This year, possibly spurred on by the overwhelming vision of my grandmother’s closet with its hundreds of hats and shoes and evening gowns (which we encountered head-on during our Christmas vacation, in the Wisconsin leg of our trip), my husband decided that we needed to repeat last year’s purging exercise.

And did I say “closet” up there? Because I meant closets.

Plural.

(there’s Heidi’s foot–see it?–disappearing into what appeared to be a wall of scarves; more clothes lie behind)

In fact, in Mama Kitty’s case it may be closetssssss (double squared plural). You’ll only know what I’m talking about if you’ve been there in person and experienced the fashion explosions happening all over the house.

Like the hats in the front hall, which represent not even a fraction of the headgear you will encounter as you wander through the house.

Just to give you a little insight into the Mad Hatter Wonderland of my grandparents’ eccentric and treasure-filled house, there’s even a mannequin in a bathtub in the livingroom.

And a mannequin by the mantel.

And that’s just the livingroom, folks. You don’t want to see the basement. I repeat–you don’t want to see the basement.

Or maybe you do.

Okay, fine.

Here’s the basement.

My husband is exclaiming in bewilderment–possibly something like “What kind of family did I marry into??”

Of course, he’s over 6 years late asking that question.

There comes a point where it’s futile to even ask.

But because I’m all about getting to the bottom of things, I’ll spill the beans. The answer is: you married into a family whose pater familias (Big Jake) has stocked the basement with enough food to feed the entire family for 1 year.

I know where I’ll be if the zombocalypse I’ve been hearing about ever breaks loose: feeding on cans of evaporated milk, popcorn, beans, and dented cans of clam chowder in the basement.

Of course, if the zombies learn how to access the internet, they may be able to track me down based on that disclosure. But then again, I’ve always liked living on the edge.

But I digress! (big time) Remember–exactly one year ago–the 111 things in 1/11 project that my friend Jenny initiated? It all started here . . .

. . . continued here with the emotional roller coaster of clearing out old college papers . . .

. . . and here with the trashing of my beloved but holey lamb socks (among others) . . .

. . . and finally here, with a clean-out of old make-up and defunct cassette tapes.

All in all, I ended up getting rid of about 120 things that I totally didn’t need. Whoopee!

So this year we will purge again! And we’re both looking forward to it. After experiencing a certain degree of materialism in the air during the holidays (if you know what I mean), we felt the need to rid ourselves immediately of as much stuff as possible. Old VHS tapes (those are so last-century), unused kitchen paraphenalia, paper files that are just taking up space, etc. I may even attack my jewelry drawer again, which is once more a tangled, mangled mess.

If any of you would like to engage in this exercise along with me this month, please send me the links to your posts, and I’ll link to your blogs as I write about our whirlwind of de-stuffifying!

It’s going to be satisfying, cleansing, and probably full of silliness.

Love,

Purging Petronilla