Most of you may not know, but I am almost 7 months pregnant with Critter Child No. 3. We have Critter Girl (who is almost 5), Critter Boy (who is almost 2) and the new Critter Child. (I think I’m going to need to come up with some new nicknames soon. LOL) What this pregnancy means, is that I had barely gotten back into my ‘normal’ clothes after having Critter Boy and now here I am in ‘maternity’ clothes again. I was thinking I was done having children for a while, so I got rid of my actual pregnancy jeans with the elastic in the band. This has led to me only being able to wear about three pairs of jeans (one pair correctly, the rest with a rubber band to connect the button and the hole LOL). And I grew out of my S.O.’s jeans about a month ago. This limited wardrobe severely changed my laundry habits and also taught me a few lessons as well. (Even though I didn’t know it at the time.)
I recently read an article on downsizing a wardrobe. The author included tips on cutting down on how often you have to do laundry, as well, stating that she wore her jeans for two weeks straight before washing them! This got me to thinking about my own wardrobe and laundry habits. So for the last two weeks, I’ve been paying attention. What I found shocked me. And also motivated me to make some changes!
Here is what I discovered:
I wear my jeans for up to a week straight without thinking about it, unless they get really dirty. My S.O. wears his for two or three days. The other three members of the household wear theirs one time and throw them in the laundry.
I run out of clean underwear before I even clear one stack of T-shirts or make a dent in my socks.
I have WAY too many clothes and I don’t wear 75 percent of them (maybe more).
The days that I wear lounge pants, I don’t accomplish anything around the house other than the bare necessities.
My children have about a million pieces of clothing between the two of them and they only wear a handful of them.
Between me and my S.O., we have so many clothes that I am running out of room to put them up in our one four-drawer dresser.
The children have a five-drawer dresser (just Critter Girl) and two plastic dressers with five drawers total (just Critter Boy).
We have an overwhelming clutter problem, not just with clothes, but with toys and other belongings.
So what did these realizations do? They made me think of all the ways that I could make our lives better. So I have made the decision that over the next seven weeks, until the official start of spring, I will be decreasing the amount of clothing my family has. And then I will start in on the toys and other belongings. How do I plan to make this last for seven weeks?
-
Week One: I will go through mine and my S.O.’s clothing.
-
Week Two: I will go through Critter Girl and Critter Boy’s clothing.
-
Week Three: I will organize a laundry schedule and an organizational method to make sure the clothes left are ones that are used in a timely manner so we are not overwhelmed with too many.
-
Week Four: Go back through all of our clothes (all four of us) to make sure I did not miss any un-needed items in Weeks One and Two.
-
Week Five: Start in on decreasing the amount of toys.
-
Week Six: Finish organizing toys and do a final sweep to be sure that we have pared down to a manageable amount.
-
Week Seven: Revisit the wardrobes and make sure I have removed all the clothesnot worn. As well as doublecheck the laundry schedule and organization methods to make sure they work.