"Less But Better" Home Goods

Short but sweet post coming up here...I've been sick most of the weekend, and I'm still not feeling 100% unfortunately. This week, I've been reconsidering some of my past purchases all over the house from furniture and kitchen gadgets to keepsakes and knick-knacks.

Starting with knick-knacks and keepsakes...I'm realizing this week that these are two very different things. Poking around my room, I'm thinking, "Which of these dust collectors are actually bringing me joy?" Overwhelmingly, the things that bring me joy are things inherited from parents and grandparents and/or collected while traveling. The stuff I can live without was purchased at a big box store or ordered online. Simple as that! Imagine the distinction this way: It's the difference between telling a visitor that the thing they are admiring on your shelf has been in the family for five generations or that it came from Costa Rica as opposed to responding, "Thanks! It's from Walmart!" From here on out, my rule is: If it's decorative, it had better have a good story.

My second shopping rule generated this week is: New furniture breeds new junk. When I moved into my current house, I kept this bookshelf just in case I needed more space to put things. At first, I didn't have anything to fill it, but you had better bet that within a few months, the shelves filled up with stuff! I've gotten rid of enough things that I can now get rid of the shelves, too.

Many rules I've already set also apply here. I can avoid duplicates by paring down to a reasonable number of mugs in my kitchen cabinet, keeping only one umbrella (I'm just one person!), and keeping only one or two flower vases. I had four of them even though I rarely get flowers. When I have in the past, haven't they come with their own vase?! I can rely on dual purposes by using my cell phone as an alarm clock and monthly calendar, for example. In fact, I have a friend whose mom has a rule against single-purpose items (think of all those infomercial products that do just one ridiculously specific task). I purchased this big metal thing pictured above to hang my towel on. All that it has done for the past year is hold my towel. Something tells me I'll be just fine without it. Oh, and my coffee grinder is going too for the same reason. I wish I had never bought it, because buying pre-ground coffee is always an option! I don't need a candle just because it smells good, and a cheap target picture frame looks cheap.

Lots to think about next time I'm at the store...In general, I'm enjoying this project greatly, but I'm afraid I'm straying a little far from the sustainability message. The minimized impact of a simpler life is what is driving me further, but this is hard to measure. The best measure of my progress may be at the end of the semester when I can see how much of this stuff I can divert from the landfill. In the meantime, I'll try to think about how to calculate the future avoided impacts of buying less. Any suggestions? Have a great week, everyone!