…in other words, it’s time to haul out the patio furniture (once our monsoons stop), grab the gardening tools, get ready to plant those annuals and gear up for summer.

But for me, this time of year also means organizing every closet, cupboard and drawer in the house. Not because I want to, mind you. I can think of 37 much more interesting things I’d rather do. But since I’ve been lax of late, my cupboards look like we had a recent earthquake. No longer are the cans and bottles lined up facing forward and boxes neatly stacked. It’s what you’d call a…

And my closets? Don’t even get me started. Well, actually, I’m almost finished because I couldn’t stand them anymore. I neglected to take a before photo but here’s the after of 2 of my closets…

See how I tried to organize the shirts by color? Call me anal, I don’t mind. Although it’s not exactly fun to organize, I find it somehow calming. I put my mind on autopilot and just dig in. Afterward, I feel more centered. Sound too far out? Maybe so.

Now don’t get me wrong; I’m more messy than I let on. Just take a look at my garage loaded with cat trees and cat-related items stacked everywhere. I haven’t taken my car out in weeks. Too much trouble moving all those trees!

But that’s not all. I haven’t had my gardener here in months because of the continual rain. At least that’s my excuse. Consequently, I have some weeds almost knee-high and lots of little stragglers all over the place. It’s not like me to let it go this long but no way was I going to put on my wading boots, if I even had wading boots, and venture into my almost underwater yard.

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, my hardwood floor buckled because of water damage. My insurance company says it’s from a dripping kitchen faucet and not the atmospheric river that flooded the crawl space under my home. Naturally, they don’t cover drips nor atmospheric rivers. Have I mentioned how much I dislike insurance companies? I have? Well then good, because I do.

Half my garage floor is saturated with water so I’m a bit doubtful a drip could do that. But what do I know, except that Liberty Mutual sucks. Since my home is paid for and insurance doesn’t seem to cover much of anything, I’m tempted to cancel. But no doubt as soon as I do, a car will careen into my living room.

But I digress.

So, I’m getting my gardener back out for spring cleaning and boy does he have his work cut out for him and his crew. The moss growing on the backyard bluestone is thick as carpet. Bushes are in desperate need of trimming and the decorative rock and mulch, which washed away during the storms, will be replenished. Fun stuff.

Anyway, the only things left for me to tackle are a kitchen drawer I can barely open, filled with baking items, and some overcrowded garage shelves. After that, I can sit back and marvel at my handiwork because you can bet by summer, both will be back looking like this…

Now if you will excuse me, I have some organizing to do.