The BEFORE Pictures...

So -- what was happening in MY LIFE during my oddball one-week blogging break??  The truth is, I was feeling a little low.  Then, I decided I needed a change of pace...and maybe it was time I got serious about cleaning my basement.  I've got company coming this month (more about that later) -- so I got lost in my basement.

 And IT'S ABOUT TIME..!!

In the words of the iconic Martha Stewart..."It's a Good Thing..."

Obviously, my life is filled with the joy of COLLECTING STUFF. Honestly.  For many years, my happy place was a Saturday auction, where I might buy boxes of random stuff...just because it was A BARGAIN.

And there isn't a week that goes by that I don't stop into one or two of my favorite thrift stores. I buy puzzles, games for the kids, t-shirts to be cut up and Franken-sewed into other things. Shoes and coats and snow pants the kids will grow into. Fleece shirts for John or jeans for me. It's ALL THERE...IN MY BASEMENT. Decades of collecting...in no particular order, of course. As well as John's tools, my sewing equipment, the Art of Homemaking Exhibit, dozens of beautiful wool blankets and/or cotton sheets, boxes of paperwork from a store I closed 20 years ago...

Well -- to give you an idea...and in the interest of FULL DISCLOSURE...today is all about the SHOCKING BEFORE PICTURES...

There is a pool table at the base of this t-shirt mountain...

This is actually WHERE ALL THE MAGIC HAPPENS...my "sewing area"

On the OTHER side of the pool table...baskets of more treasure.  One is full of velour items...and -- yes -- even a pink Lazy boy...

The view under the stairs...tubs of stuff I just HAD TO HAVE...at some point...who could ever find it?

Looking at a shelf that was built originally to start seeds?  THAT was a long time ago...

I didn't realize we had 11 coolers.  I still don't know how that happened...

Looking down the laundry side...there's a door going out to the yard...

That crappy desk fell has been sitting in this corner since 1997, the year Ross graduated from High School. And wait -- what's that? Another cooler? My ironing board is buried under the red coat...ugh...

John built these sturdy shelves 20 years ago. But they have LONG SINCE been filled with random stuff...ohh....sooo much stuff...

This back wall has a copper kitchen cabinet that cut my finger every time I touched it. We bought it in Virginia, as newlyweds. It was ALWAYS WORTHLESS... yet it has been the only thing that was with us in every house we lived in. And the old fashioned four drawer filing cabinet (that I started to paint in 1996) was full of papers, flyers, stuff I wrote, handouts I did for seminars...mostly it was the detritus from my retail store, "Rita's Sew Fun"

THESE are the actual BEFORE pictures of my basement. And it took a once-in-a-lifetime 3-month pandemic to force me to really get serious about doing a legitimate excavation down there.

And it is happening, people!!  But, clearly -- I need some major help...so I called in the BIG GUNS...

Tomorrow, I'll talk about THAT EXPERIENCE...

P.S. Leanne -- you are the only reason I'm posting all these BEFORE pictures. I am so ashamed of how bad it was...but I am seeing light at the end of the tunnel -- and you are right -- IT'S A FREEING THING...