What’s Your Favorite Color?

Money Money Money!

Mine is green, the color of sweet, sweet moola. When Mike and I got serious about the cunningness of our little plan, we looked at all the ‘stuff’ we were going to be tossing out and realized just how much money we actually throw away on things we have barely used, not to mention all the crap we bought our kids that THEY hardly used. So up went the Craigslist ads and back onto Ebay I went. We opened a savings account and dedicated all of our funds from the sale of our junk to that account. We don’t even buy a latte with that money.

Thanks to our dogged determination to list things until they sell, and the magic of the interweb, our account is growing. Today we sold a sewing machine and an old ship’s porthole that’s just been sitting around in my yard. We’re getting quite a nice little nest egg started in that account. If I had to spend that money on a boat thing I could buy a sail, or a set of new cushions, or new running rigging, or half of a new autopilot, or radar, or 2/3 of a head sail furler…  Suffice to say that I am easily pleased by any progress we make at this point.

To date, here is what I deeply regret having tossed out: Nothing.

Here is what I marginally regret having tossed out: Nothing.

I believe I am ready for the Great Purge, Part 2. Anyone need an old dresser to refinish? I’m your girl. $125.00. Burled maple. Beveled mirror. Cash only. You pick up in my Lakewood location.

Really great old chest of drawers needs new home. Maybe yours? Because I know you need a project.

 

 

Ho Ho……Holy Crap!

Tis the season, as they say. Sleighbells ring, jingle bells, deck the halls, Santa Claus, and all of that stuff. And the long, dark nights of the year. I’m excited because soon the winter solstice will be upon us and we can celebrate the return of the sun. I’m slighly pagan at this time of year, in spite of my traditional Christian upbringing.

The downside to all this festivity is the decorating. Yes, I certainly DO enjoy beautiful holiday decor, and I enjoy all the pretty lights this time of year. I even smile at the pitiful rooftop santas. But it’s hard to bring a smile to my lips as I’m faced with the sheer number of boxes of Christmas crap that are stored in my attic. I took down 15 boxes of Christmas stuff, collected over the 30 or so years of marriage and two children who loved crafts. I felt like the beast of burden who carried Mary, heavy with child, as I carried each heavy box down the attic stairs and deposited it on the family room floor. At least the donkey could deposit Mary and then rest. At least Mary had Jesus to look forward to after her labors. All I had at the end of my labor was a big mess. And a determination to get rid of half of this stuff.

“Are you getting rid of all your cute little Christmas Village houses?” my neighbor asked. “I don’t know.”, I said. I say this when I am afraid to commit myself to dumping things that I can still visualize being ‘cute’ when set up a certain way. But the ancient and frightening stuffed vintage Santa? Out! The victorian house cookie jar? Gone. I’ve never used a cookie jar in my life. Cookies don’t last long enough in my house to warrant a jar. Any cookie that is going to last that long has to be stuffed into the back of the freezer in a ziploc bag.  Also gone is an entire box of ornaments that I’ve always kept because I bought them when the kids were small, along with a box of ornaments I used when Andrew was too little to be trusted close to a tree with breakable ornaments. I haven’t used them in years, but I always felt like I had to keep them. I’ve decided that rule is silly.

Instead I’ve created a small box for each child to store the precious things they made over the years. Claire’s box will have her little stuffed santa, and the pinecone wise men and wizards. Andrew’s box will have his little clay candle holder, his styrofoam heart with smelly potpourri glued to the outside, and his salt dough dinosaurs in fancy colors.

Those boxes will also contain all of the ornaments I’ve bought the kids over the years so that they would have a box to take with them when they have their own homes. We’ve had a tradition in our family that on Christmas eve each child receives an ornament and a new pair of pajamas. We allowed them to open these two gifts by way of bribing them to sleep late on Christmas morning. Now that they are 19 and 26, I feel sure I can forgo the buying of more ornaments that will mean more to me than to them. I might still consider pajamas, though.

Among the things I’m keeping is my collection of miniature ornaments. I always look forward to these each year. They are made by Hallmark, and I used to buy them every year. I think I can find a place on a sailboat for these little ornaments so that we can have an actual Christmas tree, no matter where we are in the world. I didn’t even consider getting rid of any of them.

