Oh boy, are ya'll read for a "Book"?  Hahah!

I grew up in a big family.

7 kids, Mom and Dad, and occasionally foster children.

We lived on a farm.  So there was haying to do, crops to plant and tend to, tobacco crop to put in, hoe, top, sucker, hoe somemore, chop, pile, spear, transport, hang in shed, take down from shed, strip off leaves, pack and ship.  Oh then dispose of the stalks. 

We had dairy cattle.  So milking twice a day, barn cleaning, calves to tend to, feeding two and three times a day.

Plus fencing, yard work, garden to tend to, harvest and preserve. 

Plus in exchange for the use of some of the neighbors harvesting equiptment Dad "lent" us out as general laborers during haying and tobacco season.

Then there was school and school work during the season.

We were pretty busy most of the time.  So housework fell on poor Mom.  When we did get older and could be more helpful to her, some of us avoided it like the plague.

I would rather clean up cow crap than dust or iron.

I shared my bedroom with two sisters and when he was little, a brother.

My two sisters were not at all incline to neatness.  But then, we only had two dressers for all of us in that room.  No closet.  It isn't like we had a LOT of clothing and toys, we were actually pretty impoverished, but with that many kids...........

My one sister was worse than the other.  Everything landed on the floor.  And stayed there until either Mom picked it up or me other sister or I had a fit and piled it in a corner.  I remember walking over clothing. 

As the kids grew up and moved out, the eldest always got a room to themselves. Unfortunately for me, I had to wait until 2 older brothers and two older sisters went through that process.  By the time I got that room I was graduated from high school. 

I lived at home off and on for a couple years.  I took a basement apartment for a while in the home of the lady that I rode back and forth to work with.  ( I didn't have a drivers license yet.) I didn't have room for much there, and was at work most of the time during the week, and at my boyfriend's (now husband) place a lot on weekends.

That arrangement didn't work out for long.  Then I took a two room apartment in town.  NO closets, storage space was non-existant.  So thats when boxes became my best friends.

Stacks of boxes.

I lived there for a while.  Then I ended up taking a job in a different town.  As I didn't have a license yet, I was hitchhiking back and forth.  Not reliable, and not savory.

So I moved in with my now hubby.  I had talked him into purchasing a place of his own instead of both of us throwing our money away on rent.

It was a very small mobile home 10x55 with the hitch included in the length.  2 tiny bedrooms, a bathroom that you could use the toilet, clean the tub and spit in the sink all without changing position! 

Very little storage space.  So I got rid of a lot of items.  It was soooo easy to keep clean cause it was small, and our possessions were pretty minimal at that point.

But with each birthday or holiday there were more things to find a spot for.  Then we got married and holy hannah, where to put all the presents???  Then a year later we were proud parents.......baby stuff....eeeegads.

Within a few months of the arrival of our daughter I was so overwelmed I was having huge issues with being able to keep dishes done, meals made, baby laundry, hubbys work clothes, a friend gave us a DOG!  So I was spiraling into complete chaos.

When daughter turned 1 1/2 it was obvious to me that we HAD to either sell this mobile home and get a bigger one or look for a bigger home.

Well fate had a hand in it.  We were not allowed to move any other trailer to this property.  It was move this one and build a house, or keep this one.

So we found a place about a mile out of town with a barn for my horse (still at the farm) and our dog.  It unfortunately had an older mobile home on it, but it was a 14 x70 which at the time seemed huge.

So we fixed it up.  I loved it out there, we had a nice big back yard, a two story barn and 1 car garage.

By the time we got everything moved from the place in town, and then the stuff I had left at my parents place, it wasn't looking so big anymore.  Ok, now start adding the birthdays, christmas', anniversaries, and just plain more items.  The spare bedroom was soon too full to be a playroom anymore.  By the time we outgrew this place for our horses, every nook and cranny was stuffed.  I managed to keep the LR, kitchen and bathroom halfway presentable, but the bedrooms........omg.

Even the barn and garage were out of control.

We were too close to the highway too.  I had horses get loose a couple times.  We lost a lot of cats to traffic, and when the dog got run over in our own driveway we knew it was time.

We found a farmette in our school district, and a lot closer to where hubby works.  A two story, 3 bedroom farmhouse with a partial basement.  TWO CLOSETS!!!!  And a pantry, and a front porch!  A very large 2-car garage!  A machine shed!  A grainery/storage building!  HEAVEN!!!!

I had sooo much room!

A place for everything and everything in its place.  For a while.

Hubby developed a passion for Auctions.  More stuff.

Mom died.  Then Dad met someone, Mom's stuff had to go. It came here.  Grandma died.  Dad moved into her apartment.  Dad's stuff from the farmhouse came here.  A lot of Grandma's stuff came here.  Dad died.  His 2nd wife didn't want any of our family stuff that she deemed "junk" (she had to have everything NEW) so rather than let her toss it in a dumpster without family sorting it.........yep.........it came here.  A lot of these things can not be in a shed, they ended up in my house. 

When my daughter went off to college, her stuff stayed here.  When she moved in with her fiance' a lot of her stuff stayed here.  When they broke up, ALL her stuff came here.  When thier son was born we had to get baby stuff.  Here.  When daughter got ready and moved into a place of her and grandson's own, it's small.  A lot of her stuff stayed here. 

I babysit grandson at least 3 days and nights a week.  LOTS of little boy stuff here. 

So.  There is my book.

Siblings were supposed to come help sort and divide the parents items here.  That has been over 10 years ago.  A few items have been dispersed, but no where near enough.  One brother in Virginia, one brother in California, one brother in Nevada, one sister in Northern WI, another sister an hour or so from that sister, and one sister about an hour from me. 

Impossible to get everyone together at the same time. 

This summer I am just going to do it myself.  I will notify them when I am doing it, if they can come fine, if not, they will just have to accept how I sort it.

IT HAS TO GO.  I have had to insure the storage building all these years to reflect the antiques in there.  I am currently unemployed and we can't afford it.

Whew,,,,,,,there..................

Kat