Thursday, February 9, 2012

Attachment Disorder

I am always on a mission to remove clutter from the house. I moved to DC on an airplane and shipped my books. I moved back to Wyoming on an airplane and shipped my books (and my nicer kitchen things, CDs and photos). I am pretty good at not getting too attached to things. 


It is so much easier not to have stuff.Before, my extracurricular activities did not generally require props. Now, my hobbies require things like fly rods. Before I just required cash to go out for drinks, dinners, symphonies, plays, etc. A.'s hobbies come with entire ice shanties, a bazillion ice-fishing poles and do dads, rifles, vests, blinds, ETC. So, my lifestyle has changed enough that it follows that my physical environment has also changed.


But. I am itching to just really overhaul the whole house


A. is relatively on board with my decluttering and helps often, though he is not willing to go as minimalist as I think I want to go. And I do have to give him plenty of credit - he has gone through most of his stuff and whittled his possessions down to a fraction of what he'd been holding on to prior. Now I am trying to REALLY force myself to look at my stuff and see what else I can get rid off.


My goal: A comfortable space that is easy on the eyes and easy to (keep) clean. A place for everything and everything in its place (without having to first move 18 other things to put/get it in/from its place).


Here is my conundrum of the day: I have some really nice 9-inch cake round pans. I have not made a round cake in, oh, seven years? I am rather miserable at leveling off the cakes, frosting them and generally having them look presentable. I should probably give the pans away, yes? But they are of fantastic quality. They feel so, so good in your hands. And they bake up delightful cakes without any scorching.  I also have a really high quality bundt pan that I use about once a year. Ok. I use it maybe once every two years. It, too, is great quality but was also a gift from a very close friend. It, too, turns out great cakes.


A. and I do not bake cakes too often. (Not because I don't love cake; I do.) With just the two of us, we either gorge on cake for a few days and feel horrible, or we are reasonable about it and then I have to toss a brick of a cake out a week later. I work for a nutrition program, so bringing in half of the cake for my co-workers doesn't work so well. My co-workers generally follow what we preach and don't regularly eat sweets. I would still end up throwing much of it away.


Maybe I should start attending a local Lutheran church so I can bake cakes for the coffee hour after services.


Or maybe I can freeze half the cakes> Do cakes freeze well? Pre-frosted?


Anyway. All of these lovely, heavy, gorgeous cake pans take up a helluva lot of space in my over-crowded kitchen cabinets. If I had more space freed up in my cabinets I could store the rest of my small appliances out of site and off my counters. 


What is more important - keeping these high-quality baking pans or having a clear counter? I think I want the clear counters more.


Oh, man. I think I am going to get rid of them. 


How do you do it? Do you have ample storage? Do you have items on your counters, and do you mind? Do you have lots of gadgets, pans, etc.? Should I just stick to boring rectangular cakes and call it good?


++++


Quick Buster Update:

Buster's x-rays came back fine. There are no suspicious masses or a plugged up Buster belly. The vet prescribed him some super stinky, mushy canned food and he ate that with a bit of enthusiasm. Now he is back on the "recovery" blah food and is not too interested. 


He is also on pain meds, because over the course of positioning him for the x-rays, his yelps confirmed that arthritis has set in. (My heart broke with every little yelp. The vet would run in my room and tell me what caused the yelp and that he is better. She is very sweet.)


It is amazing, and perhaps pathetic, how much this furry, goofy creature means to me. I wish he could talk and tell me what is going on.  I am hoping that once the pain meds have been in his system for a while he will perk up




7 comments:

  1. I think you should keep the bundt cake pan and one of the 9-inch cake pans and if you don't use them within a year, donate them. Or! Since the bundt cake pan was a gift from a close friend, maybe hang it on the wall in the kitchen? (I always loved the shape of bundt pans.)

    -Says the Girl Who Somehow Has Five Crockpots

    I'm glad Buster's x-rays didn't show anything ominous. Here's hoping the pain meds kick in soon!

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  2. Could you find another use for the pans until you do need them? Like, if the round pans are magnetic, you could hang them on a wall or put them on a plate stand and use them to post up recipes, notes, etc. The bundt pan could be used in your cupboards to corral smaller items. It does seem a shame to get rid of nice things that do use, even though it is just occasionally. I do agree with getting things off the counter. It's so much easier to cook/bake/clean up when you're not always working around stuff.

    Unfrosted cake freezes beautifully!

    I'm glad Buster is okay. Hopefully he feels better soon.

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  3. I am definitely leaning toward keeping the bundt pan (that takes up the most space!) because I so use it to hold smaller things.

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  4. Do you have a friend you could give them to, who might use them, and then if you found yourself in need, you could borrow them? signed-the girl with too many kitchen gadgets

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  5. Clear counters are the awesome. Sometimes when I'm on a tear I'll put away things that sort of need to go on the counter (the fruit) just to have the beauty of a clean counter, at least temporarily.

    But! Cake pans that are nice! Is there someplace else in your house that could accommodate a small box of such things--things that are nice, but used once a year or less? That is what I would do (all the while struggling with Mike, who would prefer to just chuck it all out. I admire how you acknowledge A.'s accommodation of your anticlutter tendency--as the clutterer in the family, I do usually feel better when we get rid of stuff, but I HATE being pressured to do so).

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  6. dude. NOT PATHETIC to love your Buster that much. glad he's getting some pain meds, and i hope they help quickly & effectively!

    oof, i hate getting rid of kitchen-y things, because when i DO find myself wanting/needing them it's so irritating to not be able to use a recipe because i don't have the pan to do so. then again, i have ample kitchen cabinet storage. ack. i am no help.

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  7. Cake does freeze well. I make Torsten a black forest cake occasionally, since he adores it, but I hate it, so he cuts it into quarters (pre-frosted and everything) and freezes them individually, and says they taste just as good defrosted as fresh.

    If you have the space, it might be worth one storage bin for stuff that you use, but not often, in a back closet or a garage or something. Like Christmas lights, or whatever.

    I'm so glad Buster's x-rays came back clear! Poor buddy with his arthritis, though.

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