Clean Out Day!!!

It finally came!!!!  Yesterday was "the big clean out" for my downstairs. A little back-story for those of you who haven't followed me since the beginning...

My downstairs looked like an episode of hoarders - seriously. We live upstairs - kitchen, bedrooms, living room, they are all upstairs. Downstairs is just extra rooms - a family room and extra bedrooms as well as a utility room large enough to be a pantry. Well, when we first moved in, we didn't need those rooms, and we started storing stuff there. And then the stuff started to grow! Who knew non-living things could reproduce? haha

Anyway, over the past seven years, the stuff accumulated floor to ceiling and with just paths for walking. Most of it was trash we haven't seen in 7 years.

About a month ago, a friend and her husband came over, and they happened to see the downstairs. She decided something needed to be done about it, and he started organizing a clean up party and dumpster. The only problem is the clean up party was here yesterday and the dumpster doesnt' come until next week. But still, we worked from one accessable area to another, putting things outside at first, and working our way through until we could have trash on one side of the room and working through the other side.

All in all, the only things I kept were Christmas decorations, candles (I love my candles) and my mom's collectibles. The collectibles are in boxes in one corner of the room where they will wait for my mom to be able to move them. The candles and Christmas stuff are in totes along one wall of the utility room. The pantry shelves are once again accessible. :)

So next week, we will have the dumpster come and get all the trash outta here! Then we will make the area nice so we can use the space in the utility area as a pantry and as real storage. Then the family room area will be a playroom where I will put the toys and games and play table. Then if we want to play upstairs, we can get toys one at a time to bring up and back down. But if it gets too hot up here, we can go downstairs and play :)

Have you ever done a big clean out? How did it go?

God Bless,
One Christian Mom - Shellie