Tidying Up

I've been trying to purge things from the house, which is one of the aspects of housewifing that is a never-ending slog. I totally understand how hoarder homes wind up looking the way that they do. If I just don't throw things out or donate them for a week or two, I realize I've started having to weave through mounds of clutter to get around. And at some point, you just stop caring, or it just becomes too overwhelming, and you wind up not eating at the dining room table anymore because it's the end of the day and you're too tired to move the piles of now-you-don't-even-know-what off of it.

Or if you're lucky enough to have a basement, like me, you shove a whole bunch of not-very-organized stuff into a box and stick it in the basement and say, "I'll go through that later." And you use your table, but getting to the laundry machine starts to be an obstacle course. And then the basement floods, and the box gets wet, and now Later turns into Never because you're moldphobic (there is probably a real word for that, but if I used it we'd both have to look it up).

Well, I recently read a years-old magazine and came across an article on Marie Kondo, an expert on what she calls Tidying Up. Which sounds so pleasant. I want to be a person who tidies up, not a borderline hoarder who has to purge. Her method of organizing is called KonMari. (I am totally naming a method of doing something after myself someday.) And somehow, she managed to take folding clothes to a whole new level. The internet has been raving about this folding, so I watched a random YouTube video and gave it a shot.

Holy Carp.

If you don't think that a new folding method can be life-changing... you need to try this. (Perhaps you already have. If so, why didn't you tell me about it??)

I spent hours yesterday and today KonMari-ing drawers. Now, I'm not even doing the tidying method right, you're supposed to gather all the clothes in your house and put them in a big pile somewhere and wade through them, getting rid of anything that doesn't spark joy inside you. I am not in a place to make that time commitment right now, we'd just have a huge pile of clothes sitting around getting cat-hairy for months if I tried that. And the Baby would run around with everyone's underwear on his head and we'd find it months later in his toy bin or the bookshelf. (He seriously loves to put underwear on his head.) And then at some point I would get fed up and stick them all back where they came from.

Also, her second step is to get rid of books, and I can't do that. The solution to not having enough room for books is to build a bigger bookshelf. Maybe that'll be the Schweitzer method.

But this folding business? Who knew you could fold so wrong for so long?

I could actually fit more clothes in my drawers!

And you can see all the clothes without digging!



Thing 1's shirts fit better!



And storing the tights sideways actually saved room somehow!

Even better, these were items that I was already folding, just differently. So it shouldn't be hard to maintain the new setup. I am so excited about this folding business that I want to go fold more things now just to see the transformation, instead of working on my novel.

It's also re-inspiring me to continue "tidying up" via getting rid of things.

For further inspiration, I picked up a toy work bench for the Baby, with the intent that its home would be the basement. We can build things together! So... I need to make room in the basement.

With tidings of tidiness -

-A Real Housewife of the North Shore