A Sad Day For Sarah, Indeed

This past week and a half Ryan has been helping out with chores around the house. He has gone from chore to chore and made suggested 'improvements' on some of my less-than-effective methods. I guess I have done the same things the same way for so long that I am kind of stuck in my routine, and it hasn't occurred to me that things could work more smoothly some other way. Anyway... As Ryan was putting away my clothes in my closet, he discovered just how crowded my closet actually is. Our closets are the same size, but mine was holding approximately 17X as many clothes as his was. Ryan is very neat, to say the least - he likes his closet neat and he literally finger-spaces his hangers on the rod. (I love you Ryan) When I put my clothes away, I have to hip-check the masses of clothes, squeeze my arm into the small space, push back with my bum, and hope for enough room to hang up one more hanger. This method (although it's worked fine for me in the past) was one such suggestion for improvement that Ryan made for my systems of organization. After a week's worth of complaints about his inability to hang up my clothes, I finally broke down and agreed to clean it out -with Ryan by my side, for emotional and physical support (I still can't lift anything) It started off very slowly - a shirt here, a pair of jeans there... Finally we reached the deep, dark abysses in the back. This is the place where I keep all of my clothes (of various sizes) that I have absolutely no prayer of ever fitting into again. These are my clothes that I often refer to as my 'motivation clothes', but that really just sit in my closet mocking me in a very de-motivating way. With the help and support of Ryan by my side, I decided to finally face facts. I will never be able to wear these again. It's time for them to move on to a happier life where they can actually breathe fresh air and are not forced in shame to the back of the closet. My sisters and I usually give each other all of our hand-me-downs. It's kind of a 'thing' we do. We pass around clothes so much that they often end up right where they started. But, alas, we're all about the same size these days. So...hello D.I., here we come! The saddest part for me is that most of these clothes are really cute. Unfortunately for me, the days when I was skinny enough to wear these gems were also the only days when I was rich enough to afford them. Three kids has it's way of dumbing down a gal's wardrobe. With a tear in my eye, I wave farewell to these 14 shirts, 6 sweaters, 3 camis, 6 pair of capris, 3 pair of dress pants, 2 skirts, and 10 pairs of jeans. I'm gonna miss ya! I'm just glad Ryan doesn't know about the 8 prom dresses, 2 bridesmaid dresses, 7 old dance uniforms, 2 pair of dance shoes, and the wetsuit I'm stashing under the bed.