Monday, May 23, 2005

Tidy Up

Lately I have been working on reducing the clutter in my life and getting things in order. So far I have cleaned out the garage (took 7 hours and 4 trips to the garbage dump but now it is clean and tidy!), sorted the pantry, culled my wardrobe (3 garbage bags full to St Vinnies!) and reorganised the bookcases. It is such a good feeling to get rid of the excess and clutter. Some days I wish I could just exist with what I can carry in a backback. It would be Ok for a while, but I'd miss all my books especially and I can't carry all of them around with me!

Yesterday though was the job I've been itching to do - organise the office/studio. For about the past year, everytime I feel like creating something, I walk into this room, look at the shambles it had become and just walked back out. Well, not anymore! I realised that if I want to have half a chance of ever working for myself and, more importantly in the meantime taking time out to create, I needed to have a workable space to do it in. So I cleaned, tidied, sorted, chucked out junk, labelled, archived. The office/studio is now a sparkling, open space just asking for me to get the creative juices flowing in. I will confess and say that still I have a box of stuff I couldn't find a home for - I think I'll buy a big plastic tub to put it in and store it in my clean, organised garage!

Going through all my crafty supplies also inspired lots of ideas - I'm not sure when I'm going to get time to make them, so I just wrote them down or did a sketch, so when I do have a free moment I can get straight to it.

Only problem is now it's Monday and I'm back at work and feeling a bit bummed as I can't be playing in the studio!


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Congratulations Michelle! You seem to be on a good roll, and you must feel so much lighter after all that winnowing and organizing.

It's true that it can be a bummer to go to the day job when you want to be home playing in the studio, but it also means you have something really fun to look forward to when you come home. It's amazing how much you can get done on evenings and weekends when you're focused (and uncluttered). Good luck!

Michelle said...

Maria, thanks. It certainly does feel good to be organised, it's like a weight off my shoulders! And you're right - I have been getting lots done when I'm home - so far this week I've finished knitting a scarf, got up to date with my paperwork and made a wall hanging! If I keep this pace up I may actually finish all those "in progress" projects I have!

It also seems to be rubbing off on work - I have achieved alot at work this week which feels really good. Rather than sitting here wishing I was somewhere else I'm just getting busy and the days are flying by!