How Many Google Searches Does it Take to Clean Out the Garage?

We all hate articles that begin with disclaimers but, for the health of my marriage, I must make one. I met my husband in 1974 and my life has never been the same, which is true since I don't really remember much of life before then. We have been married for 16 years and I have never loved him as much as I do right now.

But, alas, he has let me down. It's all about the garage. Remember the picture from a previous post? The Sandford and Sons garage? Yes, Kevin is both Sandford and his son.

Earlier this week, with our Open House quickly approaching and Kevin in London, I decided to take on the garage. That's right, just me and the garage. Winner takes all. The story goes something like this...

Prologue...In the married people world the word "our" has many meanings. By virtue of being husband and wife, officially, everything is "ours". Our house, our mortgage, our bills, our furniture, etc. But we all know better than that, right? For example, everyone within a 200 mile radius understands that when I say "our office", I really mean "my office". The same goes for "our boat"...the boat that I have only seen one time and have no idea where it is currently located. Definitely "his".

It probably goes without saying that "our garage" is really a space that belongs to Kevin. I think the only thing out there that can be considered real community property is the freezer. And, no, our cars don't fit in the garage.

Chapter 1: Everything in its place - The process for moving overseas starts with analyzing every possession in order to determine its future. What is going with us, what is going into storage and what is just going. The first sweep is mostly stuff that needs to go. But where do you put all your "stuff" when your house goes on the market? In the past, we have used the guest room or the office as a dumping ground but can't do that this time. I guess that is how the garage got so stuffed.

Or, maybe not. Maybe the truth is that we just own too much crap and are way too disorganized to handle it all.

So, to get control of the garage, I needed to apply an analytical strategy. How hard can this be? It's a square space, after all, so grab the graph paper and the measuring tape and lets get it done.

Chapter 2: What is it? - So maybe it isn't going to be that easy. I started to get a sense of why Kevin was avoiding this job. It's totally overwhelming. What IS this stuff? How can I organize it if I don't know what it is?

A plan! A plan! I need a plan!

The Plan
Step one: Line up and label boxes by category.
Step two: Decide which category an item belongs in and place in correct box.

OK. That's a good start. Hmmmm....if it is Benelli, Beretta, Winchester or Remington, it goes into the "gun stuff" box. But what about this thing (brand new) that is Remington brand but says it is a dehumidifier? Better go look that one up. Turns out, it is a dehumidifier for a gun safe. I guess it is fair to assume that the big safe looking thing on the wall is a gun safe. Wonder what's in it?

Moving on, all the fishing stuff goes into the "fishing stuff" box. Should I make different boxes for fly fishing, bass fishing, off-shore fishing, crab fishing, etc.? What about fishing clothing? Would he notice if I donated all those hideous, old man, Columbia fishing shirts? What about the vests that he insists on wearing with those lame Gilligan hats? Maybe not. I think my grandfather gave him some of those hats and I can't part with those.

Where do I put this thing? It looks like a scuba diving regulator. When was the last time Kevin went diving? Better put that in a box by itself.

Down toward the bottom of the pile, we discovered the golf stuff. Are those MY golf clubs? OMG, where did all these golf balls come from? Has Kevin been secretly scuba diving in the water hazards?

PAINT! How much paint does one family need? We have 18 gallons, 17 quarts and 21 cans of spray paint. Yikes! Anyone need some paint?

Chapter 3: Deciding when to give up - After 3 trips to the storage building and only 2 hours before our open house, I decided it was time to be satisfied with the mess being just a little less messy and throw in the towel. We still couldn't get a car in but at least we can get our bikes out. Plus, I now know what is in the garage, sort of.

Chapter 4: Confession-I really hate to admit that there was a lot of yelling happening during this whole story. That would be me yelling at anyone brave enough to pass in front of me. The kids have had enough experience with my moments to know that the wise thing to do is stay out of target range but I feel a little bad for the guy who was showing the house. Well, maybe he appreciates his own wife a little more after listening to me rail.

Epilogue: There is still much work to be done on the garage but I think I will leave it for when Kevin comes home. I wonder if he will notice that it looks a little different. I wonder if he will mind.

Jackson suggested that we put it all back the way it was before he comes home. That boy has an evil mind.

Second Showing

After only five full days on the market, we had our first second showing today. Isn't that exciting? Even though I don't really want to move, it is a crazy kind of emotional boost to know that someone really likes our house.

Our whole family has done an amazing job of keeping the house clean. I can't believe it. Even though we have added several steps to our morning routine, I was almost on time to work today! Of course, it is Monday. By Friday, I'll be dashing in the door just in time to start morning announcements! Thank goodness for that front row parking that we bought at Springetti.

But do not think that the Fortune's have completely gone over to the clean side. While the inside of the house is the perfect blend of the neat and comfortable, the garage remains a more accurate illustration of the Fortune philosophy on house work. And I don't exaggerate. Here's the proof:


What can I say? We like to keep it real around here and it doesn't get more real than this!

