“Moving” Forward

I did NOT manage to get everything packed and cleaned in one day. We did, however, manage to get the most of it completed and we do have until July 31st before our lease expires so we have some time. Nothing is left over at the apartment, really. Probably about one box worth of little trinkets we need to pick up and then I have to clean the upstairs bathroom and the living and I’ll be done. 🙂

All our stuff is over at the new house but our room has not been made up yet. Bobby’s stuff is moved upstairs and our bed and clothes are set up in our bedroom, just gotta work on moving the rest in and organizing it.

Here’s an outside picture of the new house:

We’ve got some clutter and organizational problems in the house but y’all know I love fixing those kinds of problems so it won’t be a big issue at all. Johnny and Bobby have been AMAZING with their spirit and welcoming us into their home. I had a little meeting with them all last night about some expectations and the way we’re going to handle some of the clutter issues. They’ve collected a lot of things over the years for hobbies and such and they’ve expressed so much that they’d like to live more minimalistic lives and I know I can help them.
In the meeting, I said that there is so much that does need to be done in the house and to the house that if we try and tackle everything as a whole then it’ll became far too overwhelming, tempers will rise and nothing will fully get finished; so I would rather focus on one room at a time. I asked them to take a good look at the living room with me, just sitting in a corner, and brainstorm what needs to be done, how they would like to decorate, etc. I made a "Rehab Manual" for the house that I want them to think about filling in. I also said that I wanted to take "Before/After" photos and since Johnny has told me that he would LOVE to start scrapbooking but never had anyone to do it with (in comes me, avid scrapbooker) that it was up to Bobby to take the photos of the house (his passion) and Johnny and I were going to make a House Rehabilitation scrapbook. They seemed to love that idea.
I also asked them to implement a "5 second rule" when it comes to items in the house. They have a lot of things they’ve collected and hoarded, so to speak, and I asked them to just randomly, throughout their normal days, when they pass something to pick it up, take 5 seconds to make a decision to keep or throw it away. In that 5 seconds, ask themselves "Will I use this? When will I use this? How much significance does this have?" and then, when the decision is made, follow through; meaning, if they’ve made a decision to throw it away, literally throw it away at that moment so they don’t have time to "rethink" their decision.

Needless to say I’m taking more of a psychologists approach to this! I told them that, too, and they seem thrilled.
Johnny came home from work early today and told me that he wanted to say thank you for all my encouragement and I said, "We’re a family now, Johnny. That’s what families are SUPPOSED to do." They’ve expressed how much they want our living together experience to be more of a family than separate roommates and I’ve told them both how much I’m going to end up turning into their mother! These are really good boys. And I’m sorry, but their parents are fucking STUPID if they don’t realize how amazing their sons are.

They’ve been helping so much and have had this great spirit and have done so much to welcome us into their lives. They’re smart, upstanding, hardworking, senseful, positive, good-hearted and kind boys. 🙂 They really are!

So that’s all I’ve got to say right now. Thank you all for being so patient with me in the last few weeks. I’ve been so stressed out!
Hope everyone is well!