DH and I have lived at this little place here for not quite 22.5 years. When we moved in, we had four kids. At the time, we thought, coming from a house just around 1200 sq ft to this house with two stories and a basement totaling about 2700 sq ft, that we had a lot of stuff.
I mean, it was six people's worth, right? Our old house had felt like it was bursting at the seams. And while it didn't fill our new house, it fit comfortably, but it still seemed like a lot.
Fast forward through four teenagers who accumulated more stuff, then four 'kids' that moved out and, except for one, moved back in again at least once, each of them bringing more stuff and sometimes more people and those people's stuff. Not to mention the things DH and I accumulated over time: homesteading things, hobby things, crafting things. . . things we inherited when our grandmothers passed away. . .things for our grandchildren to sit in, eat on, play with. . . things our own mothers have given to us from their own cleaning outs or helping to distribute usable goods of friends who have passed on from this world.
We did, over the course of 22 years, get rid of stuff we didn't think we needed to hold on to. Things that just didn't fit, or we already owned two of, or, honestly were not our taste. Yet, at this point, in 2026, my house is stuffed.
Too stuffed. Smotheringly stuffed. I Hate It stuffed. Off and on, in the last five years, DH and I have tried to pare down what's here. Kids who bought their first homes were told "Come get your stuff!" and, they did, for the most part, come look through what was left, take what they wanted, threw away what was unwanted/unneeded and unappealing to a second owner due to age or condition, and said "give away the rest".
'The rest', is part of the issue here. By leaving 'the rest', they passed on--to me-- responsibility for locating and transporting to it's proper passing on place. There's also my own and DH's own stuff that is pass-on-able, that needs the same treatment: where to pass it on to? How and when to get it there?
Some of it, I used to give away to various charities. But in the last ten years or so, it seems that charities have gotten pickier about what they will accept. You'd think a womens shelter would want clothing and bedding and towels. . . Around here, not so much. They want those things only if brand new, not if used, and even more than brand new they'd rather just have cash.
Same with furniture, household, and children's items. There are less places around me to give them to compared to a decade (or two) ago. Yes, there's online give it away options, but I've found that posting things on Craigslist or Facebook Marketplace these days is a real pain in the arse. People want them, yes, but it takes time to weed through the replies, set up a day and time for pick up and then have the person no-show, so on to the next person who showed interest and start the whole process over again.
For big things, like some dressers I got rid of last summer (why have eight??? dressers in a house where only two people live?) I went through that frustrating rigamorole. But there's such a volume of smaller things that it would be a full time job taking photos of and making postings for items then screening responses and arranging pick up appointments with people.
I just want it out of my house. I don't want to have to clone myself in order to have time to do all my normal daily tasks plus deal with the rehoming of goods. Honestly, there's some days I look at the piles and totes and stuffed closets and wish I had lower ethical standards and could just get a dumpster and spend a few hours tossing everything in, then happily wave goodbye when the trash company came and hauled the dumpster away.
But I can't. Because I'm too frugal, too environmentally conscious, too aware that there are people out there, somewhere, who would love to have this stuff perhaps even need some of it and can't afford to buy it from the second hand shops (like Goodwill, where we used to donate all our used but still usable clothes and housewares to).
I'm toying with the idea of having a 'free' sale this summer. Although that's all the work of a garage sale with zero of the profits. And, living in the boonies, garage sales around this little place here really don't draw a big enough attendance to solve the problem of getting rid of useful items we don't want/need anymore which was the whole reason to have a garage sale in the first place.
Earlier this winter, I did donate a large bag of coats and a second large bag of nice ladies clothing to the local food and clothing bank. It didn't make a dent in the amount of things still here that would be perfectly useful to someone else. I have several bags of bedding, towels, and old sweatshirts that animal rescues are happy to have. Problem is, those animal rescues are all at least a half-hour drive from here, in directions that neither DH nor I have a reason to go in hardly ever. And that's the moral dilemma again:
Trash? It would be so much easier time-wise and in cost (gas, wear and tear on the vehicle used). We hardly ever even half-fill our trash bin that gets picked up weekly, I could, over time throw away all these things without it costing more for trash removal. But I know every item is a useful thing, and doesn't belong in a landfill yet. Oh, the guilt of the thought of throwing it away rather than taking an hour or more of time, plus making an appointment for a specific day and time (and arranging my schedule around it) to drive it to a place that would make use of it.
Donate? Where? And when will I be in that area without a special trip and several hours devoted to just that? This right here is the main reason I still have so much stuff that just needs to get out of my house.
I just want it out.
