Living with Less Part 3

Well, we are on our way to having less to clean, trip over and store in our small home. Recently, our pastor started a series called "The Simple Life". And it has really continued to fuel our desire to clean out our home and begin to live with less.

Living with less has really moved into many areas of our lives. My recent birthday was nice as I didn't receive all this "stuff" to find a home for. On Sunday, we took more time (several hours) and went through the many boxes in our garage. We went through our TWO rubbermaid boxes of extra notebook paper, pens, pencils and misc. office supplies and reduced it to one small box. (The rest will be taken to an office in town. We went through our dress up clothes for the kids, games, and "junk drawer" boxes. We also organized and packaged up all of our aquarium items, as I am actively trying to sell our aquarium on craigslist. I also have several other things to sell. We even have a "free" pile outside of our home and over half of it is gone in less than 24 hours!!

I've created boxes for my family all over the country... A box for each sister and my parents as well as a few things for some friends in town. I took our second car load of goodies to the goodwill today and BOY, we still have SO many things!!

I have heard from a couple of you that you are working and desiring to do the same thing in your homes. I wanted to offer some encouragement and some "tips" that have helped me to rid my home of the things that are piling up but I seem to not be able to part with.

• The things that are being stored in your home should only be "seasonal" items. These things should be used at least once a year. If you have things that you must "keep" they should have a place in your home that you can access them easily and you know exactly where they are. Keeping loads of cards in a box in the basement, guarantees that you will never remember that they are there, therefore never use them and you've wasted the money to purchase them, and the property taxes that you're spending on your home to store them.
• If there are things that you just CAN'T part with, put them in a pile and allow yourself a "veto". Ken and I allow each other vetos every once in a while. Things that are sentimental to either of us, we can choose to keep them. But these things are few.
• I also have a box designated to "sentimental" things. I have magazines, programs, memory item etc from our dating, marriage, high school, college, kids first years etc. And, although we haven't gotten to them, I will be more discerning to what I keep as the years go on.

Good Luck to those of you who are working towards living lean. If you have 40 minutes or so, I would encourage you to visit Calvary Community's Website and listen to the two sermons from 2/21 and 2/28 regarding the Simple Life. They are MP3 files - no video.

Another Video that Makes Me Smile

As I've posted a couple of times before, I'm a closet Justin Timberlake fan. I'm particularly in awe of the enormous skill that he has between vocally, instramentally, with creating and producing and then also comedically (mainly SNL). About a month ago, when the Hope for Haiti telethon was on, I was channel surfing between that and something else, and then trying to put the kids to bed. After putting Finnegan to bed, Ken was rocking with a crying baby girl and I just so happened to change back and catch this song. The song struck me, and the music gave chills over how beautifully it was sung. Granted, I'm a huge fan of male singing voices to begin with, so add in a song and harmonies that highlight them both, and I'm sold! I just sat in awe of the beautiful music. I've listened too it several times since then, and I still get the same reaction. So I wanted to share with you the music and this beautiful arrangement of "Halleljah" Sung by Justin Timberlake and Matt Morris. Take a moment, and sit back, and close your eyes... Oh, it is just so beautiful.

For those of you who look at Matt Morris and find something COMPLETELY familiar about it, you are not alone. Turn the pages of your mind back to the simpler days and he was starring next to Justin Timberlake on the Mickey Mouse Club on the Disney Channel. Justin has now produced an album of Matt's that I currently own and enjoy, although Ken want's to gouge his eyes out when he listens to it... To each his own..

Also, a short note about the song. I don't know much about the song. I've googled it a couple of times to read write ups about what the song is about. The writer references scripture in it and there are some musical references in it too but I couldn't find one write up that explains EXACTLY what the song is about and what he's talking about... Here is a write upthat I found... this one, I feel, sums it up.

http://www.lyricinterpretations.com/Leonard-Cohen/Hallelujah

And I even searched Wikipedia for an explaination and there was not a sufficiant answer there. Basically they believe that the tone of the song can be changed to mean different things based on the the performer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfYmMt92Otg

Video of my Swinging Sweeties

Here is the video that I promised of the kids swinging. Ken took the video while I was out to coffee with a new friend. When I got home he said "I took a video of the kids for you" Which is just so sweet, because he just doesn't do that.

This is our back yard... I'm so proud of it (and the work that my hubby has put into it), because after our crappy lawn job a couple of years ago, he has really worked hard to make it a nice back yard. Last summer he spent just about every day out there fixing it, for like 8 weeks. And now, it's beautiful again. And we can enjoy the grass, and not worry about someone falling into a whole, or tripping over huge rocks. We will probably plan to level it out later this spring... Maybe.

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=337224141512&ref=nf

Photo Post...

Here are some photos of our past month... We're beginning to see a bit of Penelope's personality and beginning to enjoy some time outside together!

Penelope is very smiley, much like Finnegan was at her age.

I've been trying to get a photo of both kids together, and smiling. We've gotten close, but I haven't mastered it yet. I'm sure it will take a bit more time :)

Daddy enjoys a game of Fishing for Mater's tires with Finnegan after work one night.
Finnegan got out his dump trucks and we hauled some "gravel" or pop corn kernals. This occupied him for HOURS!!

During the Superbowl, the kids got a little restless, so Chris and Ken took them outside to ride in the John Deer 4x4. It is so fast! Luckily, Liam was gentle with Finnegan on board, and Finnegan LOVED every moment of it, and even got to drive a little (while Liam pushed the pedal).

