January Purge

[ejchase]

I have this ongoing fantasy that one of these years I'm going to manage to average 100 items out of the house each month and 1,200 out for the year. But, so far, the most I've reached is in the 700s. Nevertheless, I think keeping a count of what I get rid of is a nice, gentle motivator to keep purging.

This past weekend, my daughter and I went through her clothes, and even though we found plenty to get rid of, I was struck by the fact that most of her clothes still fit her or have just recently become too small. That's a consequence, I think, of the fact that she and I have gone through them pretty regularly these last couple of years so we haven't kept too many pieces longer than we needed to.

Anyway, got eight books out the door yesterday to the little free library at the college where I work. A little baby step to start off with.

[Teacher Terry]

The 700 items is still impressive. I do better with big chunks of time versus daily but everyone is different. With kids new items are always coming in. Plus all the purging made me very aware of what I bring in. I ask myself before buying something if it will end up in the thrift store a few years from now. I wasn’t always like this.

[klunick]

I think I'm slowly running out of things to purge. After a couple big purges recently and not having a lot of stuff to start with, I think I might have hit a good "comfort" level. I do have to stop myself sometimes when I think about saving something (like a box a delivery came in) and remind myself to not keep it. The only things to go through are the attic and our detached garage which houses my husband's stuff so it will probably never be dealt with. I did tell my husband that I want to go up in the attic this weekend and remove stuff I put up there like old car seats/baby gates/fishing poles for littles. That way, I can tell myself that whatever is left is his to deal with. I have done my share.

[iris lilies]

iris 2009 068.jpg010.jpg

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Today at 1 PM we purge two tiny houses. yay!

These photos show the extensive work we (err, really DH) did on them. We will recover 90% of our out of pocket costs, and 0% for the hundreds of hours of labor DH put into these properties. But that is all ok--we stabilized these little houses and made that corner of this neighborhood better. DH did much of the work on the frame house but he did not do work on the tall brick house that required scaffolding. He "doesnt get high" haha, meaning he hates heights.

The first photo shows how extensive was the work DH did himself. Not only removing all plaster down to the studs, removing ALL cladding. Pretty dramatic! I know this little frame house looks like looks a generic shack from the 1920-1940 era. But no! It is very old, one of the oldest structures in that part of the city. It dates from 1860's. Frame houses are unusual in my city's historic districts because a law went into effect in the 1890's requiring everything to be built with brick due to fire risk.

The brick house behind it is later, circa 1875. The brick house is very odd because it has 6 exterior doors. It has only 4 rooms. Crazy.

We bought these houses because there was extra land around them. The property came with a vacant lot on the left side of the frame house, and the large lot on the right side is owned by the city. I leased the large lot for 10 years as a big flower garden. The city wouldn't sell it to me, holding out for a developer.

At one time we thought we might move to this property, in an adjacent neighborhood to our current one, but it didn't get much better over the years we owned it. Still has too many criminals and low lifers living there. In a recent year we were out weeding in the big lot and a gun battle took place nearby with the shooter careening down our street in his car. While gun battles aren't entirely out of the ordinary around here, I just am tired of it. 30 years of it. Done with the current city's administration and prosecutor who won't take action on many obvious criminal events due to incompetence and her philosophy.

[Teacher Terry]

So cool IL that you saved those old homes. I definitely wouldn’t want to live somewhere that’s not safe.

[ejchase]

The 700 items is still impressive. I do better with big chunks of time versus daily but everyone is different. With kids new items are always coming in. Plus all the purging made me very aware of what I bring in. I ask myself before buying something if it will end up in the thrift store a few years from now. I wasn’t always like this.

Yes, I definitely think purging has helped me buy less. I was so shocked on Sunday to see how many clothes my daughter has. I really think that will prevent me from buying more for her for a while.

[Gardnr]

https://www.inquirer.com/real-estate...i7BaDrLdROwmXY

Speaks for itself! This is BRILLIANT!

[rosarugosa]

https://www.inquirer.com/real-estate...i7BaDrLdROwmXY

Speaks for itself! This is BRILLIANT!

Great story! There's even a Tibetan singing bowl!

[Tybee]

IL, what a lovely legacy you are leaving for your city! Well done.

[ejchase]

https://www.inquirer.com/real-estate...i7BaDrLdROwmXY

Speaks for itself! This is BRILLIANT!

Great idea!