Day 275 - Really, Really, Really Old Candy

I don't even know how old this candy is, but I remember it in this same box in our old house that we left over 5 years ago. 

Those little suckers are stuck solidly to the bottom of the cardboard box, too.  Totally gross, but I still snuck it out because I'm sure DH would have objected.  In fact, I better bury it in the trash or he'll ask me why I tossed it out.  Shhhh.

Katie

Day 274 - Office Paperwork

I dug a little in the office today and found a pile of papers I could toss.  Most of this is paperwork from mystery shopping we have done over the years.  The company recommends you save your notes in case more details are needed or something, but I think 4 years is a bit long don't you agree?  Also included are a pile of advertising postcards from an animated film project DH was involved in back in 2002 & 2003.  It's called Agents of the Spirit if you're interested. 

Katie

Day 273 - More Kid Bits

Have you noticed a trend of kid stuff?  We've been busy rearranged our family room and finding new places for/getting rid lots of kid gear.

1. Lid to a music box
2. Electric box
3. Puzzle
4. Heart basket
5. Streched out bracelet
6 & 7. Marker lids
8 &10. Pieces of Dora colorform
11. Piece of a book from a Build-a-Bug activity kit
12 to 14. Miniature Littlest Pet Shop habitats
15. Bowl
16. Pencil Pouch
17. Hair 'claw'
18. Miniature LPS Dog
19. Squinky Bracelet
20. Squinky Cake Charm
21 to 26. Replacement parts for Leapfrog magnet barn

Katie

Day 272 - Strawberry Shortcake Toy

This is a very fun toy Joanna received for her birthday but it has all these small pieces I pick up whenever the kids play with it which has been less and less lately.  It doesn't match any other toys we have either so it's a large, stand-alone toy and just too bulky.

1. Market
2. Market counter
3. Instructions
4 to 22. Small pieces of toy: doll, furniture, food, shopping accessories
23. Broken hairband
24. Expired medicine
25. Baby hair clip
26. Lice comb

Katie

Day 271 - Stuffed Animals

Gah!  Somehow I didn't get a photo of this.  I had them all arranged on my bed but I guess I didn't snap a photo before I distributed everything to consignment, donate, and garage sale.  I don't want to reassemble it all because it's 10:50 pm and I want to go to bed. 

I purposefully waited to select these 26 because my kids would have freaked.  But I had every stuffed animal in the house bagged up for 6 weeks and they haven't asked for them even once.  They were bagged due to the headlice for 2 weeks and I just didn't get to unpacking them because of harvest things and travel.  Tonight I unpacked one bag (of 6), the one with stuffed animals.

I got rid of 26 items including a pelican toy with 3 seafood treats, lots of beanie babies, a couple of souvenir-type animals, some baby loves, an Elmo puppet, a quacking duck puppet, a run-around-mouse cat toy, a monkey, a kangaroo with joey, and lots of others, obviously. 

I kept 16 items - most very small and licensed characters.  Minnie Mouse, Elmo, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie mouse, Angelina, Super Grover, Tigger, Curious George, and that little turtle from Finding Nemo.  All of these are the size of Beanie Baby.  Then there are a few other "special" ones I kept, like a chipmunk, a dragon, a talking elephant, DD#2's special Whiskers cat, etc.  The remaining stuffed toys take up 30% of the space they used to.   This is after I've already weeded out stuffed toys several times, some on Day 230 and Day 156. 

Really sorry the picture didn't turn out!

Katie

Day 270 - Clothes

Some clothing items that have been piling up in that corner of my bedroom.  I picked a couple things out of my closet to make it 26. 

1 & 2. Shirts of DH's that have spots I haven't been successful at removing. 
3 & 4. DH's swim trunks
5. Pink pants I bought for DD#2 at a yard sale for 50 cents then realized there's no button!
6 & 7. DD#4 outfit that got ruined somehow.  The same stain is on both pieces.
8. T-shirt from our old Wednesday night club at church
9. Shirt from DD#3 which has an impossible stain.  Even bleach wouldn't do it!
10 & 11. shoes outgrown by DD#4
12 & 13.  Shirts from my closet that are really too small.  I was sure I'd lose a few more pounds to make them look cute, but those pounds didn't disappear so no need to hold on them even longer. 
14. Outgrown bathing suit
15 to 26. 6 pairs of socks - 1 DH, 2 my own, 3 DD#4.

