Closet Overhaul

Now that summer is officially here (what the hell, Mother Nature? We went from 40s to 80s in a week, with nary a day in the temps between those!) I had to go through O’s closet and move her long sleeved shirts to the guest closet and her tank tops to the closet in her room. Why yes, she does have two closets, one for seasonal clothes and the other for her off-season clothes. Don’t all nine year olds have two closets?

I also went through her short sleeved shirts and pulled the ones that are obviously too short (she’s a long-waisted gal) and/or too tight and those items went into our “Gracie Box”. Gracie is Tom’s oldest son’s daughter. She’s two and a half years younger than Olivia. She gets all of O’s gently used clothes.

The clothes that were used a little more harshly get tossed into either the burn barrel or the rag bin. And let me tell you, that Olivia can be hard on clothes.

Anyway! I also went through her pants and shorts. There are quite a few that were too tight in the waist and so have to be sent off to Gracie. Her pants went into drawers and the shorts were brought out into the cubbies where we can see them when trying to figure out what she wants to wear each day.

Speaking of what Olivia wasn’t to wear, let me just say that this child has very strong opinions on what will and will not go on her body. We have boxes and boxes of clothes that will fit her from when her sister was her age and her size.

But do you think Olivia will wear half of what is in those boxes? Nope, of course she won’t. Because, see, Alyssa also had strong opinions on what she wore four years ago and she and Olivia have very different sense of style. Of course they do.

Most of the stored clothes are blue. Alyssa has been on a blue kick for years. YEARS, I tell you. And, a lot of them have pictures of horses on them because yeah, Alyssa loves horses. And puppies and even a few cats. She’s also all about comfort and being casual.

Olivia, on the other hand, doesn’t mind blue but really wants bright colors like neon green and hot pink and frills and ruffles and PRETTY stuff. It doesn’t have to be comfortable so much as it should be fancy. Of course, if she can pair comfort with fancy, she’s all in. And it can’t be itchy because that is the line she won’t cross even for fashion.

Once I got started with the sorting, I found myself at Alyssa’s closet, going through her clothes, organizing them into sleeve length and color. I know…so much OCD in one family.

I called her upstairs and made her tell me if she’d wear certain things and then ones she declared too ugly to exist were tossed. Why bother saving them for Liv when I happen to agree with Lyss?

Yay for organized closets. Yes, my life is now complete…for now.