"What's in your closet?"

I have a walk in closet.

Technically, aren't ALL closets walk in? You open the door and you could go in there and sit a spell. Isn't that where the monsters live or where the secret door to Narnia is located?

Mine is small by todays standards. 6 feet by 6 feet lined by shelving and two full wardrobe bars. In colonial days this would have been considered a pretty nice bedroom. In comparison to most of my friends living in more updated and modern homes built after 1990,  it's mini. I just visited my friends closet, where there were three levels of hanging bars , built in dressers, shoe case , enormous staging island in the center of the closet and a full length mirror with a chair beside it to sit down and contemplate what outfit to wear with which shoes. I guess you'd say it was a "fantasy closet" except she lives just up the road from me and I had no idea this beauty of a wardrobe was hiding in the back of the master bedroom. It has more square footage in it than my master bedroom and bath combined. But lets get back to mine and leave the fantasy closet.

My closet  holds a lot.

Unfortunately, most of it isn't clothing. The closet also serves as a catch all, hide all and storage unit for books, games, luggage, hiking and camping gear, Christmas decorations, old school projects, hats, puzzles , umbrellas, work gear and trophy display ( to remind us of our glory days as pseudo athletes and performers.)

The closet gets cleaned out every 3-4 years. . . . okay, 5 to 6 years.

It got to the point of total disarray and disservice when we could no longer open the closet door and step in to reach our clothes without climbing over the junk and balancing on various shoes. We got an extendable  grabber so we could get to the stuff on the top shelf and reach the clothes in the corner. Sadly, they never made their way back and got stuffed into the closet. Yes, I am a mess. There is no Hazel or Alice, or any kind of valet service here. It's a one woman show and it ain't pretty!

When it got to the point that the closet door would no longer shut and hide our mess, we decided it was time to purge. The closet was literally vomiting its contents out the door and no shoving, shoveling or shifting would change it.

First out were the shoes. An easy task for Mr. Man. Keep half, throw the rest away. He whittled his shoe count down to 10 pair.

Not so easy for Big Foot. I keep every shoe I can stick on my feet because of the fear of not being able to find another pair. Granted, most of my shoes were of the flip flop category. I dumped out my shoe basket, brought down all the shoe boxes where I kept only the best shoes and did an over all survey. My wardrobe of the last 30 years could have been recreated from my finds. Tough to get rid of those KEDS that fit but hurt and now have rotted from being twisted and crushed at the bottom. Gone are the $100 velveteen heels worn 2 hours and removed after the toes started to hemorrhage and I left the formal affair barefooted and carried the shoes home to be boxed safely amongst the lost and forgotten.

The short story is we got rid of 31 pairs of shoes and sandals.

10 pair were thrown in the trash- Horrified that they were even living in my house and even more horrible that we thought we would wear them again. They should have been picked up by Hazmat !

Shoes out of the way, the clothing weeding began. Still waiting to fit back into my disco outfit from 1977 and the cowboy outfit from my western days of 1983!

I purchased organizers for my various accessories. . . . my 4 necklaces, 2 belts and 5 hats. (not a fashion maven. . . you should have picked up on that from the disco-western reference)

The most amazing find was the basket of socks buried in the darkest depths, which make up the lonely sock club. Not one has a match. There are 50 singles. How can that be? I'm contemplating braiding them into a 50 yard rope but I live in a single story so really no need for that! Crafts abound for old sock use but certainly I don't need 50 of anything! No need to hang on to those singles of toddler socks any more now that the toddler is 30 years old!

I have 12 sweaters all worn 2 times and in all shades of black and blacker. Its never cold enough here to wear them. WHY do I have so many????   Parted with 4 from 1997-2005 era and ditched the maxi skirt I thought was so stylin'  but in fact incredibly ugly and not one friend said anything in warning! It looks ugly on the hanger and horror of horrors I wore it in public!

Now that the closet is cleaned out, reorganized, dusted and mopped, I feel accomplished! Isn't that always the way?

I've etched on the door frame the month and year this clean out occurred. . . . maybe it will guilt me into doing this every year.

How many shoes are in YOUR closet?  Take them out and count. It will shock you.
I still have a lot of purging and sorting to do but feel that it's an ongoing process.

Good luck with your purge and clean out. Just do it.