The Stuff of Madness

I’m home! Hurray! With my love. It’s so good to be home. I’ve really been looking forward to it. Especially because all of our furniture and boxes arrived while we were away! The boys and I have been so excited to see it all. So pumped to lay eyes on this item or that after 13 long weeks. We’ve talked about it a ton for the last week and a half. Toys the boys couldn’t wait to play with. Pillows I couldn’t wait to lay my head on! A couch! A bed! Woo hoo!

Well, it’s all here. Want to know the overwhelming emotion? Distraction! Sheesh. I’ve only been home for about 4 hours, and already I see a huge difference. It was a lot simpler when there was no stuff. We made much less of a mess making dinner, and dinner was no less tasty! We didn’t have little boys crying because they couldn’t locate the one toy they want to play with amongst the millions of toys they don’t. It was easier to focus on the people in the house instead of the people focusing on the stuff in the house.

So…time to pare down.

It’s funny; I don’t actually know why we shipped most of this stuff. I mean come on! Fifteen boxes of Kleenex?!? Really? Eight rolls of toilet paper? It’s not Ukraine! They do have perfectly legitimate toilet paper in England! Last years half-burnt Christmas candles? Why? And for the love of all things culinary—how many black plastic spatulas does one girl need!?!? Sure, they’re safe on my non-stick pans, but for crying out loud there are only two pans—how does that justify not only OWNING but shipping SEVEN spatulas across the Atlantic! All wrapped individually in its own special piece of packing paper too I might add! Good night! The poor trees!

Sure, we’d never seen the house before we moved over here. We weren’t clear on what we’d need. Sure, we’d never lived in England before. Which helps explain why I thought it would be helpful to bring along 3 laundry baskets—none of which fit in the tiny English closets and none of which I want sitting on the floor cluttering up the space around the washer and dryer. Namely because if they did I wouldn’t be able to get into my fridge or my freezer. Washers primarily live in the kitchen in English houses.

I have decided I’m going to let myself off the hook. I didn’t know. As previously mentioned I wasn’t ready to let go of it all. Plus I’m getting a kick out of unpacking the boxes. So are my boys. They’re not currently upstairs playing with the dozens of toys that finally arrived. Nope! They’re in the living room playing with two empty boxes and a huge pile of packing paper.

Ah, the simple life. Let’s get back to that! Now…I wonder what one does with crap they don’t want if there’s no craigslist? Hmmmmm…