A Spark

That spark..... that feeling that I'm buried in stuff and I want to get rid of it!!! is continuing.  Its funny how I have been living in the same house for years and haven't bought that many new supplies in the past two years or so and yet, now, it just seems overwhelming when months ago, it felt fine. 
Now, I realize where I want to spend more of my time, with family and friends and doing other healthy things, than doing so many crafts.

 

I thought when I quit my job to stay home with the kids that I would be overwhelmed with free time and finally be able to do all the crafty things I had purchased through the years.  But the reality is, it takes time and work to raise a good, healthy family and I'm finally embracing that.  All this reading about intentional living and I think I'm finally getting it. 

• I don't want to tell the kids that they can't play something because I can't get to the toy or supplies because of all my stuff in the way. 
• I don't want to read all those backload of nursing journals that I thought I would get to once I quit work.  (I have nursing journals from ten years ago that haven't been touched!) 
• I don't want to spend all my days sitting on the couch knitting and crocheting (although I do like to relax with it while watching a good show at night). 
• I don't want to look at all the craft stuff in the basement and not know what to do because I have too many options. 
• I don't want to make things just for the sake of making things.

It's seeing those limits that is helping me want to pass on my stuff.  How long do craft items last anyway?  
I do want to spend my at-home time with my kids doing fun stuff.

• I do want to read current information in my field of nursing to keep up-to-date.
• I do want to be more active - not sit on the couch.  (I realized this when I saw there was a knitting/crocheting club at my church and its the same time as an exercise class that I've been going to for awhile.  I would rather go to the exercise class than the knitting club - that helps choose my priorities).
• I do want to spend more time designing jewelry to sell.  This too needs to be a priority over the other crafts if I really want to be successful with it.
• I do like to make things with intended purposes - either as gifts, or artwork with a place to go in the house.

And with these thoughts in mind, I have a big purge today...
Major amounts of yarn - not all of it, but enough to get rid of one of those 91 gallon bins.
My plan is to try and sell it on Craigslist, although I just checked and there are a lot of other people purging their yarn collections too.  So we'll see how it goes.

I'm getting rid of all of this.....


That's a lot of yarn!  Enough to fill up 3 garbage bags!

 

Even getting rid of some knitted items (They will be donated to the before-mentioned church knitting club).

 

And that's one empty container of yarn!