One day, watching a movie, while he was feeling a bit under the weather. He loves sitting with tons of blankets and tootsie.

Here's our smiley girl again.
Finnegan continues to show how generous he is. Only a few times have I seen him "take" something from his sister and use the word "mine". But for the most part, he continues to be so generous. He LOVES to share his toys, even his favorite ones.
This photo was taken this last week. After he stayed awake for 2 hours in his room not wanting to take a nap. I allowed him to come down stairs with the stipulation that he must return to his room if he began to whine. He did, about 90 minutes after his "nap time" was over. I allowed him to sit in his room until he could be quiet and show me he was ready to act civilized and stop whining. After about 10 minutes of him being quiet in his room (showing me he could play quietly) I found him asleep on the dog bed in his room by the door...
Enjoying a few quiet moments with daddy, after daddy came home early from work one day. She is SUCH a daddy's girl!
Sweetie kids... please disregard Finnegan's runny nose.

I pulled out some of Finnegan's pajamas and have been putting them on Penelope. She looks so cute in these little jammies. I just love it!! I have a picture JUST like this of Finnegan with this toy and wearing these jammies... I'll see if I can find it.

Jammie time together!!

(Penny is wearing another pair of Finnegan's old pajama's)

First Swinging outing of the spring... Can you believe it is Feb?? Such a beautiful day, and my husband has done a beautiful job with the lawn, since our lawn disaster 2 years ago.

And Penelope even got into the swinging action... and if you couldn't tell, mommy didn't take these photos... They were taken by daddy while mommy was out with a friend. You might notice that because I would have NEVER allowed my 5 month old in something that is made for a 9month old :) But daddy is brave and said she promptly fell asleep and enjoyed her ride. They rode together, side by side in the swings. I'll post the video in a few days.

Well, hello, fellow readers. Just relaxing on this Monday night, without too much happening in our home tonight. Both kids are to bed, assisted by me (as the hubby is still pretty sick). There was no fussing or crying at bed time tonight. Which is always a delight. Now, I am sitting back and relaxing on the couch with some Olympics and a few other choice programs for Monday evening. Ken is curled up in his chair with his laptop, surfing the web and enjoying his new Google Reader.

So much has happened in the past week... it's almost kind of crazy... Since last Monday, here is how crazy things have been...

- I found out a former classmate from High School passed away. She was 30 years old. That's just crazy.

- My friend (and photographer) Mandy, had her baby boy, Kasey on Tuesday morning.

- My parents had to put their dog to sleep last week. Really sad, despite all that has been going on with them.

- Took both kids to the dr. last week because of a cold. Penelope is all better and was really only sick for about 3 days. Finnegan, however, is still holding on to his cold. He's nose gunk is finally breaking up and vacating his sinus'. Hopefully he'll be better by MOPS on Thursday.

- Ken got the cold over the weekend, and woke up sick on Sunday am. That's no fun. So we laid low on Sunday, and didn't go to church -- which i missed greatly!!

- My sister, Beth, had knee surgery last Friday... her 5th knee surgery...

There are also some other things happening "behind the scenes" too. So it goes to show, we had a fairly emotional week.

I still want to post about some recent sermon's that Pastor Ray has recently shared with us...

More Living with Less

Oh, man... nothing in the house is safe...

I took a FULL car load of things to the goodwill tonight. DVD's, CD's, kitchen equipment, games, 6 bags of cloths... And our house still has TONS of things in it. I went through Finns room tonight and pulled a handful of things that will be going. I hope to go through the toy box later tonight and look. Ken has already been plotting out some other things that will need to be gone through. I went through my shoes last year and got rid of several pairs. I went through them again tonight, and realized that MANY of them are not the right size. I have shoes ranging from size 7 to size 8.5. I've noticed that for me, having kids has increased my foot size. Although I still have weight to lose (and some people think I'm crazy for connecting the two) I know my feet may shrink a bit, but not all the way back to a size 7! So, many of the smaller shoes are going. And we are now down to ONE (laundry) basket full of shoes (both Ken and I... although I think Ken has about 3 pairs in the basket where the rest are mine) :)

Once the house has been gone through, the garage will need to be gone through. We have bins of things that we haven't touched since we moved in and those things will most likely go... I know of 2 bins in particular that will be going... not necessarily to good will, but to others who can use the supplies that we've stored for so long without much or any use.

So, the purging continues... Thanks to the friends who have encouraged me and continue to do the same thing yourselves. Although we are getting rid of a lot of things, we still have SO much. We definitely seem to have more than we need!! And we want to be leaner people!!

Living with Less Part 2

Well, although I've been slowly working through my living with less desires, the same revelations that I expressed earlier have been conveyed by my husband... And when my husband speaks - we follow instructions. After a short discussion, he started with the CD's, and I started with the kitchen. I went through the tupperware cupboard... who really needs all that tupperware? I went through all the baking pans, and plates. I went through all of the wine, champagne and martini glasses that we just don't use. I packed up three boxes of kitchen things that we just don't use anymore and keep hanging on too. I then went upstairs to the bedroom. I pulled out three bags of cloths from the closest and cataloged them all... I got rid of all my suites and dress shirts. I kept a couple of shirts, but got rid of most of them, seeing I haven't worn them in almost 5 years, and several sweaters.

Next is the board games and tools in the garage.

Oh man... watch out!!