Cleaning out things that are too valuable to throw away, but not valuable enough to merit a place indoors is tricky. (I gave up a long time ago hosting any delusions of earning extra income through garage sales. I'm waaaay to lazy and prone to procrastination to pull that off.)
So I always begin with a heart of stone and declare, "If it's out here, we don't need it. Throw it away!"
Then I soften ever-so-slightly to, "That's too nice to throw away. Let's donate it." (The 'Donate' boxes then ride around for weeks in the trunk of my car before I finally need the space and they find their way BACK in the garage.)
And finally, before I know it, I've pretty much gone through every box--laughed, cried, sighed and moved everything from one side of the garage to the other. We sweep, reorganize and put it back where it was to begin with.
It's a vicious cycle...but when you have the kind of treasures we do, one can't be too careful.
Here's an example:
Other things I unearthed today:
- corsages from both my senior prom and BigJoel's
- a Texas Tech yearbook from 1990 that doesn't have either of our photos in it
- salt and pepper shakers that survived my house fire when I was 15
- letters from BigJoel when I was a summer missionary on the Texas coast in 1987
- small bride & groom stuffed bunnies--the "bride" is made out of scraps from my wedding dress
- a gold record
- my college diploma
- my autographed copy of "The Last Voyage of the USS Pueblo"
*sigh*
