12 September, 2008

heading into fall...

Classes start in about two weeks, and for the first time I am taking a class that I care nothing about and one that I am terrified about. Of course, if I would sit down and study instead of surfing the net...or sleeping...I wouldn't be so apprehensive. So, if E stays asleep once I hit publish I will go and do that. Or maybe clean the kitchen.
Our month of no spending made it to almost 2 months of no spending, which was pretty amazing for us. E decided yesterday to break C's phone, unfortunately, and I do mean break, so we went to the mall (augh!) and got him a new one. At least he was eligible for upgrade. Unfortunately, we did not get a free-upgrade phone. Nope, my tech-junkie hubby got an iPhone. Which, granted, is a blast to play with and I lurve it, but still. Not necessary. I also decided that when I upgrade (as my phone has been having issues for quite a while, such as turning off randomly, battery not working, battery not charging, sim card not registering, etc.) I will not be getting an iPhone for myself. I saw a cute little phone I would like instead, and if they have a similar one that is *free* I'll get that. I am waiting until my phone really truly dies though. We also returned to Costco and, amazingly, didn't buy much. Still more than we really needed, but about 1/2 of what we used to buy. Baby steps, indeed. That should be it for a while, it helps to stay away from stores though. Oh, right, C needs shoes. Because his are broken (how does his stuff get broken so fast) and then we are done. Oh, wait, we need to repair his bike. I think we are truly done then? I already know what I am making for gifts for the holidays/birthdays, I just need to get on that. Oh, right, and no-shopping does not apply to food, although really we have so much food that I manage to put it off for over a month each time. We are really blessed.
We are entering phase 2: get rid of all this crap! We were in our friend's nice, almost-empty apartment the other day, and when we came back I said "I'm jealous of A&B's place. C agreed; "yeah, what IS all this crap?" So I am going through and getting rid. Baby stuff has to wait until almost the end of the month; Jellibeanz takes trade-in, so I'll be going there and then whatever they don't take I am donating to Sienna House, which is where I donated my maternity clothes and whatever non-kosher food we get in our food bundles. I am also tempted to give the trade-in voucher to A&B for baby K, but we'll see.
The main problem with our place is my stuff. My craft stuff, actually. I just have so much of it, and it is taking up way too much space. A lot of it is going to become gifts and stuff for my etsy shop (once I sell my patterns I am going to turn it into a real shop) but still, way too much. I realised the other day that I actually detest doing papier-mache, so I recycled all the supplies. This may not seem like much, but I was raised by a packrat daughter of a packrat to be a packrat, and it is HARD to undo that many years of training. Seriously, my grandmother has an apartment full of stuff, and half a house full of stuff. My mom is almost as bad. I am going to get there, but it takes some doing. Ok, a lot of doing. My big problem with getting rid of stuff is finding some place to donate it. Craft supplies, for the most part, I can't recycle, and I know if I can't find a taker it will just go in the trash and I cannot STAND knowing that perfectly usable items are going to the dump. Ugh. Oh right, and all those patterns? (I have rescued close to 400 from going into the garbage) I have decided I am DONE storing them. The truly vintage are going on etsy, the rest I am dividing into manageable bundles of kind and giving them away. Hi, Freecycle! You are my friend! There's a burden off my mind. oh, and several boxes out from under the desk.
When we move, I want it to be simple and fast, and I do not want to be burdened with boxes and boxes of "what is this, and why do we have it?" It's not a good feeling to be wallowing in stuff, and I want to get back to how it was when I first moved out on my own, before my previous 23 years of stuff caught up with me.
Well, I'm going to go work on that a bit more. Or perhaps study. We'll see.

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