Around here, I am in a MAJOR “use it or loose it” phase. Something about selling off all my Mother’s worldly possessions in just two weekends has forced me to pause, yet again, to assess the things I have spent money on, brought into my home, and filled my life and time with. You’re probably sick of me going on and on about it, but if you’ve seen what I’ve seen come out of my parent’s house, you would understand my recent fixation on breaking my shopping habits, de-cluttering my home, and resolving to live more simply while still creating a beautiful home that expresses me and my family.
After yet another marathon trip to my Dad’s house to clean, purge, sort, organize, donate and more, I returned home last week with a raging fire to comb through every last cabinet and closet and room of my house, examining everything I own and pitting it against a strict criteria of: 1) do I use it? 2) do I LOVE it? or 3) does it have sentimental value? If it doesn’t generally fit into any of those three categories, it’s gone. Of the things that fall into the “LOVE” category (this most often applies to home decor stuff stashed away for “someday”), I’m trying to get these items out of cabinets and boxes and displayed or used. If I love it and want to keep it, I need to find a good home for it. If I can’t, it’s gone. Tough love, I know. But it’s gotta be done. (Okay – this isn’t 100% true, I have allotted myself one small decor stash cabinet inside and some space in the garage for bigger items, but that’s it so I have to be choosy with what I keep đ
So what does this have to do with succulents? Not much, but it has everything to do with these awesome square glass vases. I bought these vessels a few years ago when I was determined to grow live wheat grass for decorative purposes. Have you ever grown wheat grass? Do you know what happens really easily and really frequently with wheat grass? It goes moldy…like really moldy. Wish I had known that before I bought 5 pounds of wheat grass seeds. Ooops. So ended my wheat grass growing experiences, and my fantastic glass vases went into the decor cabinet, pretty much never to be seen again.
Enter the “use it or loose it” approach. I have always loved these square vases, but they’ve been stuffed in my cabinets for too long. If I wanted to keep them, I needed to use them and find a good home for them. Then it occurred to me that they were the perfect vessels for succulents!! Yes I know, succulents are everywhere. But for good reason…they do have an ultra-cool look and are proclaimed to be pretty hardy (I’ll report back if that turns out to be true). I do wish they had a slightly cheaper price tag (this lot cost me about $40), but using these vessels were just the kick I needed to give the succulents craze a try for myself!
This turned out to be a fun little planting project for Henry and I to do together. We picked out a range of little succulents, bought the appropriate stones and dirt, and then spent an hour before lunch loading them into these glass planters. The hardest part was keeping Henry from watering them too much!
I’ve decided that my “mantel” is the best place for these guys. I’ve been using this space for holiday displays, but I’m learning that I don’t really enjoy putting holiday mantels together for every holiday (I pretty much just like to do Christmas and Spring) so other times of the year, this area sits pretty vacant. After some more de-cluttering and getting more “LOVED” items out of storage, I now have a year-round display that I can maintain and doesn’t feel over-decorated to me.
It’s not lost on me that in order to put something to use I had to go out and spend more money on the flowers themselves. But provided I can keep them alive, that’s an investment I’m willing to make to be able to really enjoy the things in my home, rather than having them stuffed into a cabinet for “someday.”
I’m pretty pleased with this latest addition/re-purposing of our entry. Fingers crossed these babies live!!
That’s a wrap for me for this week. I hope you all have a fantastic weekend. With our super hot weather, you can bet I’ll be inside, continuing to de-clutter our home – I wonder what other treasures I’ll unearth!
See you next week!
The planters look nice. I wonder how happy the succulents will be there though, unless it's a lot brighter in real life? IIRC, most of them need lots of light.
I have really resonated with so many of your thoughts lately, and today I am coming out of commenting lurkdom to say, "I relate!" My mother passed away about a year and a half ago, and my sisters and I were in charge of cleaning out her storage unit. She was not a hoarder by any stretch of the imagination, but still: the STUFF. It changed me. I feel I've been purging relentlessly ever since, and I have actually stopped at garage sales, gotten out of the car, then gotten right back in. The thought of bringing anything even slightly questionable into my house is almost physically uncomfortable.
Looking forward to more posts like this! Peace to you and your family as you continue the grieving process.