THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS

While I was at home over the Easter weekend, I started to help Mum ‘de-clutter’ the house. Our family home has always been quite a jumble, but it is getting to the point where some rooms are becoming un-usable and the house is starting to look like something from ‘The Hoarder Next Door’. 

I was quite happy to slip into the role of the bossy son, quizzing Mum about everything from books about the ‘Benefits of Porridge’ to her collections of milk-bottle tops and used matchsticks. (They are for crafts apparently… and that book has some good oat recipes). 

The task was way too big for me to even scratch the surface for the few days I was home, but I did manage to get several sack loads of books shifted to the charity shop (these are one of the main problems!) and managed to clear a whole entire surface. 

No sooner had I cleared it, Mum was adding a few bits and pieces to it, to make it pleasing to the eye. I give up!

Maybe it is the artist in her, but my Mother seems obsessed with ‘arrangements’. So my suggestion of clearing the dining room windowsill so the shutters could be closed in winter time went down like a lead balloon. 

 I took a few pictures of some of the ‘arrangements’ for my blog. 

I’m going back soon to give it another go, but I’ve decided that whilst I can help thin things out and help sort through what to keep and what to part with, there’s no point in me trying to change the house and to be honest I don’t think I want to. I quite like it’s higgledy piggledy chaos although I will never admit that to my parents for fear of returning home one day and finding myself tunnelling through newspapers to find them! 

Have you had experiences of hoarding? How do you decide on what to keep and what to throw away? Please let me know in the comments! 

Mr Carrington 

xxx