Confessions of a Shopaholic

When I shop, the world gets better, and the world is better, but then it's not, and I need to do it again.
— Sophie Kinsella

When women are depressed, they eat or go shopping. Men invade another country. It's a whole different way of thinking.
— Elayne Boosler

The craving for the thing is rarely met by the satisfaction of getting it. And so we crave more. And the cycle repeats. We are encouraged to want what will only make us want more. We are, in short, encouraged to be addicts.
― Matt Haig

I was kind of at loose ends yesterday, and I thought maybe I should sit down and read one of the writing magazines I bought a while back. Apparently I’ve bought a few of them that I haven’t got around to reading:

This is a bad habit I’ve developed over the years – buying magazines that have an interesting article or two, but instead of taking them home and actually reading them, I let them pile up. Apparently, just having them is enough for me.

And it doesn’t stop with magazines. Have you any idea how easy it is to buy books online? I don’t even have to leave the comfort of my home to over-indulge in books. Here’s a picture of just one shelf of my “to-be-read” bookcase.

Yes, that’s right, I said bookcase. That shelf is just one small part of the books I have that are waiting to be read. And as you can see, it’s a pretty eclectic selection, too. What can I say? I like books. All kinds of books. And I never know what I might be in the mood to read.

But my shopping problem doesn’t stop there. I’m like a magpie, attracted to shiny things. And when you combine that with the ease of internet shopping . . . it makes for a dangerous combination.

One of the jewelry supply websites I surfed to a while back had been sending me weekly emails showcasing their products. I don’t need any more jewelry supplies, but they wore me down. Next thing I know I had these delivered to my mailbox:

I didn’t even remember ordering the mermaid scale pendants, but there they are, nonetheless.

Another thing I’m a little to susceptible to is the power of suggestion. There are a couple of stitchery sites that have found their way to my Facebook page, and I spend a lot of time admiring the work these crafters do. And oh, look! Most of this work has been done from kits.

So I turned to my good friend Amazon Prime and started browsing for kits. The fact that I have oodles of patterns and thread doesn’t even enter into my head. I want a kit.

The stitchery kits came in a package of four, but the needle felted gnome is in a package by himself. And you notice the stitchery books I couldn’t resist. The one on the upper left is the one I'm using to find stitches for the sampler I’m working on.

We’re not even going to discuss the stock pile of beads I keep picking up at craft stores and don’t use. Or the bin of needle felting supplies that is sitting in the top of my craft closet.

I could go on, but why bother? Seriously though, I do intend to use all of this stuff.

One of these days.

Muliebrile Monday

muliebrile ~ womanly; feminine

There is a lot of stuff in my house. And I mean a LOT of stuff. This is what happens when you’re a pack rat with many different interests.

I keep trying to pare it down, but it’s not easy. This item is part of a collection, or that item has sentimental value. And when I do manage to get rid of some stuff, more magically appears to take its place.

Have you ever watched Tiny House Nation? Basically, it’s a show where people decide (for whatever reason) to downsize from their normal, large sized home to one that’s only a couple of square feet. Okay, maybe I exaggerate a little. It’s more like a couple of hundred square feet, but it just seems like a lot smaller.

To qualify as a tiny home, it must be less than 500 square feet. Considering the average size of a home is between 1500 and 2500 square feet, that’s a big change. And that’s a lot of square footage of “stuff” to get rid of. I think the episode that really drove home the whole down-sizing concept was the one where the wife was presented with a medium sized plastic bin and told that whatever she could fit in there was her clothing allowance. Her shoes alone overflowed the bin.

I’m of two minds about the tiny houses.

On the one hand, they’re cute and compact and make amazing use of what space they have. They’re relatively low-cost to build (around 50,000 U.S.) so all you really need is the land to put them on.

On the other hand, I’ve seen cottages with more space. I could fill one up with my books alone – don’t even suggest I downsize my book collection. And while I could see using one as a writing shed, I couldn’t possibly imagine having to live in one and share the space with someone. Even the cats would go stir crazy after a while – I’d have to have a catio added on.

And that’s the thing. Many of these tiny homes make good use of outdoor space as well, which is fine if you live in a warmer climate, not so great if you live on, say, the west coast where it’s rainy.

And many of these homes are on wheels, which begs the question, why wouldn’t you just buy an RV instead?