My (im)Perfect Peace: Spring Cleaning Sprints // Week Two (semi)Complete

Yes, this week is semi-complete because I didn’t quite finish one of the tasks. Here are the assignments for week two:

Weeknight Spruce

Pick up clutter from floors, counters and tables.

Saturday Sweep

Clean off desk and sort files.

Wash and vacuum car.

Quickie Purge

Get rid of 5 things.

Peaceful Pause

30 minutes spent refreshing YOU.

I started early in the week with the weeknight spruce and the first task in Saturday Sweep. I love to pick up clutter and make things look nice and neat. It was easy to do.

Sorting through files took a while though. I reorganized our tax files, pulled out utility bills from two years ago, sorted receipts and shredded old documents. There is a lot more space in our file drawers and now ,y memory is refreshed concerning where certain things are stored.

The task I did not quite complete is washing and vacuuming my car –the most important task! Haha. I have a good reason. My husband wants to go with me to the car wash to help so we are going to make a “date night” out of it. Hooray!

To get my car ready to vacuum, I did go out and clean out all the junk. Good thing too. Here is why my car needs cleaned:

Dead bugs inside and out...yuck.

So I pulled out all the CDs, stuff in the glove compartment, books, trash and first aid kit. Then I wiped down the dashboard and sides of the doors with a damp cloth.

Next I tackled the trunk. Wowza…how did I let it get to bad?! There are spare automotive fluids, a couple of stools I use for photo shoots, some old Christmas lights that never made it to the recycle bin and old printer ink cartridges (more on that later). I also found some old brake pads drenched in something that leaked all over a corner of my trunk. That was awful to clean up.

After sorting through all the STUFF, I found plenty to throw away, other stuff to recycle and rediscovered some hidden treasures. I restocked my glove compartment and CD holders with the essentials: mini-Bible, bandages, pen, wet wipes, tissues, map, car info, flashlight, audio Bible teachings and CDs from my favorite bands.

Organized glove compartment.

And I am so glad I found this:

Some may call it a first aid kit. It’s more like a time capsule from the 90’s. Some of the items in it are so old! I did sort through it sometime in the past decade though, as evidenced by some ointment with an expiration of 2009. That got replaced right away. All the non-perishables still look usable, so I packed it back up and stuck it under the front seat of the car.

So by the end of the week, I had a good pile of things to get rid of – more than five! Some will be donated and others trashed…like that bottle of air freshener that I believe I purchased in the first year of owning my car (about 10 years ago).

Oh and those ink cartridges? Our church recycles used toner and ink to Office Depot and Office Max to get rewards. We have a ton of ink but the stores limit how much you can recycle for credit each month. The ink lives in my car so I have it with me when running errands for the church. Each month I turn in the appropriate amount. I decided to organize the inks into bags of 10 cartridges each...and found a few that were leaking.

This is why I should invest in some gloves...

I will probably spend the rest of my day trying to get blue ink off my hand. Oh well... ;-)

My peaceful pause this week was a moment spent feeding the turtles in the pond by our apartment. I had the heels of our bread loaf left over so I decided to share with my little friends. It was fun to watch all the little heads coming toward me from across the pond. I saw one mother with babies on her back! So precious! They wouldn’t linger long – just grab a piece of bread and duck back in the water. All under the watchful eye of their guardian the white heron. He always stands proudly at the edge of the pond as though he is king. Thankfully he tolerated my presence and even allowed me to take his picture. What beauty of God’s creation! These are some of my favorite moments.