Mackenzie Carose

Minimalism Is Not…

By Mackenzie Leave a Comment

Minimalism is not devoid of life although many purport it to be. Many see minimalism as stark white rooms, no furniture, or if you do, it is just a random chair in the corner or something. One cup, one plate, one pair of pants, etc… and anything else you own could probably just fit into a backpack. Minimalists are without humor and like everything to be modern: their clothing, their architecture, their music, even the authors of the books that they supposedly don’t buy.

Real fun people to be around, right?

That’s the thing about minimalists though, is that we are all different and there is no correct formula to adhere to. There are minimalists that live in tiny houses and some that live in a four-bedroom house. Some minimalists love the color blue, and their living room is painted that exact perfect shade of robin’s egg while others prefer an accent wall in their bedroom of the sweetest buttercup yellow. Some minimalists even own, and I hate to tell you this but, but some of them even own more than one plate. Shocking, I know.

See, the thing about minimalism is that it just gets you from point A to point B. Get rid of what doesn’t matter in your life to make room for what does. Tired of picking up all the things and spending your weekends cleaning when you could be out with friends enjoying a bike ride? Yup, I’ve been there. I like things tidy, but I also hate constantly picking up stuff. I don’t always want to be tidying when there are other things I want to do. Minimalism helps me with that. By having less clutter, less stuff, it is less for me to manage, to take care of. I can spend that time with my daughters which is much more important. Taking care of all the clutter? Not so much.

Minimalism is not a droll existence, living life to the least extent possible. I spend time with my family which I enjoy. I watch films, I read books, I try new restaurants, I go for walks. I love to bake, and I love listening to music. I love the holidays and I enjoy learning and traveling to new places. Minimalism reminds me of what I value and what I place importance on, and it is not collecting and housing things. I enjoy home decor as much as the next enthusiast, but I know when my space is decorated enough and to just let it be. I don’t need to keep up with the latest decor trends because I am content with what I have. Contentment is key with anything. If you are always looking for the next best thing, you will never be satisfied. Striving in and of itself can be quite exhausting.

Minimalism is not about aesthetics, and it is not about living someone else’s life. It is about living your life however that may be, whichever way that be, without all the extraneous stuff holding you back. Consider what is essential and what is necessary and also consider what is superfluous and nonessential and make adjustments accordingly.

Essentialism, intentionalism, minimalism. They are all branches from the same tree.

Living a life that you value.

As The Page Turns: October Edition

By Mackenzie Leave a Comment

New month of book reviews 🙂 Let’s get to it!

Disconnected by Emma Gannon

I actually meant to add this to last month’s book round-up but completely forgot. The subtitle to this book is “How to Stay Human in an Online World” and Gannon shows how to do just that. I have really been interested this year, in how we use social media to connect with each other but also how social media leaves us feeling awful at times and we wonder why we even use it. The influencing and advertising culture is at an all-time high and people are starting to feel the effects of it all and are unhappy. I found this book so interesting, and I definitely recommend giving this one a read.

Minimalista by Shira Gill

It is marketed as a step-by-step guide to a better home, wardrobe, and life, but it is so much more than that. This book really helps you to understand why we hold on to things and shows you really and truly how much easier your life will be if you have a place for everything. Life moves so much smoother when you know exactly where your keys are when you need to leave each morning. Little things like that and so much more are in this book, and I just loved it.

The Vanishing Type by Ellery Adams

I have really been into cozy mysteries this year which used to not be my thing. I think I have been drawn to them because the real world is so awful at times, I think I need an escape. The Vanishing Type is the latest book in the Secret, Book, and Scone Society series and I absolutely loved it 🙂

Village Affairs and Trick of the Mind by Cassandra Chan

Same series, two different books, two different reviews. Village Affairs was just okay. I figured out who did it and then had to slog through most of the book until the denouement which was a let-down as far as mysteries go. Trick of the Mind however was so, so good and I literally stopped everything I was doing, just so I could finish it and find out who the culprit was. Definitely night and day regarding these books but I enjoy this series which revolves around Scotland Yard Detective Jack Gibbons, so much.

