November Purge

[Klunick]

Bought a set of neutral kitchen towels so that I could finally declutter all (8 in total) seasonal kitchen towels.

[rosarugosa]

Mom is at the stage where she is only wearing PJs or sweats, so I culled a bag of nice winter sweaters and scarves to be donated. I'm planning to do more of the same this weekend. I know the smaller thrift stores really want clothing that is in season, so now is the prime opportunity to donate winter items. A couple of the sweaters were stained. I treated and washed them, but the stains remained, so I put them in the fabric recycling bin. I felt a little bit guilty at not expending more effort, but one has to choose how to expend one's limited time and energy. I think our main goal is to avoid hastily trashing perfectly good items after she is gone, so we're doing pretty well with that. She has a lot of clothing (like mother, like daughters as far as that goes).

We also had lunch yesterday with two very dear friends. We go back to when we ranged in age from 0 - 5, and they were very fond of my Mom and always kept in touch. We had them choose pieces of her fine jewelry, and they seemed extremely touched and pleased. Sis and I felt really good about it, and we know former Mom in her right mind would definitely have approved. In fact, I have a little handwritten list that is at least 30 years old, of people whom Mom wanted us to give something meaningful from her after she was gone, and these women were on the list.

[Tybee]

Mom is at the stage where she is only wearing PJs or sweats, so I culled a bag of nice winter sweaters and scarves to be donated. I'm planning to do more of the same this weekend. I know the smaller thrift stores really want clothing that is in season, so now is the prime opportunity to donate winter items. A couple of the sweaters were stained. I treated and washed them, but the stains remained, so I put them in the fabric recycling bin. I felt a little bit guilty at not expending more effort, but one has to choose how to expend one's limited time and energy. I think our main goal is to avoid hastily trashing perfectly good items after she is gone, so we're doing pretty well with that. She has a lot of clothing (like mother, like daughters as far as that goes).

We also had lunch yesterday with two very dear friends. We go back to when we ranged in age from 0 - 5, and they were very fond of my Mom and always kept in touch. We had them choose pieces of her fine jewelry, and they seemed extremely touched and pleased. Sis and I felt really good about it, and we know former Mom in her right mind would definitely have approved. In fact, I have a little handwritten list that is at least 30 years old, of people whom Mom wanted us to give something meaningful from her after she was gone, and these women were on the list.

Well done, Rosa! I definitely felt that responsibility both before and after Mom's death, to make sure the people she wanted to have things got them, and I feel her approval even now.

[rosarugosa]

Thanks, Tybee!

[happystuff]

Ditto, Tybee - good job, rosa!

[iris lilies]

Yesterday I unfurled a string of icycle lights, ones I had purchased from Goodwill last year. Last year I didn’t really like them after all anfter putting them up. This year I was kinda hoping they wouldn’t work when I plugged them in because then I could pitch them. Half of the string didn’t work so yay, I got to pitch them.

[iris lilies]

Thanks, Tybee!

That is nice of you to not dump sweaters on the second hand stores in July.

I wouldn’t worry about using your life’s energy to dispose of clothing responsibly. There is FAR too much clothing in the U.S. Documentaries show the tons of clothes that are shipped overseas or are destroyed as rags. It’s just horrible. And I find the “fashion industry’s“ feeble attempts to address the monster they’ve created, fast fashion, with their “sustainable “ efforts to be entirely laughable. They are a bunch of morons when it comes to earth friendly practices.

That said, I am the first to run old episodes of Project Runway again and again.

[rosarugosa]

Good point, Iris. I think I felt bad because the sweaters were both quite nice, one of them really nice and showing little wear, because Mom always bought decent quality clothing.
In retrospect, that should have been one of the first red flags to the earlier stages of her dementia journey. She had an entire rack of clothing set up in the upstairs hallway (despite having 3 bedrooms with closets and a few dressers all to herself). When I really delved into it, each item had some stains that needed to be treated. Rather that treating and laundering, items just went on the rack. Mom was always impossibly fussy about laundry, and sometimes couldn't live up to her own standards. At the time, I took stuff home, treated and laundered, and got rid of items that were still stained. The rack got emptied completely.
I had a good visit with her yesterday, and I took away another bag of winter sweaters.

[Tybee]

Good point, Iris. I think I felt bad because the sweaters were both quite nice, one of them really nice and showing little wear, because Mom always bought decent quality clothing.
In retrospect, that should have been one of the first red flags to the earlier stages of her dementia journey. She had an entire rack of clothing set up in the upstairs hallway (despite having 3 bedrooms with closets and a few dressers all to herself). When I really delved into it, each item had some stains that needed to be treated. Rather that treating and laundering, items just went on the rack. Mom was always impossibly fussy about laundry, and sometimes couldn't live up to her own standards. At the time, I took stuff home, treated and laundered, and got rid of items that were still stained. The rack got emptied completely.
I had a good visit with her yesterday, and I took away another bag of winter sweaters.

Any wool sweaters should absolutely be donated because felters use them (I have bought them myself to felt.)

[rosarugosa]

Any wool sweaters should absolutely be donated because felters use them (I have bought them myself to felt.)

Mom is allergic to wool, so none of those I'm afraid. She was all about cotton or fleece.