Enough melancholy. It’s time for me to get active and create some physical peace around me. Renos are at a pause. I’m back at work. It’s time.
Things have been changing over at my parents’ – more and more people visiting and moving in! To make space we’ve been moving over the last of my things for the final big real consolidation. Reconnecting with my possessions raises a number of questions: what should I do with all my old journals? How much mess can baby make with a basket of yarn? What storage method is best for the big pile of photo albums?
Starting with the third question: I’ve found the time to continue with a project I barely started before baby came to transfer my non-amazing photos from albums to photo boxes. In fact, the only part of this project completed pre-baby was buying two boxes and cutting some more dividers for the sections. In the past few days I’ve motored through de-albuming 3 books of photos which are now culled (somewhat), sorted and labeled. Baby is helping by ripping pages out of the next album I plan to tackle. I hope the final product is a more select, more compact record of my obsession with photographing random people and buildings.
My journals are another story. I’ve got a small container full plus some scattered ones. I did destroy an earlier journal from high school because it embarrassed me to reread it. Some of these probably will too, but I feel more nostalgic now. They will probably stay to be dealt with later. The ones from time in Russia are waiting to be reread when I write up stories from there.
The yarn, from a blanket I was crocheting, is strung across the dining room floor. Once we removed the paper yarn covers (way too tasty!) baby has enjoyed pulling on and pulling apart the balls. I’ve been trying to roll balls from the things but seem to always get the wrong end (knitters will appreciate the extra work involved here!).
Tonight I also pulled out two outfits, now hanging neatly in the closet, for my two days of work this week. I got this idea from a friend and hang the outfits with underwear and sometimes jewelry. I need to streamline my mornings if I’m going to get to work on time and get out of there at a decent hour each day.
Husband and I also talked about managing housework and food prep. We’ve decided to make time on Sundays to prepare some food for the week together. More organized, more collaborative, less stress during the week. I haven’t yet set up menu plans again (we were doing them for a couple of months and it worked well) but that is on the horizon too.
All told, I can see some progress in pulling together a more manageable physical environment and it makes me happy. Oh yes, and peaceful.