How many naked Barbies does one really need?

Just cleaned my 4 year old daughter’s closet….whew, that felt great!!!

You see, I hate clutter.  It stresses me out.  It does not stress out my husband or daughter.  Every so often I get a bug up my butt I run around the house like a crazy woman and I try to throw everything out.  My husband came up with this cute nick-name for me “The trash Nazi.”  When I get to Danica’s closet it usually turns into a battle and when I throw something into the trash pile she cries “But mom, that’s special!”  Then she goes running, with huge tears in her eyes, to Brandn and tells on me.  So he is looking at his sweet, daughter with curly pig tails and big tears in her eyes and his psychotic wife with a crazy look in her eyes and OF COURSE I’m gonna loose this battle.  Weeeelllllll, she is out of town this week and as soon as she left Austin city limits I attacked her closet.  🙂

I had 2 piles: a trash pile and an orphan pile.  June 30th, my church is having a Garage Sale 4 Orphans.  Danica has way too many toys that she doesn’t play with but they are still in good shape so they are going to be sold to raise money to feed, clothe, educate, house and protect orphans.  She has so much stuff and there are kids out there with nothing.  If getting rid of her stuff can provide shelter for a 10 year old girl to keep her off the streets and out of human trafficking then by God I’m gonna sell it!

I thought about posting a picture of the orphan pile but I don’t want my friends and family members to see stuff they gave us and have their feelings hurt.  I will say there are about 10 stuffed animals, 5 pairs of shoes, puzzles, dolls, and a bunch of random toys.  I found 6 naked Barbies, but she plays with these so I dressed them, gave them their dignity back, and kept them; I did however throw away the one with the broken head.

New thought but completely related:

I’m reading a book right now called “7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess” by Jen Hatmaker.  Brandn, thinks I have a girl crush on Jen and he calls her my girlfriend.  Read my friend’s blog/book review about it.  Jen fasted for 7 months and each month had a different focus: clothes, shopping, waste, food, possessions, media and stress.

Hopefully you didn’t quit reading when you read the word “fast.”  Some people get weirded out by fasting but this is what she has to say about it.  “When we hear “fast,” we put on a yoke of self-denial.  When God said “fast,” He meant to take off the yoke of oppression.  The Isaiah 58 fast is not about the mechanics of abstinence; it is a fast from self-obsession, greed, apathy and elitism. When it becomes more about me than the marginalized I’ve been charged to serve, I become the confused voice in this passage: “Why have I fasted and you have not seen it?”

Month 1 she fasted food; this chapter made me more aware about NOT wasting food.  Month 2 she fasted clothes.  I went through my closet and pulled out everything I haven’t worn since moving to Austin and I gave them to a friend.  Month 3 she fasted possessions.  She started off saying she was going to give away 7 items a day for the whole month; that’s 210 items.  This number sounded insane to me.  Well she ended up giving away over 1000 items, and still has plenty more to give away!  I’m not talking about items like a fork or towel. No,  I’m talking about her and her friends giving away enough stuff to completely furnish an empty apartment for a single mom and her 2 daughters and a refugee Burmese family with literally only the clothes on their backs.  They gave away beds, TVs, clothes, furniture, dishes, stocked the pantries.  They prayed that God was evident in every single item they took for granted.  The email the single mom wrote to thank them brought me to tears.  Month 3 has caused me to cry 3 times and I’m not done with it yet.

So Month 3 inspired me to give away Danica’s toys instead of keeping them.  (See, I told you the thoughts were related.)  These are not played with toys; all they do is collect dust and cause me stress.  By selling this stuff money will be raised to help elevate kids from poverty and the toys get a second chance of being played with and loved, Toy Story anyone?

If we all raised others up instead of raising ourselves a little higher, there would be few needs left on earth – Jen Hatmaker.

Thanks for allowing me to share my world with you…welcome to my brain.