The tree has been boxed up for a week now. It finally made it out to the shed yesterday. Now I just have to put the remaining Christmas cards away and move the ornament boxes back into the storage room upstairs. These are the ornaments I don't want to put back up next year. They will all go to the donation box except for the old-fashioned girl angel. My friend has said she wants it. The pink trumpets came in a bag of lovely glass icicle ornaments I bought at a Christmas fair this year — I don't like them at all.

Tags: ornaments, Christmas, January 2010

Hawaii Five-O was my favourite TV show when I was a kid. I thought Jack Lord was lurvely. Nothing to do with these books. When my mom was here I was able to go through some very old books with her — to find out which ones came from her childhood and which ones might have been acquired elsewhere. The ones from her childhood we'll keep a bit longer. These came from someone else's bookcase. The one about Atlantis was particularly odd and beautiful inside. (see binding detail).

Tags: books, antique

When a local shopping centre built a new food court, one of the promo items I did artwork for was this mug. It's a blue enamel camping mug. I didn't drink out of it. I used it as a container. My mom took it. She also took the binders. But the pants went to Value Village.

Does it count as getting rid of something if my mom takes it? I'm not sure. I worry that I have just postponed having to deal with certain things for a second time when I help her downsize. So mom, I know you read this, please use the binders and mugs responsibly and dispose of them when you no longer need them. Thanks.

Tags: clothing, office, kitchen

I have a stack of these Home Chat magazines from the 30s. I'm ready to get rid of them. My mom wanted to take them all, but she really doesn't need more stuff either. We compromised — she took two with her when she left and I can do as I wish with the remaining issues. She remarked on the advertisements in the magazines. Many products and companies are still around today. The two she took have my favourite covers.

Tags: magazines, antique, January 2010

My mom hooks rugs. The old fashioned way. Cutting up pure wool clothing into strips and hand hooking onto burlap backing. She makes beautiful rugs. I don't have any here at the moment, otherwise I'd take a picture of one. (So I've taken an image from www.goprimitive.com. Check them out for patterns and greeting cards.) I used to have a couple, but my cats would stretch up to "investigate" them a bit too frequently for the health of the rugs. I could never put them on the floor, because, as anyone with cats will tell you, the preferred place to vomit is a throw rug. (Or into a pair of shoes.) I had a wool skirt, sweater and shift that I'd been saving for awhile -- I used to wear the sweater, but the moths ate holes in it. I have shrunk it once so far -- it needs to be shrunk a bit more before cutting it up for hooking. The skirt makes for good hooking because the variegation works to make its own subtle pattern. In addition to the clothing, my mom took some of my extra rags, a large rectangular magnet (she's going to use it to attract the sewing needles and pins that drop out of her arthritic fingers onto the floor), and dryer sheets that I won't use.

Tags: clothing, crafts, household

My mom and I are still sort of madly cleaning. There is a pile of stuff to take photos of, but it's hard to interrupt the flow. The laundry room is almost finished. Sorting the tool closet will be a whole job unto itself. There are little containers full of screws and nails and fasteners. Light bulbs. Sprays. Old tape. Looking for the charger for the hand held carpet cleaner. It's got to be in there somewhere. The only carpeting in our house is up a flight of stairs, and believe me, that carpet is ready for a wash. Found an old hot chocolate tin. And a New Year's Eve mask from 2000. Haven't worn it since. Someone else can hide their face.

Tags: tin, household, clothing

Back at it. My mother is here for a few days. We are working on cleaning out the laundry/freezer/treadmill/storage room. Three pairs of shoes on their way out. The black pair is what my husband called his "rat pair." Whenever we had to clean out the old garden shed of rats nests and traps and turds or had to crawl around the crawl space in crawl space gunk, he'd wear those shoes. He purchased a new pair of trainers this fall, so now he can replace these ones with the next rattiest pair. The sandals he doesn't wear any more. The black flats I'm giving to my mother. Had a long break from blogging. Much more to come from the laundry room I hope. It's 10pm and she's still in there with bleach and a toothbrush. I'm going back to help.

Tags: shoes, January 2010