40 Bags in 40 Days

You may find it odd that I would  consider blogging about this experience here in a blog that is titled Everyday Pleasures.  But I am one of those people that finds great PLEASURE in a clean and orderly environment!  

I learned of this challenge a couple of years ago from a favorite blogger.  While I frequently purge and reorganize I never accepted this as a challenge.    But today I accept!  On the way to school I talked to the boys about this family challenge during lent.  They seemed excited to think we would be tracking a family goal and all of us would take part!  It wasn't overwhelming for them because they weren't being asked to part with 40 bags of stuffed animal and toys.  Honestly, I believe that 10 bags COULD come from their toys but I am not asking that of them.  They will sort through books, toys, clothes and coats.  What do they love... keep...    need...keep    outgrown... donate... broke.. throw out!  I am not asking them to do anything I am not willing to do myself.  I will model and assist.  We can do this!  

Today I began by creating a healthy list of areas "in need" at home and work.    I jumped feet first into the challenge and managed to fill up 3 large bags at work.  A teacher sure can accumulate a lot of stuff.  So I am 30 years into a career, and with 10 years left, any purging I do now will save hours later.  I can't imagine what on earth I would do with all this stuff other than dump it at the end of a career anyway.  Will ignoring those books I haven't touched in 15 years give me more pleasure that seeing a cleaned off book shelf?  Doubt it.  File cabinets filled with dittos... yes I still have those purple mimeograph books tucked away.  Yes they are probably antiques... but no new teacher is going to want those anyway!  So while I can't dedicate every day to purging here at work, I can on a weekly basis get rid of at least another 1 bag a week during lent.

Day one... I said good bye to 2 gallons of oil for science experiments, 6 boxes of baking soda dating back to the 90's, salt containers that turned to rock and a dozen or so of Tempra paint that had dried up.

I can hardly wait to tackle more here at school!  The file cabinets will yield at least 2-3 bags!

Off and running to purging and reorganizing!