<p>Yay for Flylady! She also sells GREAT cleaning tools.</p>
<p>I have tons of room for books (ex-H had a very nice library, and removed thousands of books when he left). So at this point I would be happy to have everyone’s old sci fi paperbacks. 
Seriously, our local library has an annual used book sale that we really enjoy going to. The sci fi pickings are usually pretty slim, so my Ds and I would love for someone to give them a great collection for the sale.</p>
<p>Thanks for the suggestions! The 5 lb coffee cans are surprisingly heavy though, so I definitely won’t be dumping them in any machines…I’d prally keel just trying to get them up from the basement and out to the car! When looking at the silver coins on ebay earlier, I noticed that people are actually buying those old wheat pennies for $4-6/roll now (mystifying since there must be millions of them still in circulation) and Indian head prices are even higher! Perhaps my youngest will agree to sort, stack, and roll them…I guess that could be his car fund as long as he doesn’t find out his sibs got the easy, lightweight stuff! Heck, as many as there are, it might be his college fund! Anyone care to guess how many pennies are in 17 5lb coffee cans?</p>
<p>I went through my dad’s coin collection- two yrs ago, when silver and gold prices were high. The Morgan Silver dollars, as beautiful as they are, are for the most part, only worth their weight in silver. There are a few years and mint markings that command a higher price, but not that many.</p>
<p>Joining the thread late, but am reading some awesome ideas. </p>
<p>Since last fall I’ve been waiting for the Elfa sale and am currently waiting for a friend of ours who works at Container Store as a designer to email me the design that she’s working on for my bedroom closet! I am going to start going through things before it’s installed, though. I’m pretty good with the clothes, getting rid of stuff I haven’t worn in a year or two. </p>
<p>Lots of mentions of old books, but here’s a new one… what are you all doing (fess up, I know some of you know what I’m talking about here) with all of your old Disney videos? Or any old movie video for that matter? We still do own a video player (I haven’t had all my home movies transferred to new media, so we have to have something to play them on). </p>
<p>My biggest gripe is all the electronic accessories we have around that no one knows what it belongs to. In our house, we all have laptops (three of us have MacBooks) and there’s one desktop in our study/office, and I’m sure all this residual crap is either not necessary, or if needed years down the road (which is unlikely because by then we will all have new computers) it can be bought. In five years of having these drawers full of stuff, I’ve never gone into it looking for a cable/power cord/etc. Ugh!</p>
<p>MiamiDAP - Maybe you can donate pottery to fundraiser silent actions or other charity cause? Our town’s charity food panty has an annual soup-luncheon meal fundraiser($15…or I think many donate more), served in hand-made donated pottery bowls. </p>
<p>Spideygirl - I’ll check out that Flylady link! </p>
<p>Woo Hoo - I finally got my son to fill a box with old books, destined for the library sale. He also gave me permission to trash all of the college snail-mail promotinal material we had collected in a big trunk. I kept a little bit for schools he applied to and made more than enough room in the trunk for the file holder with his apps, essays etc. Yea, someday I can pare it down further, but for now it is progress. </p>
<p>Confession - Sadly I found 2 birthday cards (with checks) for S from Feb 2009 with the college stuff. I’ll share the blame with son on that. He had great test scores and got a LOT of mail, so I used to make a pile for him to go through. Usually he did not (teens tend to do more research online, and I ended up that route too). If the pile got too high and I was cleaning up… a new pile went to the trunk… it looks I missed the intermingled cards. I explained that he can’t cash the checks now. Still deciding whether to fess up to the relatives - if I tell them they’ll want to write a new check… if I don’t, they may have a bad memory of waiting on him to cash the check.</p>
<p>^^
colorado_mom: If they balance their checkbooks, they already know that he didn’t cash them. The explanation you gave for how they got lost is completely understandable; I don’t see anything wrong with telling them just exactly what you told us. You’ll feel better for having cleared the air, and they’ll be able to stop wondering.</p>
<p>If you want to fend off the offers for replacement checks, here’s one idea: Ask your S for the names of a couple of his favorite charities. If replacement checks are offered, you can request (or have him request) that the funds go to those organizations instead.</p>
<p>I have several containers of coins, too…</p>
<p>Yesterday I cleaned out the upstairs linen closet. Three trash bags and a laundry basket of donate-able goods later, I have room for guest towels and blankets in there! There were vitamins and other meds dating to 1998 – must have put them in the closet when we moved in and they haven’t been touched since. Not putting anything with an expiration date in that closet again!</p>
<p>teriwtt, I still have our old Disney musicals, Thomas the Tank Engine and Schoolhouse Rock VCR tapes. Haven’t been able to part with those yet.</p>
<p>I was actually watching TV tonight and heard
Skidamarink a dink a dink, Skidamarink a doo, I love you
in a car commercial!</p>
<p>We still have that Wee Sing - Grandpa’s Magical Toys VHS. How could I ever throw it out now? It’s making a comeback!</p>
<p>I saw the same commercial. It prompted my H to start quoting lines from that original Wee Sing video, which I think we watched several hundred times when the kids were young. </p>
<p>I consider myself to be a pretty organized and clutter-free person. My husband is neither.</p>
<p>Teri - I debated what to do with the videos when we “fluffed up” the house last year - I realized that saving them for the future grandkids wasn’t gonna work - my kids will NEVER own VHS players! I gave them to a friend who had grandkids NOW and they are enjoying them. Gving away some of them - with all their memories - was sad but it made more sense then keeping thme and letting them continue to deteriorate</p>
<p>I haven’t read all these posts, but want to plug a wonderful charity, “Suitcases For Kids”. From the website-- "In November, 1995, 10-year-old Aubyn Burnside learned the average child in foster care moves three to four times and traditionally carries his/her personal belongings from home to home in black garbage bags. . . " You get the idea. It is a great way to recycle the unwheeled suitcases up in your attic.</p>
<p>[Suitcases</a> For Kids](<a href=“http://www.suitcasesforkids.org/]Suitcases”>http://www.suitcasesforkids.org/)</p>
<p>1moremom, thank you for that link…what a wonderful thing! How must it make that child feel to have their things packed as if they were trash? That’s just horrible…</p>
<p>Suitcases for Kids - Love it! </p>
<p>On the uncashed checks, I’ve assumed that all non-teens balance their checkbooks. (My teens just use their debit card instead and track balance online). So I figured the relatives did notice. Just was hesitant to remind them.</p>
<p>Colorado mom - ahh, timely reminder before D returns to college today. I KNOW there is at least one uncashed check from xmas! thnx!</p>
<p>My question goes all of the way back to post #16 which mentions the Space Saver bags: when things get scrunched do they recover their fluffiness when you take them out of the bags? S brought ALL of his room contents home over break because his room is being used during the interim. I would like to “shrink-wrap” his blankets, quilt, egg-carton pad, etc. but don’t want to squish them if they won’t recover their shape.</p>
<p>I recently used these space saver bags. When I needed a thick quilt for company over Christmas, I took it out of a very squashed pressed together wrinkly bag, and it came out all fluffy just like it was when I put it in. I was really surprised how well it did!</p>
<p>I would think twice before I put down in those bags. Our down sleeping bags came with big cotton duffles for storage when they are not in use; keeping them crammed in the stuff sacks is not recommended. The same is probably true of a down comforter.</p>
<p>The comforter I used in the bag was not made of down. I think I would hesitate to put down in one of the space saver bags, too.</p>
<p>Thanks for the responses on the space savers. His quilt is not down, so I will try it. I just took some sweaters out of one of the bags and they looked fine.</p>
<p>The space saver bag topic is timely. I was wondering the same question this week.</p>