Katie

Day 269 - Miscellaneous Junk

So today I pulled 26 bits and pieces out of the box in the corner of my room.

1. VBS craft from my cousin's kiddo
2. VBS craft from my own kiddo
3. A lego instruction sheet
4. Broken mug - so sad because I love this huge cup!
5. Gluestick lid found under the couch
6. Chapstick lid found under the couch
7. Twisted pipe cleaner found under the couch
8. Part of a dress-up shoe
9. VBS craft from kiddo (another one)
10. Kid flosser
11. Key to a car we don't have any more
12. Crocheted pin
13 to 18. Markers without lids
19 to 22. Cassette tapes we aren't interested in
23. Magnet toy from that math book
24. Lice comb
25. Sunglass lens
26. Broken hair band

Katie

Day 268 - 26 Bits and Pieces

My brother helped me clean up my garage awhile back and we came across lots of bit and pieces to toss out.

 

1. Car mat from a car we sold to the junkyard.

 

2. Box for our pencil sharpener

 

3. Dora sun hat
4. Bubble wand
5. Ball
6. Duck

7. Plastic bin lid, broken

8. Toy truck
9. Toy pan, broken

 

10. Beach ball, hole somewhere

11. Box for laminator

12 to 20. Toys from DH's boyhood collection

 

21. Book I passed along on our annual camping trip.

22 to 24. Casette tapes that don't play.

 

25. A piece of blinds.

 

26. No picture, but I gave a friend a baby headband earlier this week.  You know, one of those ones with a huge flower.  Her baby is tiny and the flower was literally as big as the baby's head.  Sweet girl will grow into it I'm sure. 

 

Katie

Friday Narrative - Long Break

I felt like I'd better right up a little explanation for where I've been! 

About six weeks ago we were in the midst of vacations and headlice.  Vacations were cancelled, headlice were attacked, then we got hand foot mouth which is a super contagious kid disease.  I was so busy and stressed dealing with kid sickness I just had to let ProjectTwentySix go for awhile to keep my sanity.

Then I got sick with multiple styes in my eye, the headlice was back, and our family car broke down twice in one week. 

Then we had another trip out of town for 9 days and came home to frantically prepare for homeschool.  Now that we've got our first week of school under our belts I'm wanting to wrap up ProjectTwentySix as quickly as possible. 

I'm realizing my time has become much more limited now that we're doing preschool, kindergarten, and first grade.  If only I'd stayed caught up!  Then I'd only have a month left. 

But I am committed to finishing.  We started with purpose and I still would love to see my house emptier and my life less cluttered.

As it stands I've got about 100 days to go, but I want to be done well before Christmas which is actually 102 days away (kinda scary).  So my plan is to double post as much as possible and be done sometime in November. 

Wish me luck!

Katie

Day 267 - Kid Junk

Most of this went straight into the trash.

1. broken hanger
2. pencil pouch
3. silly band bracelet, discovered in the basement and promptly broken
4 & 5. plastic paper clips
6. broken Ariel bikini top for squishy princesses.  You'd have thought the world was ending when I told DD#2 I couldn't fix it.  And she forgot about it 5 minutes later.
7. nasty jar the toothbrushes used to be in
8. broken camera someone gave one of my kids.  Just not worth the effort to find a manual online and buy connections,e tc.
9. VBS craft compass
10. Broken singing toy.  Just threw it out.
11. plastic toy
12 & 13. toothbrush covers
14 to 23. kid flossers - some were totally gross
24. Hair band that is broken
25. Hello Kitty pez keychain
26. Plastic lid that broke when the container it was covering fell out of the freezer.  Hate when that happens! 

Katie

Day 266 - Magnets

I found a little stash of magnets behind some books on our homeschool shelf.  I got rid of the book/game they went to long ago so these went straight into the trash.  Conveniently there were 26.

Katie