Freeing ourselves

Jeremy and I have been conducting a very interesting science experiment these past two weeks. How much is too little?

Preparing for the listing of our condo - our first-ever home purchase - THIS WEEK, we have been decluttering.We're pretty neat - okay, I am - to begin with. Yes, if The Container Store had a fan club, I would be a card-carrying member. But we have really pared down our stuff - stashing things in our good friends Dave and Whitney's basement; donating oodles of stuff to The Salvation Army and recycling a serious stash of magazines that I've been meaning to comb through for recipes.

Our last Everest: cleaning up the living room, which also does duty as our TV room, main entertaining space and playroom. We took every last toy and stashed them in one of our bathrooms for the pictures in our listing. Toys. piled. to. the. ceiling. You could barely open the bathroom door. To avoid any confusion on Jack's part, we moved all of the toys at night, in a very Grinch-like style. Jack and I sat at his little blue table the next morning, and he took stock of the living room. I could see the wheels turning in his little head. "Where are all of the toys?" he asked.

Our place was photographed for our listing Friday morning. We've spent the weekend pulling the toys back out and stowing even more away. Up until lunchtime on Saturday, Jack only had two toys to play with, and the funny thing was, he really played with them. As we introduced more toys into the mix, he seems to have a new interest in them. It seems the less clutter we have, the more clarity we gain.  It's really been freeing to have less stuff in our lives. I can't say if they are related, but I've felt more energy lately. Let's see if it lasts.