The Sign is Up!

The For Sale sign went up Friday afternoon and it already seems as though the house is no longer ours.

We have had several showings so we should feel good about that. I'm a little sad, though. I love our house, particularly now that it is so clean. We have been very happy here and it is painful to think of starting over...again.

It is natural to experience ups and downs during a life change and today has certainly been a down. This week, I'm going to make a real effort to be more positive about this move and try to have some fun, yes, FUN! No cleaning or packing and maybe I will even challenge myself to have fun without a computer. I wonder if that is possible. Maybe bowling! Or laser tag. I've never done laser tag but have always wanted too.

Of course, there is always shoe shopping which is a guaranteed mood enhancer. Hmmm...Zappos, I think.

Is carpet supposed to crunch?

We got new carpet a couple of weeks ago. Our carpet was the most disgusting carpet I have ever seen but I didn't see the point in replacing it just so the cat could have a landing pad for his next explosive fur ball demonstration. Our Realtor, Deb, convinced me that the house would show better sans enormous fur ball stains and so began the project.

My older sister always says that I got the good hair in the family, which is true. She's almost bald and I have really great hair. Unfortunately, she got all the domestic genes. I simply can't deal with most domestic matters and picking out carpet has never registered the tiniest blip on my "do before you die" radar. My mother was unlucky enough to be visiting on the day that the carpet sales people came so I had the opportunity to prove that you are never too old to embarrass your parents. Bless those sales people. They had no idea what they were about to encounter.

Does anyone really know how many different colors of white there are? If I had known that I had to pick out a COLOR, I wouldn't have opened the door. Then, when my response to "What color do you want?" was "I don't care." they didn't believe me. The guy opens up a gigantic book with all these tiny carpet squares in varying hues and depth and then starts talking about padding. WHAT? My before-10am decision making skills were already used up on the color question. I had nothing left to give they guy. He was just going to have to figure it out for himself. Can I go play video games now?

It was definitely time to draw the line. I politely (although not according to mom) interrupted Mr. Salesman to convince him that I really did not care. Really. I don't. Just get it close to what it is now but without the fur ball stains.

After a few moments of confused silence and a random point at one of the carpet squares, a color had been chosen. It was time to do the measuring. He pulled out the graph paper and I felt a little flutter in my heart. Now THIS is something I can help with! I'm great with graph paper and a measuring tape. Sadly, they didn't need my help and were confident that they could handle their own graph paper.

Skipping forward to the end of this intriguing story, the carpet is now beautifully installed and the cat has been relocated to a new home where he can spend the rest of his days on hard wood floors.

My question...Is new carpet supposed to crunch in random places? No one seems to know. Jackson thinks that the installers helped themselves to his Flamin' Hot Cheetos and dropped some in random places around the house. Instead of picking them up, they just installed the carpet on top of them. After all, that's what Jackson would do!

Calm before the storm?

It is oddly calm around our house tonight. For the first time in weeks, I actually COOKED dinner tonight. It seems like we are in a holding pattern for now and I am planning on enjoying it! Maybe we should start by celebrating Jackson's birthday...which was 3 weeks ago!

The house goes on the market in the morning. We have all made predictions on when it will sell. I'm the most optimistic of the group, which is unusual and a little unsettling.

Kevin has been a real trooper since coming back from his trip. It is amazing how much he has been able to accomplish in such a short amount of time. He told me to stop telling people that he was helping to make the bed every morning, though. Apparently, making the bed is not a very manly thing to do!

Fingers crossed for tomorrow!

The First Post

Welcome to our new blog which will chronicle our move from The Woodlands, Texas to London, England. Since most of our friends have kept up with our lives until this point, we are going jump right in as if we have been blogging all along.

Today, the Realtor came to take pictures of the house. Hopefully we can get the house on the market tomorrow but it may be Thursday. We aren't really worried, though. It is a great house in a fabulous neighborhood in the service area of the best elementary school in Texas...and I mean that! Our neighborhood epitomizes the urban family, except in the suburbs, and our elementary school has the ratings and awards that back up my high opinion.

Now that the house is finally clean and ready for showing, I feel like we can relax a little. There is still work to be done but we won't be doing any more packing for now. The hardest thing will be making sure we leave the house in order every morning. We are off to a good start, though, with all beds in the house made this morning. Kevin and I even made our bed together this morning! It felt oddly satisfying to do something so domestic together considering that neither of us possess a dominant domestic gene. Made me feel all warm inside.

The reality that the school year is racing to an end is causing some serious emotional distress for me. Today, I got all teary-eyed during recess when one of my 3rd graders told me how much she is going to miss me next year. They have no idea how much I am going to miss them.

But it is too soon for the sad stuff (even though I just had to grab a box of tissues). There is much work to be done yet.

I need an emotional boost so I think I'll go do some shoe shopping. I've got my eye on a pair of pink Louboutin sandals and some Ed Hardy rain boots. Zappos, here I come!