Good afternoon for real this time.

Who is paying for the trash service? How many cans can you put out each week?

My mom saved letters from two men she thought about marrying (one match was ended by her potential future mil because of religious differences, and the other guy just kept saying "will you marry me when..." And my dad said "will you marry me now".) she told me where the letters were so I could burn them if anything happened to her. Then the first guy died and she reread his letters and threw them out because they made her sad. After that, she gave all the other letters BACK to the other guy at their 60th high school reunion. Apparently the second guy read the letters and sent her a note saying "thanks for returning my letters. It was interesting to revisit who I was over 50 years ago. No wonder you dumped me, I was a pretentious @$$."

I am up to five things. 4 in the donation bag and one in the recycling because it was a hard thing to let go of because it meant letting go of a project idea I was attached to, not just the object.

I continue to slowly add things to the recycling, trash, and craft thrift bags. And I have a bag to take to school.

I am also finding things that make me cry because they remind me of times I miss or people I have lost. But I have not given up.

SubC, I loved your letters story! How cool. If I come across mine, I will likely read them and toss most.

I pay for the trash service, but TotsDad gives me $200 to help with expenses each month. He pays the internet as well. It is not much, but I want them to be able to have enough to move out! Which should happen before summer I believe. I have had the experience in the past of being calm and tolerant for years, but then at the last month or so (with other people, not him) losing my cool and getting harsh and "putting my foot down" and messing up a relationship, so I am cautious. Seems like people remember the last thing you did or said, and not the months or years of good and calm things that preceded it. I am in the home stretch with my kids living in my home...

I went into the wardrobe cabinet it my bedroom again today. It is a hard cabinet because I have not messed with it in years.

There were a lot of jars, mugs, and glass kitchen items in there from when Teen was breaking all my stuff so I had to lock it all away. That made me sad. I got a dirty storage bin, washed it out, pull those items in it and put them in the storage small bedroom. Yes, I want to get rid of jars. But not those jars, and I cannot get to the jars I want to donate yet. They are behind piles in the storage bedroom.

Anyway that made space in the wardrobe. I needed to take a break after that. There are other things in there like photos, documents like the restraining order against Teen and my divorce papers, and it is a bit overwhelming. Maybe I will move them all to a different space and use the wardrobe for nice things like sweaters and blankets.

I just took all the ornaments off the Christmas tree, and TotsDad came up and took it out to the curb. Now there are needles alllll over the place, living room carpet, table, dining room floor, stairs, entryway, porch, sidewalk...

I will have to clean up the living room tonight at least. It is so many needles I will have to sweep them first or the vacuum will clog. I am glad the tree is gone, though. I am ready.

I need to look for the cake pan I need to make this cake. I do not feel like doing anything!!! Bah!

It's true that people tend to remember the most recent thing.

I guess if he is willing to make dump trips, that will do. You can't have garbage piling up at the house!

I basically spent my whole day on the basement. Dh spent his down there too. He is mostly working on the trains. He has his father's toy trains, and dsil dropped all of *his* father's toy trains at our house. He told Dh he didn't care what Dh did with them- he could throw them out. Dsil loved his dad, but his dad died, and it was a complicated relationship. I don't think he's really processed it. Anyway, those trains are in a variety of conditions and Dh really wants to get them working as much as possible, because he thinks some day dsil will care, and if not "they are still part of our grandson's heritage from their other grandfather, and I want them to have that even if they didn't get to meet him."

I have cried a lot today.

But, Dh says he can see that I worked on the basement, that it made a difference. Besides trash and recycling and things "set free" in the yard, I have half a paper grocery bag for the offsite craft storage, and a full paper grocery bag for school (all uncounted) and 8 items to start my tally for the year.

Oh dear Lila, you must have listed right after I started typing!

I am taking my tree down on Monday. Bean wants to help undecorate it and feed it to the goats.

I didn't know goats would eat a Christmas tree! That is really cool!

Oh your Dh sounds so sweet, thinking of the trains like that and dsil and grandson. How dear. I am sorry you have been crying today. I am guessing things you are coming across are triggering?

Tomorrow is trash day, and I have every intention of taking out as much of my trash as possible even if it fills a bin. There are two bins. Maybe if the bins are full, TotsDad will make that dump run soon.

