Spring Cleaning Week: Bedrooms and Bathrooms

Today, Simple Mom addressess bedrooms and bathrooms. She talks about how these areas are often neglected, though bedrooms need to be a sacred respite (which is not even close to possible if you are the type to stash EVERYTHING in your bedroom--not me, but I know a few...). This has been another busy day, so I am just now reading the article. Here is how I have connected it to my own life.

Bathrooms: First, I do not keep my medicine in the bathroom, because moisture and medicine are not a good combination. It is kept on ONE shelf, high in my kitchen. I have a linen closet (which DESPERATELY needs to be decluttered... I'll add that to my "to do" list), so I don't store towels in the bathroom. I don't personally know anyone who store sheet sets in their bathroom, but I will be applying the store-the-sheets-in-one-of-the-pillowcases idea to my linen closet! I like the tying-sets-together-with-a-ribbon idea as well, but it seems like something Martha would do and is not so practical for me. Now that I am thinking about it, I am actually fairly clutter-free in my bathrooms... What's up with that?!! Still, I think I will go through the cupboards and just toss anything that I never use because I forgot it was in there.

The Kiddo's Bedroom: I do have Anastasia help me purge her room from time-to-time (particularly before and after holidays, because people spoil her way too much). We've done it enough that now she will just bring a toy to me every now and then and say, "Mom, I don't want this anymore. Let's give it to another kid who doesn't have toys." Not only is this great for helping to declutter, but it warms my heart and makes me feel like I'm doing my job in helping her realize what it means to be a good human being.

I cannot have her in the room when I am trying to find old clothes to remove from the rotation because she has a very strong attachment to certain clothing items, even if they don't fit her anymore. When I do have a moment to sneak out an item (that sounds bad, but you know what I mean...), I have a big gift bag waiting in another room that I toss it into. Once the bag gets full, I sort through it, pulling out items that I cannot bear to get rid of (these go into a size-labeled plastic storage tub in the garage, hopefully to be used by a future sibing) and keeping the rest in the bag, which I then take to work and hand-down to a colleague who has two girls. This system seems to work well for everyone involved!

We don't keep too many toys in her room, aside from dolls and books. There is a shelf for the books and a big wicker basket for the dolls. My sister made a dress-up chest that is in the room, too. Other than that, toys are stored in the living room.

I really like Simple Mom's idea of having kids be involved in deciding what is useful and beautiful in their room. I am going to have to try that, for sure. It sounds very empowering.

Master Bedroom: The only real "to do" item in this room is tackle my closet again. Though I did this for both the warm and cold seasons last year, I know there are still plenty of clothing items that I never wear, but are somehow difficult for me to just take out and get rid of. So, I will try again. If I know I haven't worn the article of clothing, I will put the item in a bag, out of site. If I haven't looked for anything in a month, the whole bag goes!

I have a recent experience with the involving-husband-in-decorating idea. The year we got married, I painted an abstract couple standing in an embrace. It is hanging above our bed. The colors of the painting no longer match our bedroom decor (...four residences later...) and the painting is smaller than what I would like to see in that space. So, the other day, I mentioned that I was thinking of painting something new to hang in that spot above our bed. This casual remark was quickly met with J asking me "Why?" and "But, where will this painting go?". Huh. In over ten years, I had no idea he had any sort of attachment to that painting.