Sunday, April 1, 2018

Space

Bedroom. The floors never looked that good.
The emptying of the old house is somehow still going on.

My advice to you: declutter now, so you don't have to do it later.

I actually admitted defeat and hired my local thrift store to come in and empty the attic and basement. Whatever they couldn't use, they would take to the dump.

Living room. So much brighter without
curtains. Shame there are neighbors
4 feet away.
I assumed, wrongly, that all the contents of my house were of such high quality that they would dispose of very little.  And then I saw the dump receipt.

They removed a TON of stuff. Literally a ton.

I'm dizzy at the idea, even knowing that about 200 lbs. of it was my big wooden conference table that I used in the workroom.  (They said it had limited resale because of its ginormous size, and also they didn't have a place to store it).

Even then, I had to get a scrap metal guy to come in and remove the old dryer, 50 year old hot water heater, and an old oil tank.  The last 2 had been in the basement when I bought the house,but as my realtor just told me,"It's not 2000 anymore; standards are higher."

Which means, apparently, a clean basement. And attic. And floors. And rooms that no longer even faintly smell of cat.  I found a cleaning product at the dollar store that did everything. It's recommended for use in "public bathrooms and animal quarters," so I figured it would shine floors and alleviate minor cat funk in a few corners.

It certainly did that. The smell of the cleaning product was so strong it clung to my clothes, and the house smelled like a roofing truck drove into a bar.  The smell faded after a few days. Thankfully.

Kitchen.  It hurts to leave those
cabinets behind. But they're so
perfect in that space.
Every time we go back, I think we're done. And every time we leave, we say, "Just one more day should do it."

This time, I think we're right.


Workroom. The table took up
almost the entire space.
*** In case anyone wants to look up the cat-odor-defeating product, it's called Creolina.  Here's a link, but there's a good chance you can find it locally.  Try your nearest dollar store and work out from there. 

4 comments:

Vicki said...

Oh dear! I bet that was so hard to let go of so much stuff. But now you are free :)

sewingkm said...

I feel your pain as we're listing our house in a week. I've been de-cluttering for the last six months loading up my car trunk and taking contents to charity places. After 30 years of collecting stuff I'm finally letting go. It is freeing! Best of luck to you.

Catherine said...

Isn't it amazing what we can collect in the course of just living? What a great service your thrift store offers!

What product did you use to remove kitty smell? We had a cat who had trouble with his bladder before he died. He is gone, but the odor remains.

Anonymous said...

"Karen: Writer, packrat, cat lady, mad sewer, book hound and anything else you can think of that requires accumulation in numbers."
A little less pack-rat now, Karen ?

The "accumulator" in me rejoices in your clean space. I should get to it too......
Thank you for sharing your journey with us and enjoy your new home !

Evita