Out With The Old-In With The New

I enjoy Christmas at my relatives because I don't have the stress of making room in my small but modest house. Although the toys are enough to drive me bonkers. I would be so much happier if my relatives would each just do one nice gift vs. many gifts. Mainly because we have a small house and the kids are left with twice a year deciding what MUST go and what CAN stay!

You see each child has a toy (bin) shelf in their room. The only toys they are allowed to have are the ones that can "fit" in their bins.

I insist that the toys be grouped by like things. So they just can't have a mess of stuff. Now there might be a few things that are naturally too big for these bins and that is okay. I do make allowances for some things like that, but even then there is a limit.

This is the reason we don't allow them to open things while at our relatives' houses. You see in order to get the item the kids have to make room for it in their room's by getting rid of OTHER stuff. If they don't want to get rid of anything then they can't get anything "new". 

My son as gotten rid of one 13 gallon garbage bag of stuff and has only "earn" 1 new toy.  My daughter has gotten rid of half of 13 gallon garbage bag of stuff and has only "earn" 1 toy. They have a TONS more toys and will have to get rid of a lot more things to make room.  I have a feeling that when they are done they both would have gotten rid of 3-4 garbage bag EACH!!

We do a similar thing in the summer. In the summer they will get rid 1-2 garbage bags EACH. The main difference between Christmas and summer in the summer time there is less stuff and it's POST birthdays. So kid's do have a bit of an overflow of toys for a few months.

What's sad about the whole process is the only time my kids get new toys is on their birthdays and at Christmas.  So often the stuff they got at their birthdays are gone by Christmas and the stuff they got at Christmas are gone by the summer.

In other words the toys here will only stay for 6 months!! This is because often the kids rather keep the newer stuff then the older stuff. This is really the reason we only get them 1 toy each (and often wish other would do the same), because in 6 months we know it's going o be gone because it broke or because the kids got rid of it to make room for their new stuff.

So what do you do? Do you make your kids get rid of their old stuff regularly?

School Room! I wish!

Several of the (homeschooling) blogs I follow have been showing of their homeschooling rooms! Oh how lovely, clean, and organized they are! It is a real blessing to have a space for ONLY homeschooling. Then there are homeschooler like me! Not so well organized, cluttered, and cramped for space! (Please see pass the clutter and dirty counters. Thank-you)

This is my living room that holds most of our homeschooling materials: The only thing really missing from these 2 pictures is the wall where our front door and couch are on and part of the wall that has our fireplace (that would be the wall with the wood paneling). In the one picture where the desk chair is right next to me is where the front door is...

This is the kitchen that has the table that the kids work at time to time, and that little corner I call "my office":There really isn't much more to the kitchen other then the counter, sink, and stove. They are all on the 2 walls that are not shown.

Both rooms are about 14x13. So there you have it. As you can see we don't have a "school room", but we are still able to homeschool the children. Please see pass the clutter! I'm trying to find a system/way of decluttering! I'm not every good at "housework" if anything that would be my real weakness when it comes to homeschooling and being a housewife. When I try things are great! When I don't try it gets overwhelming! There really isn't much more to the house other then a cluttered laundry room, if you can even call it a "room", it's more like a closet. An average size bathroom and 3 average size bedrooms. Then again with 950 sq. feet, there isn't going to be much more.

What I lack in "housing" space I make up for "yard" space! All of the back yard pictures where taken from my back door (the kitchen door). The red line that I "drew" into each picture is to help show where the property line is.

Looking to the rightLooking straight outLooking to the leftThat big old dog in the one picture is our dog Gravy! Yes his name is Gravy. When he was a puppy he looked more like a pile of mash potatoes with brown gravy on him. Thus we named him Gravy! He is 6 year-old! Here is one more picture of the Gravy.Gravy is a lab and collie mix and weighs nearly 90 lbs! He thinks he's some kind of "lap dog" and is always trying to sit in our laps! LOL

One last note regarding the yard: I WISH I knew how to garden! I have more then enough space for a garden (as you can see). I just don't know HOW!! LOL That would be the other department that I lack in! At least my kiddos (including the dog) have room to RUN; even with a large garden there would be room to RUN! LOL Perhaps some day I will learn how to garden.