A Clean Start

A clean start (also known as a fresh start, but I'm sticking with 'clean' for this post).  Isn't that what we've all wished for at least once in our lives?  The chance to erase past problems, mistakes, or regrets, and start all over again.  A chance to do things differently, better, with a more happy result.

With the new year soon to begin, I've decided to make a clean start, of sorts.

Don't worry, I'm not leaving this little place here.  Not changing my marital status; we're at 18 1/2 and shooting for 20, LOL!  I'm still going to be an involved mom, an ever-present part of my children's lives while they are still at home. 

My clean start is with my house.  It's slid way too far down the slope of disorganization, clutter, and ever growing dust bunnies. It's not like the health department is going to condemn it or anything; no, it's just that I'm a person who thrives on order, and the house (well, more than the house--the garage, the garden, even the barn) has become a stressful chaotic mess.  This hasn't been an overnight thing.  Or even a 'December is so busy getting ready for Christmas' thing.  Nope, it's taken a few years to get to this point, and I'm just not going to let it go any further.  This is my rock bottom of disorder.

It's time for me to take it back over.  I'm the lady of the house.  It's my domain, and I'm the one who gets to set the standard.  My standard is organization.  Simplicity.  Peace.  Not stuff it here, there, anywhere, cuz we're too busy to deal with it.  Not "Mom I don't feel like cleaning so I'm going to stall until you get distracted with something else and  don't notice I haven't swept the stairs all week".   Not things that MIL sent over via Sister-In-Law or DH that DH didn't know what to do with, have a use for, or a place to put them so he abandoned them for me to deal with.

Clean.  Orderly.  Useful. Enjoyable.  Those are the new tenets of this little place here.  This really isn't a home of children any longer.  This is a home with two 40-somethings, a teen about to leave for college (aka pseudo-adulthood) in eight months, and a teen who should be knee deep in her training on how to run a home.  No excuse for dust bunnies, streaky windows, or piles of things stuffed into the room that is supposed to be the study/home office.  No need for toys that never got fixed after they broke years ago, or board games or decks of cards that are missing half their components.  And no need for the things MIL sent that we don't want and will never use, but are keeping just because she gave them to us.

So, between now and midnight the thirty-first, there will be a whole lot of decluttering going on.  Usable things will be listed on Freecycle and Craigslist.  Donations dropped off at Goodwill.  A whole lot of sweeping and mopping going on.  Dust bunny evictions.  Cobweb deconstructions.  The trash bin will probably be full on Monday morning; full of things not re-usable, donate-able, compost-able, or burn-able.

I'll greet 2012 with a clean start.  With some order and structure instead of feeling like I'm always flying by the seat of my pants and getting buried in stuff other people want me to have/take care of.  Hopefully it will at least last until maple syrup season starts in February or early March.  With great will power (and willing daughters and husband), it will become a permanent thing--the next phase of my life: the orderly and relaxing home.