To keep or not to keep...

One of the things that frustrates me about renovations is that whilst you are working on one room, another room has to work twice as hard because it has to take on the function of the room that you are renovating as well as its own function. For the most part of the year our living room couches were tipped on their sides in our master bedroom until our living room was finished enough for the couches to go back where they belong. Everyday when I woke up the first thing I saw was those upturned couches. And again they were the last thing that I saw before I went to sleep. My bedroom had become a dumping ground and I had lost my haven. In case you cannot tell it did not do wonders for my mood. When it became apparent that we were not going to finish renovating the lounge room by my December 2014 deadline I rearranged all the furniture in my room so that I could put the couches up the right way and actually use them. {insert huge sigh of relief here}

When we finally moved our lounge room furniture back to its rightful place I started emptying my home office into the master bedroom where it will reside until we finish renovating the office. The thing is though I haven't found a place for everything and I now have piles of boxes and stuff on the floor. Sometimes I have to clear a path to the bedroom door by pushing those boxes aside with my foot. Other times I'll want to have a clear floor so I'll start piling everything onto my bed and see if I can put things away from there. The trouble is often those things end up back on the floor as before I know it I'm tired and it's time to go to bed but then there's all this stuff on my bed getting in the way of me and my sleep. It's a vicious cycle. But here's the thing, today I noticed that it's always the same things that I leave out to trip over/clutter up the place. But why? Why do I have two boxes labelled keep and donate (as many professional organisers tell you to do) that are sitting there empty? Why  is the keep/donate/toss thing not working for me? To find out I had to take a closer look at what these items are. Ready for another list?

• A baby monitor
• A lidded hyacinth file box
• Old letters
• Programmes/ticket stubbs from theatre or dance performances that I've attended 
• Keepsakes from my dancing days, even old dance shoes
• Kiddos art work
• Keepsakes from my wedding
• My wedding dress

Wait, what? My wedding dress?! Er why? Why is it shoved in a white gift box with tissue paper instead of hanging up in my wardrobe? Oh that's right, not much space in there. Also I believe that I may have left it in a plastic dry cleaning bag for too long and hastily moved it to the box once I learnt that the plastic can turn your white dress yellowish. But why am I keeping it? It's not like I'm ever going to wear it again. And surely by the time my daughter gets married it will be so out of fashion that she wouldn't want to wear it. Besides, I'm a Kylie Minouge height, it's likely that Chloe will take after her dad and tower over me in the not too distant future. I'm obviously keeping it for sentimental reasons but do I really need to? It's taking up space. Should I go all Marie Kondo and thank it for serving me before I let it go - to the salvos...or even eBay? I have plenty of photos to remember it.

See?

Have you kept your wedding dress or have you let your wedding dress go? And more importantly are you happy with your decision or do you have regrets.  I'd love to hear your advice.

xoxo, Bianca