Making Space...

I almost wasn't going to post this week because I hadn't managed to declutter much, but then I remembered that middle son came last weekend and took away some things, and I have pictures!

Then, today I spent a bit of time going through a small linen closet I use to store scrap yarn balls, finished projects waiting for their purpose to be revealed, and some other miscellaneous crafty stuffs, and decided to rehome some of it.

So, in the end, I came up with a respectable amount of stuff.  I'll let the pictures mostly speak for themselves:

S-T-R-E-T-C-H!!!

Just couldn't reach...

Aahhh...  there we go, everything secure in back

Loaded up and ready to roll...

Humoring mom with one last parting shot...

So long, Son!  

And thank you for helping me with my challenge!  😁

Since much was boxed up by the time I got out to the garage, there was no way I could count items, but I'm going to declare 20 things gone that middle son carted off.  I know that under-represents what he took home with him, but I'm good with that.

For my haul today:

Some more things I've been saving for the yet-to-appear grandchildren.

I'm growing less inclined to save things for them.

I decided to rehome these crocheted and knitted items 

- just going to donate them.

One way or another these sewing tutorials above that my mother-in-law had and a "course" she completed are all going to find a new home.  The sewing lessons will likely be tossed, but I'm going to let sister-in-law make that decision.  All I know is, I enjoyed looking at them, but it's time for them to leave my house.

And hopefully, someone will find a use for these yarny ball scraps.  

Do you think?

So with some underestimating of what has left, or will soon leaving here, I count 43 items.

Making Space Week 42:  538 things gone!

462 more things to hunt down and clear out 'till I meet my goal! And 10 more weeks to do it - if I've counted correctly.

 

~~~~~

Now to address a question asked in regards to a post I wrote a couple of weeks ago where a reader was puzzled by the large number of dishtowels I own.  

I totally understand!  And I think I can clear up what may be puzzling, or at least give a glimpse into how I use the prolific number of kitchen towels I own.

In a week or week-and-a-half's time I almost always go through the 25 or so dishtowels that fit in the kitchen drawer I've assigned them to.  And when I have a load, I launder them - actually, I hope I don't blow anyone's mind with this, but I sometimes do two loads of kitchen towels and dishcloths a week because I separate the white towels from the colored towels and dishcloths. I try to stagger their use, though, and I often wash darks one week, and whites the next (putting the freshly washed cloths in the back of the drawer).  There is no schedule.  I just wash dish towels and cloths when I've run out of the whites and when I've run out of the colored towels and cloths.

It probably would have been helpful if I had explained that we wash and dry by hand every single dish and piece of silverware and pot and pan used. Every day.  Two or three times a day we do dishes.  I know it may sound a bit archaic in 2021, but we haven't owned a dishwasher for the last 23 years - since moving to this house that didn't have one, and without remodeling the kitchen one did not fit.  It seemed odd at first, but it soon became part of the pattern of our lives.  While studies have determined that some dishwashers may use less water than hand-washing does, I believe I can honestly say that washing dishes by hand doesn't take much (possibly, any) longer than rinsing, pretreating, stacking, unloading, and sometimes having to dry still damp dishes from a dishwasher.  

It's just doesn't seem like a big deal to wash dishes by hand.  In fact, it's often a peaceful activity for me.  When I stand at my kitchen sink I spend a fair amount of time looking out of the window.  I've watched the neighbor kids grow up, and my own boys playing outside.  I've watched the seasons change, and the shadows in the back yard and on the deck change their orientation as the year progresses.  I've been alerted to many beautiful sunsets that called me to interrupt the dishwashing and go outside and see the whole big sky myself.  I've also shared this task with the other members of my family. Hubs washes the dishes fairly often, and our boys grew up washing dishes by hand.  And while they all have dishwashers in their own homes now, they don't seem to flinch at the idea of washing dishes after a family holiday meal.  Sometimes they even volunteer.  

That said, all of this does take a number of dishcloths and dishtowels.  And when I say dishtowels, I mean tea towels as well as terry cloth towels.  I find, anymore, that I mix and match what I dry dishes with. Once I learned how to wash terry cloth towels so they didn't attract lint, I was golden - I often prefer them now for drying dishes.

Add to the daily dishwashing, when I'm doing serious cooking or baking, I can use several towels in a cooking session - washing and drying my hands after handling something messy, sometimes wiping up a spill, or even grabbing a towel to hold onto something hot, or to provide a quick pad for putting a hot pot on the counter. Sometimes I use a fresh towel to blot water off just-washed lettuce, or to dry any produce I might be washing off. Is it becoming clear how I can go through so many dishcloths?

Add to all of that, I am pretty fastidious about kitchen towels and dishcloths being fresh (for example, I never use a towel I've wiped my hands on to dry dishes or produce).  And while hub will try to get away with saving a dishtowel for drying dishes later in the day, I consider if it's gotten wet enough to have to dry out, it's used, and it goes into the category of "dirty" and into the collection of towels waiting to be washed. To dry them while they wait to be washed, I hang them on the oven handle or take them to the laundry room where I have a basket dedicated to dishtowels and cloths and I often drape the wet ones over the edge of the basket - tossing them into the basket to collect when they're dry.

So maybe by now it's not so puzzling that I would keep 25 towels handy in a kitchen drawer.  The 50 or so in storage are probably superfluous, but I do enjoy rotating different towels into the kitchen drawer with changing seasons (mainly, we're talking autumn, Christmas, winter and spring/summer. If we had an automatic dishwasher, I imagine the number of towels I'd keep could be cut down pretty drastically. Or maybe not. Having a generous supply of kitchen towels has become my habit.  I have a whole system for washing them, and rotating them in and out of the kitchen drawer on a near-weekly basis, and the linen closet seasonally.  All that said, I'm open to change.  Who knows...  maybe someday I'll have a dishwasher again and will only keep a skeleton crew of towels and cloths for the kitchen business.  

By the way, washing dishcloths by themselves is, I believe, what keeps them lint free.  And maybe my front loading washing machine.  I do love that thing.  Years ago, we had a top-loading washing machine that didn't have an normal agitator.  It left lint on darks when I washed them, so I imagine it left lent on everything.  I was never so glad that an appliance needed replacing.

And that, dear reader, is all I have for this weekend!  Thank you for stopping by!