Starting the New Year with Less Clutter

Before Ed and I headed off to Albany for Christmas, we collectively decluttered the main floor of our house - except for a few "dumping grounds". We came back from Albany with loads of loot (compliments of Santa and Grandma Lynn) and realized that our current organization system was at its breaking point.

Ed banished himself to the basement where toys go to die in our house, and was able to nearly fill my home office with discards for the next person who walks in my home with a toddler. Don't say you weren't warned. There's loads of floor space now and it is finally an inviting playspace. He removed the storage cabinet doors so they would function as shelves, and now the kids can actually see the toys. Novel idea, I know! These shelves now house the musical instruments and most of the toy cars / planes / tractors, etc. Ed also tossed out all furniture on our patio that we one day hoped to restore. It's never going to happen, and it's embarrassing telling company to please not sit on a particular chair because it can't hold anything that weighs more than Helen (a robust 27 pounds these days).

I took to the main floor of the house and managed to (1) get the illegal daycare center that Helen runs under control; (2) get the building toys onto a hard surface so Connor didn't have to deal with building on carpet; (3) toss out a few bags of trash; (4) move all outside toys to bins in deck - a project accomplished mostly by Connor; and (5) construct a marble run with Connor though admittedly, he ran out of energy for the project before I did.

Behold!

Plan toys, stacked on upper shelves, grocery store near couch, FLOOR SPACE!

Helen's illegal daycare, which has been a baby hospital lately with lots of babies with broken arms. She insisted the "hospital vacuum" be added.

Most of the marble run - more pieces to come!

What you can't see are the neat boxes of legos, trains, and track pieces and the lovely set of shelves with many beautiful handmade toys. Every time I cleared a space, Helen couldn't wait to go play in it - so not only does the house look better, it's way more functional with a lot less stuff! Now, hopefully she doesn't notice how many things were removed!

Happy New Year, all!
Elaine