We missed the self-imposed deadline for listing our house by about 30 days…in fact we still haven’t officially listed it. The problem is that I want it to be perfect before we open it up to showings, but I’m slowly learning that perfection is just not going to happen. That said, we do have a few small final touches we want to finish up before we finally (finally!) list our house…so we’ve extended our goal yet again…but this time only by a week.

(Oh, by the way, below are some snapshots of the kitchen post-remodel as promised…we bought all the supplies and left our contractor with a list of tasks, without seeing any pictures of the progress along the way, so it was both nerve-wracking and thrilling to see how it turned out when we got home. We are pleased…)

Here’s what we’ve done in pursuit of sprucing up our house since getting back from Christmas holidays:

• painted the kitchen and mud room (mud room-ish area, rather)
• finished filling and painting all trim upstairs
• painted doors
• updated doorknobs
• bought a new (to us) sofa
• ordered and installed a new (beautiful) garage door
• ordered and installed a new (beautiful) stove
• replaced 7 light fixtures
• patched a hole in the wall
• installed door stoppers to prevent future holes in future walls
• filled in nail holes
• rearranged living room furniture
• rearranged living room artwork
• drywalled a previously-unfinished storage room in the basement
• rented a storage unit
• packed the truck full of boxes 5x and hauled to storage unit
• sold a bunch of stuff privately on Craigslist
• sold a bunch more stuff  at an indoor garage sale (best idea ever!)
• donated everything leftover from sale to local flea market
• continued finding extra stuff and continued taking it to thrift stores

So you see why we had to bump the deadline a second time—we’ve been quite busy. Luckily, the only things remaining to do (at least the only things I’m deeming absolutely necessary prior to listing…there will always be more we can do, but it has to stop somewhere) are these:

• touch up paint in living room, bedrooms, and bathrooms
• haul a bunch more stuff to the storage unit/recycling depot/thrift store
• deep deep clean the entire house (hopefully I can pay someone else to do this for me, because guys, I’m tired)
• get quality photos taken by a talented friend
• list
• sell
• repeat

Just kidding about the repeat part…I don’t intend to go through this process again for a very long time indeed!

But when we do decide to buy/sell/move again, it’s going to be a lot easier, because through it all, this process has taught me:

1. It’s silly to hold off spending money on updating a house if we’re just going to update it to sell eventually—better to spend that money up front, enjoy the benefits for awhile, and have it all ready to sell when the time comes. (Of course, if not planning to update at all before selling, this is invalid.)
2. I thought I was pretty good at decluttering and organizing, but ha! I’ll say it again: HA! I was nowhere near where I would like to be, but at least now I know that, and I’m working on improving. This is especially important since we intend to downsize significantly with the next place we live.
3. We buy too much stuff.
4. We store too much stuff.
5. We will never again buy and store this much stuff.

I’ve been enlightened.

Helping me along the way are the two books I read/am reading this month:

Zero Waste Home by Bea Johnson and The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo. Both books have been revolutionary for me in different ways, and although I feel compelled to wait until we sell this house and find somewhere new to live before I can fully implement their theories, I nevertheless know them to be true. I feel certain in my bones that this—this minimalistic, clutter-free, waste-free, joyful way of life—is meant for me.

Since reading them I’ve pre-edited countless cupboards, closets, drawers, bins…all of them still need work and I’m not ready to tackle them as thoroughly and intensely as both books recommend, but even still, it’s liberating. For example, today I sold my nail polish stash (already cut in half since selling my least-used colours back in the fall), including base coats, top coats, finishing spray, and remover, in one fell swoop, and vowed never to go back to my nail-painting ways.

Why?

Because it takes a lot of time to paint my nails. Because it takes a lot of money to keep buying new and interesting colours (half of which I don’t even like once I get them on my hands). Because there are a lot of things I can’t do while I’m waiting for them to dry, like fold laundry or hold my baby. And because they usually look awful anyway since they always chip within 24 hours, no matter what base/top/in between coat I use. I’m just too hard on them, and the whole process is basically a lot of waste. In fact, I’d just painted my nails last night, but when I read Johnson’s advice on embracing the nude nail, I looked down at my already-peeling nubbins and thought, “I’m so stupid.” I set down the book, gathered my supplies, snapped a picture and posted it online, and they were out of my life within 35 minutes. It’s such a simple thing and it’s kind of embarrassing that I’m making such a big deal out of it, but it’s symbolic you guys.

I haven’t felt this passionate about life since I discovered poutine.

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