Frugalous

photo credit: usedtobelost

On August 1st I get the keys to my apartment. That gives me a couple of weeks to sort, purge, pack up the house. To add to the fun, my 18 year old daughter is moving into a townhouse near her college 90 minutes away, after spending last year in a furnished dorm, so she needs to get her things packed and moved too.

I’ve already sent dozens of boxes of books and household items as well as a dozen or so garbage bags filled with clothes, shoes, table & bed linens to a location donation centre yet I still seem to be over run with items that need to be dealt with.

I’m considering a yard sale but it’s giving me the shivers just thinking of it. My past experiences as a yard sale saleswoman haven’t been overly successful. Right now the idea of spending several hours (days?!?!) gathering items to sell, pricing them, dusting them, setting them up for display and then spending a day waiting around for people to come buy things and carry them off – *shudder*. I’ve just never made much money from it and all in all I find it a waste of time and energy.

Nothing against yard sales. I’ve got to many over the years and have found some great bargains. But as the seller it’s no picnic.

I’m considering doing an “online” yard sale of sorts instead. For the time it would take me to sort, dust, price and display items for a traditional yard sale, plus the time involved actually operating a yard sale all day or worse, all weekend – I could sort, price, photograph and write a short description of each item and post it for sale on Craigslist, Kijiji, or even local buy and sell groups.

On the other hand, a yard sale gets it over with on a specific date. Selling on Craigslist or Kijiji could drag this out for days or even weeks longer. With a yard sale I can say to myself – at 2pm if these items aren’t sold I will donate them to the local charity – and take them there immediately and be done with it.

Maybe I should just flip a coin?

Consumerism. Our generation is based on blatant consumerism. Even with terms like recession and economic downturn being bandied about – we’re still spending money hand over fist. Well most of us are. The few of us who are trying to live below our means are often pressured by society, peers, even family members to spend, spend, spend!

My upcoming move has me trying to decide what I will have room to bring along. My kitchen in particular is at issue. I currently have a good sized kitchen. More than enough counter space, lots of cupboards and big roomy drawers that house a large variety of pots, pans, utensils, and small appliances. And if I were to run out of space in the kitchen there’s lots of space in the cold cellar and garage to store more stuff. The apartment has a tiny galley style kitchen with very little counter space or storage. I’m dreading the thought of going through my small appliances and deciding which I can bring with me and which I’ll have to sell or donate. The kitchen is the one room that is giving me the horrors when it comes to “rightsizing” my life.

After lamenting this fact in a brief moment of self-pity the other day a good friend replied that we should cross the border and go shopping at all the outlet malls in western New York next week. Great sales on everything I could want for my kitchen she says. A day later while lamenting the fact that I’ll have so little kitchen storage my sister suggested I come spend a day shopping in Toronto with her. She knows all sorts of great little places to pick up dishes, cookware, crockery, etc. really cheap she says.

I’m a little boggled. Everyone knows that my funds are severely limited these days as I start my business. Everyone knows I’m moving into an apartment that is 1/3 the size of my house and my goal right now is to get rid of things I own not to add to the pile of clutter!

I’ve been having real difficulty keeping myself to the frugal straight and narrow recently, as I’ve mentioned with my bed dilemma (I’ve decided to go the most frugal route… I’m using the antique sleigh bed which means I only have to buy a double mattress now) and now I’m considering buying a new freezer.

This is an improvement though. At one point not too long ago I had decided that it would be best if I sold all of my furniture in the house and just bought all new furniture for the apartment. New everything: new dining room set, new sectional for the livingroom, a wall unit/entertainment centre, new drapes, rugs, lamps, new bedroom sets for both myself and my son, and so on. I’ve managed to talk myself out of most of that but it sure is hard.

Especially when friends, family, peers tell me all about the cool new things they just bought this week.

And they all wonder why I never answer the phone.