My Husband's Crap: April 2008

In my last post I showed you the progress we were making in moving my husband's shop crap to our garage and the storage barn, and the overflow that was resulting inside the house. This post is an update now that everything has been moved to our property, with photos as usual, so that you may truly appreciate the full magnitude of the crap.

We begin outside where much of his crap is located. Open the garage door and what do we find? (Everyone say hello to Sugar's behind.)

EVERYTHING, it would seem. I mean, looking at these photos, you must wonder how there could possibly be more.

A few other angles to give you a complete view.

(From inside looking out the kitchen door. Say hi to Hank!)

Yes, it really does go all the way back, into each corner.

Backing out of the garage you will see we have quite a bit of overflow. As far as I am concerned that shop cannot be built soon enough, and yet it will probably not be built until the end of the summer at the soonest.

Somebody reserve my padded room, now, because I'm going to go nuts.

The crap spills around the corner between the house and the barn. He says there is room in the barn for some of the things that are in the garage right now. We had to hastily unload everything into the garage last week due to the storms that rolled through.

What's that against the side of the house under the carcass of the bench seat springs and hood from the 1951 Ford that is in the garage?

Oh, there are the bunnies!

At least they get some shade out this deal.

Then there's the stove (and various other crap).

He insists that he's going to use it for a project. Don't ask. I couldn't begin to explain it. That effin' stove makes me more nuts than all the car parts.

It even makes me even more nuts than this:

The truck has been sold and is waiting for transport. The car was intended to be a drag racing car for Pinks! That's on hold for now. The rest of that crap is supposed to be for building his shop building.

Here is where some of the children's bikes and outdoor toys have to stay for now. There is more on the porch too.

The ugly gray book display shelf will either be moved indoors to a child's bedroom (if I can find the room) or possibly be sold in a garage sale. We picked it up along with a lot of other crap at a school auction, like the upholstered benches under that formica counter top he's planning to use to build a work bench.

Along with those children's chairs and the other ugly green chair and the blue tool box in the driveway picture from above. Here's a reminder so you don't have to scroll back up.

No need for thanks, it's what I'm here for.

What's that on the porch?

It's a microwave, of course! Supposedly it works. It's going in the garage sale too.

Next is the kitchen where we find the table top actually exists.

Some of the items were actually put away in the attic storage.

But the rest were simply moved to the floor and stacked by the cabinet where he normally piles his smaller crap. As you can see, no progress on that counter.

There are only a few things on this counter top that don't belong. I found a home for all my bisque that was sitting there when last I posted.

He's recently taken to leaving things sitting on this antique lingerie chest. I know his recliner sits beside it, but if he's not sitting here his drink shouldn't be either. Please note the peeled veneer. My children can be thanked for that. GRRR.

Moving upstairs.

Oh, wait! That is actually our youngest child's room. It's a mess. Like father like son, I always say.

The three and half year old is going to be losing his bedroom in the next couple of weeks. He's moving into his older brother's room, which is significantly larger, by the way. They shared a room at our old house and I didn't want them to have to share again, but we have to do something until we can get my husband's shop built, and eventually add on an office to that shop--and that's years down the road at this point.

This isn't working for me.

Why yes that is my bra hanging on the handles of that chest of drawers.

And the bottom drawer is missing from my husband's chest of drawers because five weeks ago, one of our cats moved her litter of kittens to hide under it. They have been living in our bedroom ever since. They are going to be getting kicked out when we start moving everything.

Then there's my husband's desk. For the love of sweet Georgia Brown.

I want our bedroom to be a bedroom, a haven and a retreat. So my husband's desk and all of his office related crap, like the magazines stacked on the bedside table, and the boxes stacked up in the corner, will be moved into the our youngest child's bedroom. Luckily right now, he's excited about moving back in with his older brother. The six and half year old, however, had to be convinced.

My desk (currently in living room), file cabinets (also in the living room as well as in my closet where I can't get to it) and those black book shelves from our bedroom will also be moved into the office. I have a thesis to write this summer and I cannot see me writing it in the living room.

Converting our youngest son's bedroom into an office will solve many of the clutter issues inside the house, provide my husband and I with more private and efficient workspaces, and I hope it will also provide my six and half and three and half year old sons with some companionship that will strengthen their relationship and turn it into a friendship that goes beyond the sibling bond.

As for everything outside? A garage sale is planned for this weekend for a small percentage of our crap, and in a couple of weeks, my husband will be past his deadline on his most recent book, so that he can get some of that outdoor crap organized.

Or else, I won't have to worry about writing that thesis because I'll be living in a padded room.

~Sleeping Mommy

Seriously, we have to get $10,000 as soon as possible or my nerves are going to suffer from the stress of dealing with this.

We are moving the contents of the shop my husband rents (20' X 75') to our two car garage (20'x 20'). Do the math. It's impossible.

So, we bought a storage barn with lofts (10' x 16') and we moved everything that can be moved indoors inside. Now we have to find homes for this stuff.

This is his usual pile of crap on the counter. Sometimes I think that no amount of extra space will cure him of piling this crap on the kitchen counter.

This is a broken drawer that I would normally put in the garage or his shop to wait to be fixed. Right now it's in the living room. He's too busy moving stuff and working to fix it right now. I don't even have CLOSET space to hide this anymore.

The bisque is mine. It was in the garage waiting for me to have the time to paint it and access to a kiln to fire it. Since we moved last year, we don't have my sisterinlaw's kiln anymore and she hasn't had it hooked up. Now I have to find some place for it.

The kitchen table. Most of this is going upstairs to our bedroom--somewhere. Ha! (It hasn't changed since my last post).

We moved some of it to the barn, but not too much because that barn has to hold a lot of car parts and other car care and restoration supplies.

He's not finished moving everything yet. We have no idea how we will fit everything in the garage and the barn. He has to work out of the garage, so it can't be crammed full. He needs the space to work on his projects so he can write his magazine articles, or we don't eat, let alone have a roof over our heads.

These photos don't even include the outside of the house right now. The porch and patio is loaded with my gardening supplies and the kids' bikes and outside toys. There are car tires by the barn. There will be a couple of project cars out there too.

And, we've begun piling things up for a garage sale as soon as it STOPS STORMING.

In defense of my husband, 95% of this cannot be helped right now. We need to build a shop for him to work out of here on the property. We refuse to throw anymore money away on a rental so we have to make some sacrifices in space and working conditions for a while until we can get his shop built.

Until we get that shop built and everything moved into it, I'll be the on in the corner, curled up in a ball, developing a permanent twitch.

~Sleeping Mommy