professional home organizing

Don’t laugh at me, but I knew what I wanted and it was a sweater with a rainbow on it.

I’d seen it hanging on the rack in some store in the mall and I wanted it. So. So. bad.

But I was unemployed and penniless.

(Seventh grade can totally suck like that.)

Also, this sweater was more expensive than all of the clothes my family had in our entire house put together. And so even if I were full of pennies, I was not gonna use them all up on one amazing sweater from the mall.

And neither was my mother.

And yet.

Every time someone asked what I wanted for Christmas, I casually mentioned that I’d seen this rainbow sweater at the mall and maybe that would be the only gift I needed this year.

That “only gift” thing went over with my family like onion flavored ice cream.

 
Because my family was a Christmas Eve Extravaganza kind of family.

Three generations gathered in my grandparents’ living room, along with their friends Ardelle and Bob (“from the war”). Theater-in-the-round seating, all focused on the white aluminum tree.

And oh my gawd this tree was towering over everyone.

Because it was on top of a table.

Because we needed space under the tree.

For the gifts. Because we had piles and piles of gifts.

 
Which sounds…extravagant.

But if you added up all the money that was spent on all of the gifts in all of those piles, it would probably total something like eighty-two bucks.

Because I am not lying when I tell you that a lot of those gifts were emery boards.

And I am also not lying when I tell you that sometimes Grandma took the emery boards out of the packaging and wrapped each little stick of sandpaper one by one so that we’d have more gifts to open.

 
Christmas Eve was The Event of the Year in my family. And the goal of this event was to make Christmas last as long as possible. And honestly, that’s always been fine by me.

I am happy to spend hours opening gifts and partaking in the passing of the cookie tray and listening to my grandmother yelling at everyone to be quiet because she couldn’t see what Ardelle gave Aunt Jenny.

This is the holidays and they only come once a year.

So I promise you that I was not sitting in the corner, sulking over a rainbow sweater that I knew from the jump wasn’t happening.

I honestly almost didn’t even want it anymore.

Which means, of course, that I never saw it coming.

The next morning, inside a big box with my name on it was the sweater with the pastel rainbow across the front. The one impossible thing that it turned out I really, really did want, even though I knew I couldn’t have it? I had it.

 
And I’d love to end this story by saying that I wore that dang sweater every day until I wore it out. But I am apparently an ungrateful snotty nose kid because I never, ever wore the magical miracle rainbow sweater. Ever. I don’t think I even tried it on for my mom on Christmas morning.

Because the truth is: that scratchy lump of rainbow colored wool was such a miracle to me that I was afraid I would ruin it if I wore it anywhere.

So I didn’t.

I kept it on the shelf in my closet.

And sometimes I’d take it out and I’d hold it and feel so … happy.

So happy that even now, a hundred Christmases later, I want to cry thinking of that sweater and how my mom looked at little 13-year-old me, knowing that there were plenty of things I was going to want that she wasn’t ever going to be able to give me, but if it was at all in her power to make a ridiculous rainbow sweater magically appear, she was gonna do it.

 
Fast forward about 20 years and 7 different apartments worth of keeping this precious sweater in a box in the back of my closet, something in there sprung a leak and I had to get rid of the sweater.

Because wet, moldy wool is not magical or miraculous. It is funky.

And when sentimental stuff goes stinky? It cannot stay.

 
When people hire me to help them downsize or declutter their home, one of their biggest fears is that I’m going to come in and make them get rid of everything they own.

And while I do have a fairly strict “Anything Infested With Closet Fungus Has To Go” Rule, I am not overly focused on what my clients should get rid of.

Because I know that what matters are the things they should keep.
 
I do not believe in living in a home that is stuffed full of things that are taking up space for no reason.

And I don’t believe in living in a home that is so full that you constantly feel like the life you want to be living is fighting for space.

I do believe that we all deserve to live in a home that feels like we can breathe. A home where you can exhale when you walk in the door and inhale all of the love and hope and encouragement and knowledge and joy that is and has been your life.

To create a home that does that, you need to let go of things that are making life harder. And hold tight to the things that are going to remind you who you are, that give your current life meaning, and that truly matter to you. Right now.

And by “hold tight” I do not mean wrap them in tissue paper, lay them in a box, and shove them in the dark corner of your closet where the dusty lint balls and random bobby pins live.

No. No. We’re not doing that anymore. The funky sweater is our cautionary tale.

 
When something is meaningful to you, let it be meaningful. Right out there in the open. For everyone (but mostly you) to see.
And if it’s not meaningful enough to be out, ask yourself if it’s truly meaningful enough to keep.

 
One of my favorite things to do for clients is to help them bring their sentimental items out of their closets and into their everyday.

Wear the necklace.

Use the dishes.

Design a gallery wall and display your grandma’s crochet!

And if you somehow are holding onto thousands of emery boards, you should totally panel your entryway with them so that every time you walk in the door, you’re reminded that no matter what else you have become in your life, you are also the granddaughter of a woman who wanted Christmas Eve to last forever.

 
Enjoy all the sentimentality your sentimental stuff is beaming out at you.

This is the stuff that makes your home … your home.

 
Your only friend brave enough to suggest paneling your entryway in emery boards,
Vivian


 
PS. If you’ve been decluttering and you found some sentimental items that you’d love to get out of the back of the closet and into the open where you can see them and feel the love every time you look at them, but you’re not sure how you’d even start to do that? Hit reply to this email and say, “Vivian, I’ve got EMERY BOARDS!” and I’ll get back to you to discuss.

Because I am full of ideas and together we can figure out a way to make your meaningful stuff be a meaningful part of your every day.

Or you can book a Strategy Session and we’ll turn “I don’t know where to start with all my stuff” into a very simple next step. 👇🏼

DECEMBER 19, 2025