The results of my labors are such that I will have maybe 3 or 4 boxes of actual ornaments to go into the attic at the end of the season. Half of my Victorian village made the cut, so I get to have my cake and eat it, too, on that subject. If it’s too much of a pain to set them up and pack them away this year, then they’ll go after the holidays. In all, a fairly rewarding purge, and almost painless.

Update on the furniture situation: thank God for sisters! Between my two sisters, over the Thanksgiving weekend I parted with two chairs, a cabinet, a rug, a desk, a set of china, a silver tea service, and various other bits and pieces, enabling me to move even more stuff into the garage staging area. The great purge continues!

Craigslist Lament

The Shabby Chic table: Sold for $50.

  So, it’s been awhile since I’ve updated this blog and I thought I better get to it. This is the time of year when I feel most like doing nothing; just laying around in bed eating bonbons all day or looking at boats on Yachtworld.com ( a personal weakness that borders on addiction).  But since I don’t eat bonbons anyhow, and I am supposed to be using this blog as the proverbial fire under the hind end, I’ve actually been making progress at home, even if not on the blog.  See?  It’s working!

When I last posted, I was commenting on the sheer number of pieces of furniture we’ve collected over the course of a 29 year marriage. I’m coming to terms with disposing of some of those pieces and now I feel the urge to comment about the use of Craigslist as a tool for selling unnecessary items.  To be more precise, I feel the urge to complain about my Craigslist experience.

The promise of Craiglist, that of easy, free posting of unwanted items which will soon be sold to people just waiting to buy, is a fantasy. At least the second part is a fantasy. Yes, the posting is free, and fairly easy, even if it does take some time. But the part about people waiting to buy said items really must exist only in my rather too-vivid imagination.  To date I have spent around 4 hours photographing and posting items on Craigslist and I have sold exactly one item, a little white Victorian table, for $50, which is $25 less than what I listed it for. That amount of work has earned me $12.50/hour and 1.5 square feet of floor space.  I think the only reason the table sold is that I used the term ‘Shabby Chic’ in the title.

We’ve had a number of emails asking if this item or that is still available, and then when I email back that it is available….. NOTHING! What is wrong with these people? Or maybe they don’t actually want the item, only to know if we still have it, like they need to be reassured that it will be there whenever they are ready.Or perhaps they email only so they can laugh as they expertly dash our hopes of an easy sale.  Or maybe they are  lonely people who email others just for the joy of getting an email back.

I wonder if the problem is deeper than that, however. I wonder if our sales problem lies more within a change that appears to be happening across the country, if not across all western nations. I wonder if the problem we’re having with selling our ‘stuff’ to others is because overall, people are getting tired of accumulating all that stuff in the first place. It’s no accident that there are so many books on downsizing, clearing clutter, etc. and that there is a movement to build smaller houses. It seems like collectively we have already ridden the crest of the wave that allowed us to collect and sell lots of ‘things’. I wish there were data that compared the relative ‘success’ of a garage sale now to one held 10 years ago.

And although many people do not have the extra cash now that they did 10 years ago, this ‘buying less’ mentality is not limited to the cash-strapped masses. CnnMoney published an article this month stating that even the wealthiest people in the U.S. (defined as those making more than $130,000/year) will be buying fewer gifts this Christmas. Maybe I’m not defined as ‘wealthy’, but I can assure you I am among those who will buy less. Patagonia recently announced they are starting a new campaign to get people to buy fewer things, focusing on buying better quality and making those things last. Why, that’s downright UN-AMERICAN! Frankly, it looks like just a smart marketing strategy since, according to a recent New York Times article  people appear to be holding onto things longer across the board; making them last; repairing rather than tossing things and replacing them. Our mothers and grandmothers could give us a lot of advice about this.

Putting two and two together leads me to believe that his evolution of values we are experiencing means that eventually there will be fewer items for sale on Craigslist. So you’d think that people would be rushing to buy our things in anticipation of the times of scarcity! Don’t these people prepare for the future? Maybe I should re-title my listings: THE END TIMES ARE UPON US! BUY THIS NOW BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE. ALSO: SHABBY CHIC!!!  I’ve heard that the more exclamation points a listing has, the more people pay attention.  No? Okay. But if that doesn’t work, we’ll have to have a garage sale in December.  Cash only, you pick up at our Lakewood location. Haggling cheerfully accepted.

 

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