Beau’s New and Spacious Room
It’s funny how deep issues are reflected in mundane activities. Last month I switched the guest room and Beau’s room. Beau’s room was the size of your typical bedroom in a new house – small with just enough room for a bed, a dresser, and a desk, and not much space for playing. On the other hand the guest room was twice the size of Beau’s room with two closets and oodles of space to play and spread out. It was silly to cramp Beau’s style. The switch was an easy decision.
I had a grand time setting up a twin bed for him with new bedding, moving the recliner in there, and arranging his toy shelves and bookcases just so. The best part was moving his slide in there and getting it out of our family room. The end result was simple, functional, and roomy. Perfect.
And then came my battle with the guest room. Well, it’s a guest room for only a few weeks out of the year. When my mom (our only visitor for the most part) isn’t here it has become a catch-all for papers, projects, out-of-season clothes, outgrown clothes, things that I will someday use. My battle with this room is never ending. It has always been this way, through three houses.
It’s not that I can’t organize things… I have boxes of file folders waiting to be filled, empty plastic bins to keep things in an orderly fashion, and tons of closet space to effectively store these items. Do I do any of this? No. So while I pour over Nesting Place ( I seriously adore everything about her house and her philosophy) I think to myself I can so get my house together for real. And then I start….and then I call it quits. And I finally realized why. It’s not just about filing bills and organizing clothes. It should be. Instead it’s about me facing all those decisions that in hindsight I regret having made. So while Beau’s room is about the future, this room is stuck in the past for me. And this year I am determined to tackle it and my issues once and for all.
The Guestroom…My Battleground
Thauna says
Hmm, decisions you regret? ….I too have a problem with organizing certain aspects of my home/life and I’ve never been able to figure out the why. I let bills/mail pile up because I don’t want to face them (the bills). In the past I’ve let go of things to find myself looking for them and then realizing I gave or threw them away. Of course I only needed them after I got rid of them. So now I’m afraid to get rid of anything until I’m absolutely certain I’ll never need or want it again. How long does something have to be unused before I can make that decision? 1 yr, 5 yrs,??? Maybe someday I’ll get this under control, hopefully before I end up on an episode of Hoarders. LOL
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Wendy H says
Yikes! My bedroom! I’ll help you in May if Beau will let me camp out in his awesome space. <3
Lori says
Hm. I hadn’t really thought about this as a reason for avoiding organization. Some things are so easy for me to slap into organization, but others are so difficult. Looking around my apartment, I want to do better because it all feels so suffocating and unmanageable at times. I wonder if my productivity will increase if I get things in order. Probably. But it’s all about confrontation, like you said.
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Haley Kline says
I tackled a lot from my past in my recent “purging of the closets” as I shall call it. I got rid of a lot of stuff that I was originally very afraid to get rid of. Sentimentality I guess. Then I looked at all the wasted space that was being taken up by stuff that I never used or looked at. I held on to those things that mattered most, like my Grandpa’s fur church hats and the few Christmas decorations that have been in the family for a long time. The rest of it just seemed like junk after I really looked at it. It was easier to let go of this time. Not sure why, but it was. Hope you have that same clarity when you tackle to project again!
Holli says
I think that really makes sense Lizzi…… I can agree with avoiding piles of stuff so you don’t have to face what’s in them. I really can.
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Lisa says
Here’s the deal. Devote 30 minutes every day to the room. Just like on all of the organizing shows, start with 3 boxes: keep, give away, throw away. I always give myself a fourth box, though–still need to think about it. You’ll be surprised by how quickly you make progress. And every day you’ll find that you’re putting less and less in that “still need to think about it” box.
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Rachel says
Ah, I totally know the feeling. I need to take everything out of the laundry “room” (a glorified walk-in closet in the basement, really) and start over. I love Nesting Place, too, BTW.