Simplify

Tying in to choosing the nobler path, and inspired by my brother's family, we've begun our spring cleaning purge! For Paul, it meant finally saying goodbye to his beloved toaster oven. We had two safety concerns about the 5-year old appliance. One of the elements is gradually and increasingly warping. I was scared it would snap one of these days. There was also so much grease baked into the interior, we were concerned it may just self-combust. And so it sits outside, waiting for next week's garbage day. (Are you allowed to put such things out for curbside collection? Perhaps he'll take it to the dump.) We agreed that we won't have a toaster oven again until we build our dream home with a custom kitchen. :) And for me, the purge means taking down the Ikea corner shelf from our kitchen and tucking it away until we figure out a better location for it. I love shelving, (and boxes to put things in, too) but have come to realize that hidden storage is the key to keeping the clutter to a minimum in our house. We also had to take it down as we're painting the kitchen and hallway. Bye, bye avocado green. I'll post some pictures sometime for you to see. It's actuallly very close to the same colour as my Mom's vintage Mixmaster machine. How many of your moms had a small appliance, fridge or stove of that colour? Purging, for me - and my mother agrees - does not mean getting rid of that vintage Mixmaster. I feel an odd attachment to it. I also purged my Tupperware collection a little bit. That said, we're taking steps to de-clutter and simplify our home. Feels good.

I enjoyed Oprah's guest last week - Peter Walsh from TLC's "Clean Sweep". His new book, "It's All Too Much" - An easy plan for living life richer with less stuff - looks like a good read. He seems to have a good philisophy on simplifying life.