Keep, Donate, Sell, Toss

Well, we did it! Thanks to the over 20 people who came today in about 2 shifts, we made more progress than I thought was possible for one day! Old friends, former and current colleagues who I’m thankful to also call friends, and family - it was the perfect mix of everyone. 

We got sh*t DONE. The furnace room got emptied of the items for donation and trash, and the glasses & dishes from the dining room were all packed away in boxes where they will remain until we move back in later this fall. But the real transformation happened in the garage. 

Our now garage will ultimately become our new primary bed and bathroom so sadly, the baseball wagons, bikes, and planting pots cannot not stay. Neither can all of the other crap that has accumulated over the years. I’ll let you see the pictures to understand just how much stuff we are talking about but needless to say, our boys owe each of the people who helped throw stuff away a debt of gratitude. (David and I do too but the boys don’t realize what a gift this is for THEM.) 

Our dedicated crew showed up to work and worked hard until the very end. We used tarps to designate keep, sell, and donate - and then we had two great big bagsters for all of the trash. All of this was a bit too reminiscent of that old reality TV show where they had hoarders sort out their stuff into keep, sell, trash - and then sell it all in a yard sale. We’re skipping the yard sale but otherwise, it’s pretty on target.  

Bagster will come this week to get the dumpster bags, the donation truck will come Monday morning, and over the course of the next week we’ll see how much we can sell from that sell pile. (Any one wanna buy a kayak?) In the coming weeks, we’ll have a company bring in a shed we purchased to hold the items from the garage we know we need to keep so the garage can be completely ready for its transformation. 

Today marked the first physical action at our house that foreshadows the changes and the work still to come. And as always, we were surrounded by friends and family who are walking with us each step of the way. 

Thanks to all who came today - and a huge, huge thank you to Michelle and Stephanie for organizing this whole day. Today wouldn’t have happened without them. 

And for those of you who wish you’d been able to come - no worries, there will be more opportunities coming soon. I promise! :-) 

Erika