I never want to spend five hours in my closet again! You see, I did that last Thursday in an effort to clean it out – an activity that had not yet been accomplished in the entire nine-and-half-years of living in this house! It’s true. And, perhaps I am taking a huge risk in confessing this reality to you, but you know, we all have our shortfalls and cleaning out my closet is evidently one of mine. Don’t judge me! 

I’ll say it again. I never want to spend five hours in my closet again. I know this to be true because at hour three-and-a-half, I desperately wanted to throw in the towel. But how could I? The contents of my closet were piled in a mountain on my bed and I certainly wished to sleep there later that day. Here, take a look. I was going to save this photo for a little further down, but I need you to see what I’m talking about:

Mount Closet Clothing

Delighted to have successfully scaled the north face of Mount Closet Clothing, Eli was able to muster a proud smile and wave!

Luckily if I stood on the bed next to it, I could get an aerial view!

Ok, so you get the idea. Every time I thought I was making a dent, I realized there was still more to take out.  For instance, it took me an impressive amount of time to remove the contents from the two shelves above where our clothes hung as well as the clothes themselves! You can sort of see what I mean here:

And when I finished that, I began to take another sigh of relief, but then noticed this was still left:

 These are the shelves on the left side that house our pants. How is it possible that we could possess so many pairs of pants and only wear a fraction of them? Did I think I might be “pre-children” small again? Who knows?

I could not even find solace in the fact that everything made it’s way out of the closet because now it was not only on my bed, but all over the floor as well! I don’t think I could have even said I was half way done at that point!

Case in point No. 1

Case in point No. 2 – The bags in front are trash and the ones behind are the beginning collection for donation.

Case in point No. 3 – By the way, I loved that belt! I didn’t part with that one!

In all of this chaos, I did find some treasures. That was obviously the best part! Discovering memories of the people we were… Here, take a look:

This is a pic of my sis and I maybe nine or ten years ago before heading out to Fiddler’s Green for a Poison concert!!

Speaking of Poison…I was a significant fan of theirs. Look at this gem!! Bright green bandana from their Glam Slam Metal Jam tour. That’s right!

Some Geek shirts anyone? (Uh, those aren’t mine!)

How about an old Starbucks apron? No, it’s not for sale…besides, I don’t wear it anymore because the tie is broken! And, look, its marker-stained! Ew.

This was my very first bikini I ever wore! A little too sassy if you ask me! 😉

Indeed, this is a James Taylor record! When my parents moved, I volunteered to keep a hefty stack of their old LPs for them. So glad I did! I’ll show you the others that I found in another post another day!

I finally got to the point of folding up all the clothes for donation – which was a task I also thought I’d never see the end of!

I collected 7 white garbage bags full of clothes that we never wore!

I actually used these shoes for an 80s party that I attended years ago! Pretty good, I think! But alas, I had to let them go. Maybe they’ll see themselves at another 80s party someday!

So, here’s the moment you all have been waiting for…well, that I was, anyway. The after pictures!! Thank the Maker!!

I can actually stand in my closet and walk around now!

I’m not disgusted by the old clothes taking up valuable space anymore! Clothes that taunted me as I knew I would never wear them again!

And, finally, only pants that we currently wear!

Why am I possibly sharing the intimacy of the contents of my closet with you? Well, because my hope is that if there happens to be anyone else out there like me who has been neglecting their closet for nine years, I say to you: CLEAN IT OUT! For the love of Pete! You will not regret it! You will find treasure! You will have room to move! You wont be taunted by excess clothes that either don’t fit anymore or you don’t like after all…you will have a new found ability to select clothes with a smile on your face and peace  in your heart because only the clothes that you currently wear will be in front of you! It only took my nine years for me to figure this out, folks! I’m a whole new person!

Also, please note that this is just the current state of my closet – clean and organized. But, since we have an IKEA store just a short distance up the interstate from us, we think we may even go so far as to take out the current shelving and completely re-do the space-IKEA style. Stay tuned!!