Tackle It Tuesday – Books and Bedroom

PART 1. THE BOOKS: It started with a notice at our township library that they were having a used books drive. All I had to do was pull my car up to the curb and volunteers would unload as many books as I wanted to bring in. With Chris out of town on a business trip, I wanted to do something to surprise him when he got back, the way he builds me a piece of furniture every time I go to BlogHer. And the fact is, I’m a book hoarder. I was hanging on to decades of books, stacked three boxes high in our basement. That notice at the library was the jump start I needed.

I set aside 4 big packing boxes from product review deliveries and started sorting through the boxes in the basement. I made piles to keep, piles to donate, and piles to throw away. As a book lover, it’s almost painful for me to throw away a book, but if I came across one with a torn off cover or the beginnings of mildew, out it went. Into the keep pile went everything by my favorite authors – Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Jonathon Kellerman, Janet Evanovich, J.D. Robb, Patricia Cornwell, and into the donate pile went everything by authors I liked but didn’t love enough to give space to on my shelves – Tami Hoag, Sandra Brown, Lisa Gardner. I reminded myself that if I got in the mood to read something by those authors, I could get it at the library.

I filled up all four of those large packing boxes, plus three more of the original boxes from the basement. I tossed out several boxes that were so old, I knew I had used them to move books from our apartment to our first house, FOURTEEN YEARS AGO. I filled the trunk and back seat of the car with those seven boxes and drove to the library. You should have seen the look on the librarian’s faces! Apparently not that many people had noticed the announcement about the book drive. They said bring in my used books any time, they sell them in their used bookstore for fifty cents or a dollar, and the funds go back into the library. So, I went home and filled up four more boxes and drove back and dropped those off too. I didn’t get any pictures though :(

And you know what? I don’t miss any of those books at all. But it sure felt good to finally get rid of stuff I didn’t need that other people will want and that will help my library too!

PART 2. THE BEDROOM: Chris came home from his three week business trip last Saturday night, and besides surprising with the books, I wanted the house to be especially clean. I’ve written several times about what a slob I am, and I’m not a very good housekeeper, either. Chris is the one who does the picking up, and I didn’t want him walking in the door after sleeping on a plane all night and feel the need to start cleaning. So I got up early Saturday morning, told the kids that they WERE going to help and were NOT going to complain, and we set to work.

While Ryan was cleaning the kitchen and Nathan was cleaning the bathroom, I decided to tackle the mess that was our bedroom. I took a bunch of “before” photos specifically to post here so you could see just how bad it was (click to embiggen):

And then I started on one side of the room armed with Swiffer cloths and Pledge, a trash bag and another big “donate” box. The first thing I did was fill a smaller cardboard box with about 20 magazines that were piled up on the floor by the bed gathering dust. I didn’t even stop to look at them or tear out any articles to keep, I just put them in that recycling box and didn’t look back. That huge box at the foot of my bed was filled with clothes I had been tossing aside knowing they will be too small in the Spring, so I filled the “donate” box with those.

I dusted and vacuumed, I used the hose attachment to get the dust bunnies around the edge of the bed frame and between the wall and the dresser. I pulled out all my shoes and put three pairs in the donate box and one in the trash (trust me, they were beyond saving). I cleaned off the top of my dresser and my bedside table, and finally I pulled paperbacks I didn’t want anymore off of my bookshelf and tossed those in yet another donate box. When I was done, the bedroom looked like this:

The last couple of months of my life have been one surprise after another. I don’t know why, but I’m changing things for the better. I’m letting go, I’m making tough choices, I’m sticking to my plans. And you know what? It feels really, really good. Did you tackle a project this past week? Write a post about it and link it up on Tackle it Tuesday at 5 Minutes for Mom!