I hate conflict, it makes me upset most of the time. I hate bringing up negative things. Youngest Son had his gf over and she spent the night. I am not okay with this even though he is an adult. I let him know in a nice way but now I feel bad because he is sensitive and I don't want to hurt his feelings. But I really do not want, and never have allowed, girlfriends to spend the night here. They have only been dating a few weeks too, so I feel it is not appropriate. If he wants to go to her place, he is an adult. But I feel like with it being my house I should be able to have that kind of rule. It may be an outdated idea of waiting until you are married to sleep together, but that is what I think is best, and they are not even in a long term committed relationship. Am I being an ass? I am not trying to. But for some reason I feel bad that I even had to say anything.

I am not in a great mood, it is raining and grey, the trash bins being full annoy me, having no space for my stuff is tiring, I just need to get over it and stop being annoyed about things that will soon not be an issue.

Good morning!

Lila, the crying was because I am finding a lot of things with strong emotions attached (the basement is where I store my boxes of stomachaches.) and then once I was feeling emotional, it became easier to set me off. I cried when Dh talked about fixing the trains for our boys.

I'm not sure what to say about the girlfriend. While yes, it would be good of your son to respect your wishes, he is an adult, and it is also his home. It does seem like staying at her place would be a better option. Depending on her circumstances. Your house has a mother that is made uncomfortable and young children whose parents may prefer not to have that behavior modeled. Does this son also have a plan for moving out soon?

I am looking at another day of working around the house/in the basement depending on what Dh has planned. He is currently at the gym. I have done yoga and am heading out to take care of chores. I have been going out late because I can and it is very cold.

Closing in on lunch time here. I have a feeling I'm going to be posting a lot for a while.

Did chores, carried an empty shelf out to the studio loft, packed up one bin of Christmas decorations, found two items to let go (one Christmas, one not) plus another handful of craft stuff.

Also found my Mickey Mouse clock from when I was a kid. It has not worked in decades. Dh is trying to fix it for me!

The dishwasher and washing machine are running.

Back to the basement.

hi SubC! I will come check on you today! I have the day off and am also doing stuff, but not what I would have chosen to do. Last night I spent a lot of time making a cake just right for a birthday today. It was in a springform pan. As I was putting it into the oven, it fell apart. The latch just popped right open without me touching it. The batter went everywhere. All over the front, door, inside, drawer of the oven, the cabinets, everywhere. I was devastated. I had to go cry while the oven cooled down. I do not have time nor ingredients to redo it. My son had to come and take the door off the oven and put it in the shower, and I scooped up as much batter as I could and then he put the drawer in the shower. I was cleaning up this mess for 2 hours last night, as it got in all the holes and creases and seals. It was awful. I also had to unclog the bathtub which meant Son had to take the drain apart.

So this morning we pulled the stove out from the wall and I spent another 2 hours cleaning behind it, the sides, the floor, backsplash, inside the oven, then mopped the kitchen. Then son put it back together. It is still not totally done as the stove top needs another cleaning with the burned on stuff. It has been exhausting. I have enough ingredients to make a miniature cake that they wanted. Ddil is going to bake a cake for the rest of the family that is not as complicated.

I am glad it is over. I will go bake the mini cake now. See you again soon.

Oh Lila, I am so sorry about your cake! That is horrible.

Dh fixed my clock! It has been running for two hours (the works are out of the case) if it is still running tomorrow, he will put it back in the case. He says I have to put it somewhere where I will remember to wind it.

I am up to four items out today. One of them is a doll my grandmother gave my daughter. She doesn't want it anymore. I think it is creepy. My mom agreed that it was creepy and I should donate it. (I called her.) She said she is sorry that she and her family gave me so much stuff and taught me to hold on to everything, and that she needs to work on her own house. She said I can call her any time I want for help with the basement. She also blessed passing on the box of Girl Scout stuff I have in the basement that was hers. I called our council and they invited me to drop it off, they have a historian who will go through it and make best use of it. It is a twenty minute detour after work, so I will do that next week. I will count the box as 1 after I drop it off.

I started to make the food I want for dinner, because I remembered it takes a long time - longer than I remembered. I will have to make it tomorrow because I don't want to eat dinner after 7pm. Dh bought himself a tool with some Christmas money that arrived today and he is out in the woods working. I might ask him if he wants to take me out to dinner tonight. Or we can have leftover pasta or soup.