Project 333 from Be More With Less

Project 333 is a challenge where a group of like minded individuals embark upon the goal of only wearing 33 items of clothing and accessories for 3 months. You carefully go through your wardrobe and select the 33 items you will keep in your closet/dresser. The remainder of the items get boxed up and sealed. After 3 months has passed you then have the option of including the boxed items back into your closet or hopefully if you've survived without them you donate. If you live in a location with seasons, as I do, some of the boxed items will come out, enter your closet and the 33 items you've been wearing will then get boxed up. There are some items that are excluded such as underwear, workout clothing, wedding rings, etc. to read the full list of rules, or if you would like to join me, click on this link Project333

I've been contemplating doing this for over a year now but every time I read about it part of me worries, not so much about whether or not I'll survive 3 months with only 33 items of clothing and accessories, because I'm pretty confident I can handle that. Hello exhausted pregnant mama wearing yoga pants and a pink tee again, but I worry about the selection process and the boxing up bit.

Will I be able to select only 33 items, what if I box up an item and then wish I had kept it in the rotation?

I've decided it's time to move past that fear. I have a baby due in 2 months, our house is still under construction and I feel like the walls are closing in around me. I long for space and I don't necessarily need a 3,000 square foot house to achieve that space, I just need a little wiggle room and a little less clutter in our current home.

Josh would surely say, "Clutter, what clutter? There's nothing left." Or as my nephew gasped yesterday, "Cyril hardly has any toys, I'm bored." To which I responded, "You'll think of something Eli, you're very imaginative." Five minutes later I was cutting out a pig cartoon for him so that he could make a mask to scare Uncle Joshy, but I digress.

I think when that newborn arrives and rocks our world it will be so nice to open up my closet and see all that space with no decision fatigue. I'll only have a few items of clothing to select from, which means one less decision in my life, and that'll surely make me a happy mama. Also, I need space to hang some of baby girl's dresses and cardigans, I didn't hang any of Cyril's clothing as a baby so I didn't anticipate needing wardrobe space for number 2. Then I started going through my box of donated clothes and it just felt wrong to fold and shove the pretty dresses in a drawer.

At first I will box up and store the items not included in my rotation, however I hope that once I get comfortable with this project I will just keep all 33 items, times 4 seasons, for a total of 132 items in my closet/dresser because I don't like clothing that has been packed in a box, I feel like it gets ruined all folded up and packed away, it needs to breathe. Those of you who have read Marie Kondo's book, The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up, will understand what I mean when I say this.

So that's that. Tomorrow I will go through my closet, make my selection, put the rest in a box and store it at Steads with the rest of our belongings until October 1st. Who's with me?

Hopefully I'll feel this good after the project is complete :)