Our son just finished his first year of college. We went to pick him up and found out that he had a lot more stuff than we realized. Our car was PACKED. I got there at the tail end, and stopped some of the things from going into the car because there simply wasn't room. I wish I had gone earlier and helped him pack up his things. We could have gone through them at that time and saved us a lot of space in the car and temporary clutter in the house until we go through it all. He had done some packing ahead of time, but had about half of it left and all the cleaning and not a lot of time to do it since we had to leave that night. There were dishes and bedding that were old and unnecessary that ended up coming home. We did give his food to another person who lived in the same place. Once school is over for my teenage daughter, we are going to have a major declutter session for both of the kids.
So, what lesson can be learned from this? If you are planning on moving, start early and think twice about what you pack. Don't leave it until the last minute or you will be throwing things in boxes that you don't want or need and taking them with you just because you don't have much time left to sort through things.
Looking at the bright side, the extra college clutter that is now in the house will help me make it through another month of getting rid of one thing per day.
Go you for having a major decluttering session with the kids! My mom just yelled at me about how much crap I had from college that piled up in the living room meanwhile she filled every other room in the house with junk. It warms my heart that you're teaching your kids about the downsides of owning this much stuff.
ReplyDelete