Progress....

(For my own short memory purposes....STOP: this posting & the next do not get shared with the girls!)

So you may think Santa's sleigh looks like this:

But this year it actually looks more like a white Dodge caravan:

Full of things purged from the girls' closet and the garage:

 I filled just about every spare inch in our van, and tomorrow will be making deliveries to Goodwill, Kid's consignment store, a neighbor friend and donating the nicer game and story related items to Little Miss Mae's therapy clinic. 

Yes, it was hard work.  Yes, I'm dog tired tonight.

Sammy "helped" me on the cleaning out project while the girls were at school....

& it seems to take twice as long with the littlest Elf "helping!" 

Yes, my kiddos barely survived the rest of the day once they came home, 

and watched lots of extra movies
while I finished it off, but guess what?  

They like being able to see the floor of their play closet, 

and Little Miss Mae actually played in there about 2 hours straight, 

since she could actually find what was in there to play with.

 The blue box in the corner is Little Miss Mae's "Happy Spot" 

(a tent with all her special treasures) to just get away from it all and regroup a bit. 

 Yes, I did actually get rid of dolls and stuffed animals, several dozen in fact!  

This is what is left....still way too much in my opinion, 

but since I was plowing through everything on my own, 

I had to be a bit cautious to not part with too many of the very favorite newer items.  

But I will do this again in 6 mos. or less probably,

 and be able to part with many more of these things then,

as it doesn't take long for the newness of a toy to wear off.

 I labeled the bins for sorting purposes, and plan to post these photos in the closet near the areas to help with clean-up and knowing where things go. 

By the way, this would've never been pulled off with the girls' help.  

All of a sudden everything becomes their very favorite toy in the whole world 

when I start talking about parting with things.

There will be tears, fighting about whose toy it actually is, screaming and fits....

on the girls part and mine!

   So I have learned to just take my chances and part with items unknowingly...

of the seriously hundreds of items I've done this for, 

I have only been called out on one specific toy...so not too bad of odds!

Now if I could just be as ruthless with my own junk!