Week 35 - Basement

This week I mostly cleaned up some of the places I've been ignoring for months -- not all -- but it's a start.

The basement, for instance, is where I have been tossing anything that needed to be out of sight or out of the way. The picture can't really show all the crap that has accumulated, bit it's actually getting difficult to walk in some areas.

First were the shelves along the back wall, most convenient to the stairs and therefore the place where everything small or stuffable got shoved. Much of this stuff actually belongs here so it was more a matter if reorganizing than removing.

Big tips -- 1. two half filled boxes can become one filled box; 2. many things take up less space when they are properly folded. Sadly, there is still a fair amount of stuff which should actually be gotten rid of entirely. However, it would take forever to do it now.

Next I moved to the opposite corner, the front wall by the garage. This is the area formerly occupied by my sewing room and all my projects. and has been unmanageably jumbled for weeks.

Here, my best option was to move everything out of the area, build and/or properly set up some shelves and then move all the stuff back in a more organized manner. At last, I can get to everything back here, if I know where it is.

As an added touch I hung some blinds I had in front of the shelves to hide all the boxes and stuff. This still leaves two areas to do. My tools and my wood storage area. That should be interesting.

As long as I was working in the basement, I also got out my hacksaw and removed the copper pipes and filter from the old oil tank to the furnace. They were pretty annoying just because they either stuck up out of the floor ...

... or out from the wall.

The filter was easy and fast, but leaked a little.

The pipes near the furnace were also fairly easy to remove, but they leaked about half a cup of furnace oil in the removal process, I covered the oil in both areas with a layer of kitty litter for a couple of days ...

... and then swept it up.

When the weather was dry and not too cold, I did a little more outside work. This week it was cleaning up a section of the parking strip which had been pretty much a dumping ground for the last year.

Mostly it was a matter of scraping a layer of dirt, small trash, leaves, weeds, and moss from the pavers and the planting area. Then scrubbing the pavers with a stiff brush and water (from my rain barrel).

I also removed the clematis which was never stiff enough to actually climb the wire it was wound around. It went in the back yard next to a tall rhodie which should give it the support it needs. Then I moved a red climbing rose from a shady spot in the back to where the clematis had been. Hopefully both plants will be happier where they are now.

I used river stones, which I have been consistently salvaging from all my dirt sifting, as a sort of rock mulch.

Week 36 - Final Payment