

Have I lost you yet?

Let me explain. I am forever rearranging furniture and the change of scenery is great for a month or so until I rearrange it again: we've been in this house three years now and I've rearranged my bedroom furniture at least five times. Looking at something new every now and then is good for you.

Though often we need to change ourselves and that's when getting away from it all comes in handy. We can tell ourselves we need to change and want to change but actually doing it is the hard part. Getting away and seeing how things CAN be is a great motivator to actually do it.

For four weeks we lived without clutter and with minimal internet access and it was awesome. I realised I don't utilise my time very well and that we have way too much 'stuff'. I kind of knew this before the holiday but actually getting away from it motivated me to do something about it.

I will make no excuses for the amount of time I'm on Facebook and have no qualms about it at all. Facebook connects me, for free, to friends and family who I love dearly and live hundreds of miles away either on the other side of Australia or the other side of the world. Let me tell you national and international calls are not cheap!
Despite my love affair with Facebook I will admit I no longer spend ages just scrolling through my news feed, multiple times a day, now I check it then find something to do.
It may seem like a strange thing to say but I find it really difficult to do anything with my two children around. I have hobbies - sewing and perfumery- and if I so much as think of fabric or essential oils my kids start fighting like a civil war just began. This in the past kept me in the living room or outside with them playing or looking on and doing nothing for myself while they were awake. Funny enough it never bothered the kids when I had to cook or clean, they'd just continue on playing, but the minute I tried to do something for me war broke out.

I'm sure any parents reading along know exactly what I'm talking about.

It left me feeling disappointed in myself at the end of each day. Sure the kids were fed, the house was clean and they had fun but I didn't DO anything. And the argument 'but you played with your children that's most important' doesn't work for me. Yes absolutely it's important to play with your kids and I love spending time doing just that but it's also important to do something for you each day as well not to mention kids also need to learn independence.

So I've been back two weeks and I'm utilising my time better, the motivation I picked up while away is holding strong. I exercise and have Hungarian lessons at rest time, I read when the kids are outside, I prepare dinner after breakfast and I've even managed to sneak in some sewing prep without that civil war breaking out.

Apparently all my kids needed was to see me motivated too.

Now about the clutter.

We have a LOT of stuff. I won't try to down play it,we own a lot of crap. And in fact a lot if it is just that, crap! My mother - who if you recall lives with us - is a hoarder. She's not quite at the stage where we need to call in a TV crew but she loves hanging on to random stuff for random reasons and she is also into the habit of buying something simply because it's cheap. Honestly she came home once with a bacon cooker because it cost only $2. It sat in the cupboard for a year before I threw it out. She hadn't even opened the box.
I realised a couple of years back I was on my way to becoming like her, a big no no in my book, so I was slowly improving my own habits. I used to hold onto boxes that my perfume came in because they were pretty. Each time I did a spring clean I would manage to throw out something I'd been holding onto for years and then right before our trip I did a major clean out and got rid of a heap of stuff. But we still have too much so this week I'm taking no prisoners if I haven't touched it in the past 6 months it will be finding a new home.

My wardrobe while away consisted of what I could fit in to half a suitcase. Five shirts, three pairs of jeans, three pairs of shoes, three jumpers, you get the drift, it wasn't a lot but I managed, and I was happy and I never once said "I have nothing to wear"!
So the day after we got home, when I had all my holiday clothes clean and ready to put away I went through my wardrobe and threw nearly everything out. Summer clothes were put away but only if I KNEW I would wear it come summer. I'm one of those people that holds onto items because it's still good and it may fit next season, or because it had a memory attached or simply because I liked it - even though I may not have worn it for a good three years, or more - this time round it ALL went.
Now my wardrobe is clean and stays that way. My drawers aren't over packed and I don't have a thousand pairs of shoes sitting around collecting dust. I did the same to the Husbands wardrobe too.

The next day, day three of being home, I attacked the toy room. For four weeks my children entertained themselves with only a handful of toys and their imaginations. It was brilliant. So the toy room got a tidy up. They still have far too much but I'm on a mission, I'm watching and if it's not played with by the end of the month it's going to the op shop.

Honestly if you can do it without the holiday I recommend it. De clutter you will feel amazing for it. We have stuff that we'll never even think of getting rid of. My Disney collection and the Husbands Lego collection being the main ones. But for everything else, well, do I really need 6 mixing bowls of varying sizes??

My original aim when writing this very long winded post was to let you all know about a challenge I'm starting, another way I'm utilising my time. It's a 30 day blogging challenge. Each day I have something different to write about and I'll try to make it blog related as much as I can.

It starts tomorrow so stay tuned.

Skye






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