Busy but nothing to show for it yet!

Whew!  I've been busy this morning.

I've mentioned before that my sweet little Peter is a bit of a hoarder.  He refuses to throw anything away, starts collecting things and then moves on to something else (bottle caps, antique bottles, baseball cards, golf balls, just to name a few), and manages to find the tiniest bit of meaning in even a scrap of paper.

So over the years, he has  amassed quite a bit of stuff/junk/trash in his tiny room.  I've managed on a couple of occasions to get him to throw some things away but usually we just move them to the basement where eventually, unbeknownst to him, I throw them away or donate them or sell them at a consignment sale.

He has recently decided that he wants to collect war memorabilia.  And he has decided (finally!) that the pictures of construction equipment on his walls might be a bit babyish so he purchased three flags from the gift shop when we were on the Freedom Trail.  He would like to hang those on his wall and display the beginnings of his war collection.

And he actually said, "I think I need to clean out my room."

The problem is that he can't do it alone.  Based on the shear volume of stuff/junk/trash he is too overwhelmed and because of his sentimental nature and very tender heart, he definitely needs some help determining what should stay and what should go.

I've hemmed and hawed over the last couple of weeks trying to determine the best approach to take.  I finally decided that I just needed to empty the room while everyone was gone.

And that's exactly what I've done today.

I have gone through every drawer and every shelf in his room and moved things into the bonus room into four piles:

To be donated
To be stored in the basement
To be put back in the bedroom
Trash

At some point this week, depending on schedules, homework, and basketball, I am going to go through the piles with him and shift things around.  I am hopeful that Peter decides to move more items into the trash or to be donated pile.  Unfortunately, I know how his mind works and I'm certain things will move from those piles to the store in basement or put back in bedroom piles.  But I am remaining hopeful that once he sees how empty and clean his room is, he will want to keep it that way.

And I have a little secret.  The pile that is marked trash is very small.   I have actually thrown 4 large bags of trash into the can outside and I'm hoping that Peter doesn't notice.  The items that I threw away were all literally bits and pieces of things or just plain old junk.  But I was afraid that if Peter saw them he would not be able to part with them so I did his dirty work for him.  And I think ultimately he would be okay with it.  I'm hoping that he will see what's in the trash pile and feel good about throwing those items away and perhaps be inspired to throw more things away. 

Wishful thinking?  We'll see.

My bonus room is a huge mess right (even more so than normal!) so I'm hoping that we are able to get this stuff sorted and put into it's respective places this week.  Until then, the door to the bonus room will remained closed!