Michelle, I rented a 30-yard dumpster when we cleared out my Dad's house before selling it. A lot of his stuff was stored for the kids, donated, sold, etc., but there was still just a lot of junk (might have been useful years earlier, but rot sets in. . . )

When that stood in the driveway across the road from the house (at the beach where he lived several of the beach house owners also bought lots across the road for parking, garages, gardens, etc.) I'd every so often get a knock on the door from a neighbor asking if they could get rid of some bulky item that the trash wouldn't take. I think we had a couple of old screen doors and a toilet full commode in there, along with a couple of computers. I called the company to ask if the computers were okay, and she said yes, because they'd separate the contents before trashing or recycling (and this was in 1997, so recycling attitudes have progressed a bit since then.)

I'll offer a spin-off story from that process: I remember one day when the next door neighbor knocked and asked a favor. Dad used to have a free-standing swinging bench that he got from L.L. Bean that went out on the deck overlooking the water every spring. They had a joke between the households that it wasn't spring until the swing was out. Tom wanted to know if they could buy that from the estate if no one else wanted it. I was quite sure that someone would claim it, so I didn't leave it to chance. I asked if Tom knew where it was, and we went poking around my Dad's shed (the house was smaller than this shed) and we found it. I gave it to Tom, pointing out that no one in my family would miss it since they wouldn't know it was there (or probably remember, at any rate) and Tom and his wife had a history with it.

Susan, I have news: it has been a seesaw. ;-D

Looks like this weekend will be the one to try to get in the last mow of the back yard. That'll probably be enough for the season. The front yard has more activity and will require some additional trimming along with running the mower to mulch in leaves a couple of times. I won't drain the gas from the mower yet.

I'm considering how things are arranged here, not just trunks, but also books, dishes, etc. Kat sprucing up her beading collection reminds me that all of my beading materials are in an antique secretary in the bedroom. It is a lovely old piece with a glass-front bookshelf on each side. I have a few books, a few antiques kind of casually stored there. It is a lovely display piece, and maybe it would be better situated in a different room, with small more expensive antiques or glass in it. Beading materials might need a better place to reside, or the shelves could serve to display and organize the work. Either way, I need to rethink what this desk is doing.

SRS