Room By Room...Here I Go!

"The wise woman builds her home, 

but the foolish tears it down with her own hands."  

Proverbs 14:1

It's after 11pm, and I've been organizing and muddling through mounds of clothes for my two oldest sons.

For the past 6 HOURS. (minus a little time to eat dinner)

They are 15 and 16 years old, and for the past couple of years, I have let them sort through their own things to "weed out" what didn't fit and "get rid of" unwanted clothing items.

BIG MISTAKE.

It became apparent to me, recently, that I was going to have to get in there and help do some of the purging and organizing.

Teenage boys DO NOT have good judgement about what ACTUALLY FITS. (Caleb insisted that he needed to keep his size 14 boys camo shorts. He wears men's clothing!  Nathan tried on a long sleeved shirt that was at least 3 inches above his wrists and INSISTED it was fine b/c he LOVES the color yellow!)

Compound that small fact with the mentality of my oldest to keep EVERY article of clothing because it has some special meaning to him...

And compound it with the incessant NEED of my 2nd oldest to keep EVERY t-shirt he has ever owned (especially all the orange ones).

Don't get me wrong...my boys are not filthy.  The floor of their room is never covered in items.  There isn't trash strewn everywhere.

They just tend to stuff their drawers and closet with everything.  They don't seem to know what they have, and so they wear the same 5 items that get washed all the time.

Have you ever seen a drawer full of worn-out boys' underwear buried under stained and stretched socks?  

Trust me, it's not pretty!

No more.  We must clean out.  We must simplify.  

Slowly, but surely, I will make our home a haven of peace and rest.  It need not be a place of stress due to STUFF.  

I'm ashamed of the way I've neglected our home.  

I'm ashamed at how much we possess, when there are so many who have so little.

Lord, help me.  Give me discernment in what to keep and what to give away or throw out.  Help me hold lightly to physical possessions; I tend to be so sentimental!  Help me not to hesitate getting rid of something for fear I may need it in the future.  Lord, you have always provided abundantly when we needed it!!

Lord, show me how to organize a home for 11 people in such a way that it can be a BLESSING.  

Room by room...here I go!