Take a Deep Breath

Ned came to visit today.  He finds himself with free time and wants to help us clean up.  I had him do a couple of things in my office that I am no longer able to do (too heavy, too high) and we talked about to make the office "workable."

He's done many of these massive clean-ups (one here, before our 50th anniversary party) and is an expert at it.  He says that the only way it can be done is to remove EVERYTHING, use the living room as a "staging area," go through each piece of furniture and start to throw away.

The reason this room is so furniture heavy is that I brought home all of Gilbert's furniture after he died and couldn't bear to part with it, so fit it in this teeny office....somehow.  But we're coming up on the 30th annversary of his death and I've resigned myself to the fact that he ain't coming back and I'm ready to get rid of this furniture and other things I've held on for 30 years.

This comes at a good time because I just saw a photo of someone who had done a craft room remodel and I loved it.  It was very simple and clean, but a bunch of shelves, each of which could hold plastic containers with craft supplies.  That would be absolutely wonderful.  I've been looking for that photo again, but can't find it, but its something like this:

Not exactly this, but something on this order, perhaps a bit wider.  Maybe my set builder husband could build something that would fit, once we remove all the junk from here.

If we're going to do this thing, I want to do it right so we don't have to think about doing it ever, ever again.  We are at an age where whenever we replace an appliance or something else "big" we say that this is the last one we will ever have to buy.

The advantage of doing this while Ned is available to help is that when/if we ever decide to move out of this house and into something smaller, this room is, for me, the biggest stumbling block.  If I can get this stumbling block out of the way, the rest won't exactly be a piece o'cake, but will be much easier for me.  The things of sentimental value for me are all in this office.  The rest I could, with perhaps a bit of sadness, but with no real painful twinge, let go of.

So someone asked for before and after photos a couple of weeks ago when I was going to straighten up (and then got sidetracked, so I will post them now and then when/if we actually finish this project, take pictures during and after.  So here it is, in all its glory.  The top row is the left side of my office from where I sit at my desk, the bottom is the right side.

As you can see...this may take some time!!!