Argh.

Well..Mike just dropped "Flussie" off for her..big day...

And I decided to clean the crap out of the closet... yes..AGAIN.

Why, you may ask?? WELL! Let me tell you..

Last night my mom took Andy to her house for dinner so I..... BLEW UP MY HOP BALL!!!!!!!!!!!

That is a WHOLE different post in itself, which dont you worry, will come soon. BUT! Now I had to.. well.. hide it!!! Its mine & I'm not sharing damnit, so until Christmas comes & Andy gets his.. mine will remain hidden except for when I sneek into the bedroom alone to hop around on the floor. (And yes..I have already done this..that thing is a GOOD work out!!!!)

So!! Its too big to hide under my little table where I hid the exercise ball Andy is obsessed with so I stuffed it in the closet with a blanket over it for last night.. This morning, I opened our ONE hall closet & tackled the mess that I call "Mikes hording of junk given to him by people"

Yes.. You see.. My dear husband can not say NO. People give him stuff.. often with the "we were just going to throw this away but I thought I'd give it to you instead" which is OH so sweet..and Mike just CANT say NO. It doesnt matter if he will NEVER EVER EVER even touch the thing, he will say "Oh wow! Thanks!!" and then KEEP it. SERIOUSLY..People he meets at SCHOOL..even our NEIGHBOR give him random CRAP!!!

Not "Oh wow thanks!!" and then donate it to GoodWill later with out them ever needing to know..

Nope..I love my sweet sensitive husband, but he attaches love to objects.

While he does have great parents, he didnt have the childhood, or connection or, in my opinion, secure, wanted feeling that children deserve, as unfortunately, most children of divorce wind up with at some point in their life, so now.. He seems to attach the feeling of being loved or cared about to people giving him THINGS.

Please dont get me wrong, I'm not "dissing" Mikes family yo.. I'm just saying, that in general, often children who come from divorced families wind up with their own issues, or insecurities, or sadnesses from that divorce & lack of 2 biological parents. Not always, but from what I've seen, quite often.

We've been working really hard on it, trying to remind him that the memory isnt in the sweater, or the ball, or the shirt, but the memory is with HIM. After his step dad, Greg passed away Mike held on to all of his old clothes.. Thats totally okay, but it got to the point where Mike had no room for more clothes ( that fit him) and he was getting rid of clothes that he wore, and clothes that fit him, to keep 5 identical shirts that are 3 sizes too big & he never wore. So, we took some time to take pictures of objects/clothes/etc and to make a little "memory piece" out of his 2 favorite shirts & donate the rest to people who could really use them.Which, in the end Mike said he felt good about, because he knew that Greg was a giver too, and we both remember one time he tells us about these pretty glass coasters we have "If you have them use them. Dont just keep them around, actually use what you have." And Mike felt that giving them to people who would be able to use them, was a good thing in the spirit of Greg.

I'm lucky he's such a sweet, caring, thoughtful man. I hope I dont sound like I'm complaining.. I'm complaining more about the massive amounts of things he is hording in the TINY amount of storage space we have.. Which is ONE closet. A SMALL one..closet..We use my moms basement for storage right now & I cant even tell you how much stuff down there, are Mikes things that I could bet money on, he doesnt even know what is in there!!

SO.. The whole point of this.. duh.. I've been trying to stress to Mike .. NO BIG CHRISTMAS GIFTS.

I personally, would really like to ask of people to only get each child ONE toy. Pamela gave the suggestion to ask for people to put money towards an extra year of Preschool for Andy,which I LOVE. I also like the idea of Gymboree/Little Gym/etc classes for the kids.. We dont NEED more toys.. Both boys have a savings account, both kiddos have a college account. I'd MUCH rather, while we are in a SMALL house and they are young, have people give to this type of thing.. in a few years the kids will "know" and have gifts they actually ask for.. I'd like to be able to do this while we can get away with it, so to speak. My family has always done "Christmas Lists" where you write down a few things you'd like.. As a kid, mine was always changing..making sure my BIG #1 was at the top of my list!! I just figured, everyone did that? I mean.. why would someone want to get you agift that you dont need/want/already have/dont have room for??? I would much rather get someone something they actually WANT or can use.. Right??

I already over did it on the gifts for the kids.. not in quantity. but a select few special toys that are bigger than I'd prefer.(Damn co-op pricing..) I've passed the word on "SMALL gifts!!!" to my family, but then Mike told me that his family doesnt do that.. No lists, no mentioning of what people would like, etc..

And I was suprised..I guess I thought Christmas Lists were something most people did..I mean.. When you "go see Santa" dont kids have their little list in mind to tell him what they want??

So, it got me wondering..Do you do Christmas Lists?? I know I read in a magazine one lady keeps a Word document all year & adds little notes to it when she comes up with an idea through out the year so she can pass it on to family & I thought that was a great idea! No doubles of toys, everything you KNOW the person will like!!Right??

Am I just crazy???? I might be.. I go from "Man this closet has alot of junk.." to wondering "Does everyone to Christmas Lists??"

...I often wonder if other peoples minds work the way mine does..or if I'm actually crazy...

The world may never know.