The Minimalist Game - Days 5 -7

The matttress and sheets as posted for sale on facebook.

Read this post about The Minimalist Game if you've not read it as it explains what I'm playing at. 😁

Day 5: A single sponge mattress from a child's bed and two fitted sheets to go with it. (I put these 3 items up for sale on a local facebook page.) And 2 glass jars that DD painted and gave to her friends.

The Child's bed was bought for DD when she graduated from the cot. It has undergone a couple of transformations. It originally had a trundle bed underneath for sleepovers, and two large storage drawers under the trundle. All these heavy additions have long gone and we swapped the child's mattress for a regular single suitable for an adult.

One of the things I realized a while ago is that I don't want heavy furniture. I've said it before but we live in a desert and there is a lot of dust. I don't want a load of furniture that you pull out once a year for cleaning underneath. I want to be able to get the hoover or the mop under the beds and sofas. It's cleaner and the rooms look more spacious when you can see the floor extending under them. It's a lighter, airier look and feel. (See the new sofas)

The child's mattress had been standing next to the bed, alongside the wall for a couple of years. I admit that it was a useful little shelf for putting your specs and your book on when you go to sleep but without it the room is wider. A small bedside table does the same job and is good for a lamp and a glass of water too. It's amazing how an extra 10cm of room makes so much difference.

With the old sofa that was the size of a single bed, DD's bed and the trundle, the mattress (and in fact I had another similar mattress that I gave away with the old sofa), my double bed, and another small double; I could sleep nine people in this apartment! Even when my sister brought her family of five to stay (only twice in 17 years since the 'baby' was born), we were only seven people. And although I have two toilets, I only have one full bathroom and probably not enough hot water in the tank for nine people to shower anyway.

I don't know why I kept all those bed options. I think I forgot that I'm no longer a student with whole crowds of friends descending for weekend parties. I now have sleeping accommodation for five people, including us two, and that's quite enough. My sister's family no longer all travel together as two of the kids are grown up. And if one day the whole family plus my Mum and my brother all want to come at the same time.... there is a lovely little boutique hotel around the corner. Sorted. (I'll offer to make dinner so they can book B&B),

The other 2 items to make up the 5 for the 5th of the month, are two empty Nutella jars that DD painted and gave to two of her friends as part of their Mishloah Manot for Purim. Sorry no photo but she painted a rainbow coming out of a cloud on one jar and a panda bear in a forest on the other. They were rather cute actually.

If you read the linked post about Mishloah Manot, you should know that the days of making a million of these are gone for the moment. DD made two for her best school friends and that was it this year.

Day 6

Day 6: Three ceramic bowls, one painted enamel cooking pot, one pottery planter and an old silicone loaf baker. These have been sitting on the balcony since I read one woman's account of collecting all sorts of coloured containers to plant things in on her eclectic balcony. I never got round to doing that planting and although I do plan to plant loads for April's Project, I've decided that the eclectic gypsy caravan look is not what I'm after. It doesn't really go with the minimalist style. So that's 6 wouldbe planters from the balcony.

Day 7

Day 7: A tray, two milk jugs, two teapots (I used to collect them), a loose-leaf tea strainer in the shape of a teapot, and a gift from a friend (not pictured so as not to offend but nothing to do with teatime). I bought the tray and the yellow jug in 1985 when I left home to live with two other girls. There used to be a yellow sugar bowl to match the jug and there is still a red teapot that I kept.

That's 31 things so far from The Minimalist Game making a running total of 416 clutters since October.