Can You Help Me With a Money Emergency?

cross-posted from MomReviews

Image representing BlogHer as depicted in Crun...
Image via CrunchBase

*deep breath*

I need $100 by Thursday.  I had been counting on my monthly payout from Linkworth for the text ads I run on Table for Five, but they don’t payout unless you earn $100, and I only earned $95.00. The money will get added to my payout for next month, but I leave for BlogHer on Thursday morning.

The money will be spent on gas for the car I’m driving there and back (I’m taking 2 other people down and 3 people back, but once the tank of gas the car is delivered with is gone, we’ll have to chip in to refill it),  lunch on the way there and back, tips for the doorman and any necessary cab rides, and if I have enough, a souvenir BlogHer t-shirt which they’ve never had before.

$100 might not even be enough but I feel bad enough asking for help as it is. I’d also like to point out that while this blog does have text link advertisers, the amounts they are willing to pay are not large, and the money I received for those ads this month has unfortunately already been spent. On the mortgage payment. And keeping my kids in Cheerios.

So, my dear readers, I’m asking for your help. I know money is tight for everyone, anything you can donate is greatly appreciated. It used to be commonplace for blogs to have “Tip Jars” but that practice fell out of favor a few years ago. Since I have a PayPal account and a debit card I can use to access the money, I’ve created a PayPal donate button.  You can transfer money from your PayPal account to mine, or pay with a credit card.

When I say any amount is greatly appreciated, I really mean it. If everyone who reads this blog donates $1.00, it would take less than a day for me to have what I need.

OR…you can ask me to DO STUFF FOR MONEY! That’s right, thanks to PayPal, you can send me money BUT I have to agree to do something in exchange.  Click the link, type in your name, my name and the dollar amount,  then fill in your PayPal address and my PayPal address, which is elizabeth(at)table4five(dot)net.

What am I willing to do for your money?  Write posts, review sites, post text link ads or button ads (length of ad would depend on amount paid),  whatever you can come up with that’s appropriate for a family-friendly blog :)

I’ll answer potentially embarrassing questions, help you with WordPress problems,  just name it.

I really hope those of you who are regular readers know how hard it was for me to write this and how grateful I will be for any donations.  BlogHer is the most important conference I go to all year, every year I come back having learned something that adds value to my blog and having made new friends and contacts that often turn into long-term relationships. The vendors I meet at this conference could be the giveaway sponsors of next month!

I’ll close this by saying thank you in advance for anything you can do to help.

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Post Recap-it’s not Spring BREAK for this Mom

Today is the first day of Spring Break for my kids. Which means that Kaitlyn woke up at 7:15, she stands up in her crib and calls out “Open. Open. Ohhhh-pen” until someone goes to get her. And the boys actually slept in, the bums. So I got up, made a pot of coffee, whipped up boxed pancake mix, and started my day. I’ve written so many posts over the last few days, I want to recap what’s been going on for readers that are just now joining us:

1. A sponsor is giving away a $200 American Express gift card to be used for college expenses, it’s NOT an April Fool’s Day joke, here’s the link to the post.

2. I am collecting donations to be given to another blogger who is dealing with her third bout of cancer, and wants to take her girls to DisneyWorld. The PayPal donation button in the post goes directly to the fundraising page, she will get 100 % of what is raised, and if you don’t have a PayPal account, you can still click the Donate button and use a credit card. Here’s the link to that post.

3. We had an unexpected furnace repair that cost (after disputing the charges) $518, and I had to use the money I was saving to pay for BlogHer. Yesterday, BlogHer announced a contest, the winner gets free roundtrip airfare, conference pass, and two days’ accomodation. It’s pretty much my only chance to go. I need to be nominated by people who think I demonstrate “passion, innovation, and the ability to inspire a community”. If you want to nominate me, I hope you know how grateful I would be. Here’s the link to the nomination page, you do not have to sign up for the Blogher website to nominate someone.

If you haven’t visited those three posts yet, I would sure appreciate you taking the time. Like a commenter said, I think of us as a community, as a family. Any of you can count on me for anything I have to give, any time. Thanks for spending some time reading this today!