Playing house

I spent most of the afternoon going through our bedroom.
It looks better but I am still not done.
Five garbage bags of stuff have been filled to be given to the thrift store. Thats just from my bedroom and the laundry room and neither one are clean yet. Yikes!!
I have always felt the need to collect, hoard, pack rat, keep stuff. I dont really know why. All this stuff does not make me happy and I dont feel lost with out it. I feel way more lost with rooms and closets in my house with piles of stuff in them.
I was always the kid growing up that had the pig sty for a room. I guess I thought I would just out grow it. When I got married the stuff followed and when I had kids the stuff multiplied. I have not out grown it yet and with another birthday coming up in just two weeks, I dont see me out growing it them either. I think that this is going to have to be something I am taught.
I have read many books and seen many shows on getting rid of stuff. Now it is time to put them into action.
So I am asking myself three simple questions; Do I love it? Do I use it? and is it beautiful? If I can answer no to any of these questions it gone.
Tomorrow is day number two and I hope that more bags get filled full of stuff and make it out of my house because it sure feels good.

Getting back into the swing of things

We have been back from the ocean for 5 days but I feel like I am just starting to get back into the swing of things... but lets back track to the ocean for a little while longer.
Most of our days were spent on the beach.. well I guess that was one of the only places I remembered to pull out my camera.
WARNING very photo happy post.

 We showed up at our camp spot at about 1 and headed to the beach shortly after.
This was the first time that the little lady was able to really play at the beach. She loved it.

The little man loved running around in the sand bare footed. As soon as we would come to the top of the dunes and you could see the ocean he was pulling off his flip flops.

While the littles played in the sand the hubby had a blast flying his kites. He was a little unsure that he was going to be able to fly since he hurt his shoulder just the week before... But he was able to fly just fine.

We spent most of out time at the beach playing on this little hill just outside of the dunes. The hill helped block most of the wind for me and the hill was fun for the littles to play on.

One day just before we were headed off to the beach the little lady face planted off the picnic table and scraped up her head pretty good. I really did not want her to get too much sand in it so I put a band aid on it and tied a bandanna around. I did not know how well she was going to keep it on but to my amazement she left it on and no sand made it into the cut.

While the little lady napped in my arms in the warm sun the little man build a 'boat' and went off 'sailing and fishing.'

On the evening of the fourth we drove down to the beach, built a little fire and enjoyed the evening.

It was a great camping trip. Relaxing and low key.
The drive home was twice as long as the drive down thanks to traffic and road work. Not having A/C did not really help the drive either.
It was nice to be home. Our house felt so BIG. It was kind of eye opening for me to realize that we could fit everything that our family needs into a 8X18 trailer but yet out 2,000 square foot house is crammed pack full of STUFF. So I feel the need to start operation de-junk.
I have read may books on simplifying but its way more than just reading it the DOING part that I need to work on. Hopefully this time I can go it since it is really starting to get under my skin.