That’s it from me! Anything interesting you have read lately? Let me know 🙂

A Minimalist Laundry Room

By Mackenzie Leave a Comment

neutral laundry room

A minimalist laundry room, you might ask, does it even exist? Do you even have a washer and dryer if you are a minimalist? Are minimalists even supposed to have a room specifically for doing laundry? Isn’t that the opposite of being a minimalist? Are you secretly a maximalist??

I could go on with the questions and some of them are valid. But the truth of the matter is whether or not you are a minimalist, consumerist, luddite, or any of the other adjectives one uses to describe themselves, we all wear clothes, and they all need to be cleaned at some point.

Okay, so back to my laundry room. Yes, room. This part is important. I live in an apartment that has a laundry room. It is right off our garage, and everyone traipses through it to get inside. Because of this, it has become a catch-all for everything that comes out of the car, inside to the apartment, then no one knows where to put said item and it just goes into one of the cabinets in the laundry room. While my family and I have lived the hashtag apartment life for many years now, we have never had an actual room in which the washing machine and dryer were housed. Stackable machines got us through many a load of laundry back in the day. But when we moved into this apartment last year, we got a room full of cabinets to house our clutter… I mean, a room to do laundry.

This is not a typical laundry room makeover post. There wasn’t a need to go to a big box store and purchase bins and containers to house newly organized items. I didn’t procure a “Live. Laugh. Love.” sign to hang above the dryer. If you’ve seen the Geico “Becoming Your Parents” ads, then you know 😉

The room didn’t require a fresh coat of paint. What was on the walls stayed on the walls.

I merely got fed up one Saturday at not being able to find things that I knew we had and that were just buried under other things that had no business being there. So, I dumped everything out of the cabinets and got to work.

Anything that was rubbish immediately went into the trash. Items that were similar were grouped together and then housed together. When you can’t actually see what you have, you go out and purchase more because you think you have run out of said item, hence our multiple packages of dental floss. Lesson learned.

I then wiped down the cabinets and then put back what needed to go back. Obviously, laundry detergent and sheets for the dryer. Extra rolls of toilet paper, bars of soap, and our beloved dental floss, were also placed back, but grouped together. But best of all? There is a whole part of this cabinet that is empty. Nothing. *sighs of happiness*

Everything is in order, and it is easily able to be found. I organized and it cost nothing monetarily out of pocket. It did cost me my time and frustration though. This project took a few hours, one because I had a four-year-old trying to “help” me 🙂 and the other reason was across from the washer and dryer in these photos are more cabinets and they honestly were the worst and just filled with nonsense. It was extremely difficult to try to photograph because of the cabinet placement and lack of lighting so I don’t have a before and after of the shenanigans that was those cabinets. But suffice to say, those shelves are also now organized, and the broom and dustpan no longer fall on you the minute you open the door.

A few years ago, I wrote a blog post called Extra Square Feet: Extra Anxiety. I had just had a baby and with the extra square feet in that particular apartment, I was starting to feel overwhelmed with the amount of stuff that seemed to be trickling in. There just always seemed to be stuff and it was giving me anxiety. I feel like in the four and a half years since I wrote that post, not much has changed. Clutter = anxiety. Extra stuff = anxiety. Stuff not being organized = anxiety. What has changed is how I personally deal with my anxiety and the tools I have in place to get through those waves. But clutter just makes me crazy.

The problem with the laundry room before I overhauled it, is that everything was out of sight, out of mind. If you can’t see the clutter, then you don’t have to deal with it, right? Yes, up to a point. But it stays in the back of your mind. The fact that you need masking tape, and you know it is in that maelstrom of a cabinet… *sigh* The only way out is through and the only way to get it, is to just get it.

Also, you don’t live in a vacuum when you are a minimalist and live with others who are not as spartan as you. And that’s okay (sometimes). But for the most part, we are on the same page and everyone loves how organized and efficient the laundry room is now. We have sworn to keep it looking this way and keep it structured.

Also, we are good on dental floss.