It’s been a while since I last posted. In the intervening months I’ve had my baby and watched him grow up and take his first steps. I realized recently that my closets were full of maternity clothes that I didn’t need anymore and baby clothes that Ducky had already outgrown.

Fortunately, I have a friend who is expecting a baby in April and another friend who has a baby boy a few months younger than mine. All the extra clothes have been collected, boxed, and I’m giving them away this week. There’s no point in hanging on to these things I don’t need, especially when I know people who will really use and appreciate them.

Giving away these clothes is also good practice in letting go. I know there’s a lot of junk in my closets that I’m needlessly clinging to. The more I can get used to giving things away, the more I think I’ll be able to improve my ability to conquer the clutter in my closets.

It’s after Labor Day, which means it’s time for me to reorganize my wardrobe for early fall. This year, though, I’ll be doing things a little differently: since I just began my third trimester, I don’t want to buy a bunch of new clothes. I’ll need to take stock of my existing maternity wardrobe and see if it looks like enough to get me through the next three months. Other than that, my fall wardrobe switch-around routine is the same as always.

1. Put away anything that looks too “summery.”
   I start with the obvious pieces: white sandals, white shorts, white shrunken cardigan. Next, anything that just seems out of place in the fall, like this dress and skirt:
   

   I know all these pieces will either feel brand-new when I take them back out next spring, or else I’ll wonder why I ever wore them and send them off to the thrift store.

2. Bring out the jeans and long-sleeved tees.
   My closet is going to be a little crowded during this early fall time when I’m still wearing summer tops along with fall ones depending on the weather, but I know it’s only for a month or so. Then, the lightweight tops will go away to make room for sweaters.
3. Review my shoes.
   Now is the time when I take a good, hard look at my sandals and flip-flops to determine whether they’ll make it through another summer. I hate getting rid of shoes I love, but I also know that I’m not doing myself any favors by going out in public wearing beat-up, falling apart shoes. This year, I decided that I can salvage the gladiator sandals but the brown flip-flops are too far gone. I ought to look for a replacement pair right now during summer clearance sales.
   
4. Put away or give away anything that doesn’t fit.
   This year, that means all non-maternity clothes go into storage. Normally, this is also when I have to admit that the skirt I didn’t wear all summer (or all last fall/winter) because I just needed to lose a few pounds is probably never going to fit before it goes out of style, and it’s time for me to just let it go.

There are times I wish I had a bigger closet, but I think it’s probably better that I’m forced to pare down my wardrobe to just what I can wear right now. That makes it easier to get dressed in the morning and helps me curb my pack-rat tendencies.

As you may already know if you read my personal blog, I’m expecting our second child this December. Last time I was pregnant, I didn’t start to “show” until August, so most of the maternity clothes I have are for the fall and winter.

This time, I needed maternity clothes by early June. Realizing it would be a long, hot, summer, I decided to invest in a few nice summer tops. Since I’d had a lot of success buying lots of clothes for my little boy on eBay, I thought I’d try it for myself.

I easily found large lots of nice summer maternity clothes, many “NWT” (new with tags). I calculated what I was willing to pay per item, including shipping, and got to bidding. But I kept losing the auctions, even when I waited ’til the last minute to bid. I saw that new maternity tops were $16.99 apiece at Target, so I was unwilling to pay more than that on eBay. Actually, I didn’t want to go over $10 per item, though a couple bidding frenzies got me up to $13/item. I still lost.

Two of the shirts I bought on eBay.

Frustrated, I decided to check out the auctions for small lots and individual items. In children’s clothing, these are usually worse deals: items selling for twice or three times what you’d pay for them in lots. But surprisingly, in maternity clothes, individual items were much cheaper. I ended up buying nine shirts that ranged in price from $1.25 to $13. Even with shipping calculated in, they averaged only $5.32 per shirt (two of the small lots were from the same seller, so I saved a little on shipping).

Why were people paying so much more for the clothes in lots? Maybe it was the perception that buying in bulk saves money. Maybe they didn’t want to bother searching through the other listings to find individual items. Whatever the reason, I’m going to be a lot more cautious of lot sales on eBay in the future. Just like in the grocery store, it always pays to calculate the per-item price so you can really see what you’re paying.

I’ve come across some great new blogs in the last week, and I’d like to share.

1. Teecycle.org sells great vintage T-shirts. These are real classic, used tees, not something faux-distressed to look "vintage".
2. Kadi over at Simply Thrifty posts about how hard it is for her to pare down her shoe wardrobe. I completely sympathize.
3. Artist and mother Delilah offers up some examples of the worst of current maternity fashion. Sadly, there was enough material for a sequel.

This past weekend, I cleared 7 old shirts out of my closet. What’s momentous about getting rid of these particular shirts is that they fall into two categories which I have a hard time purging: newish/practical, and old/sentimental. (“Newish” means “purchased within the last 3-4 years.”)

You know how putting on your favorite shirt makes you feel? How you look in the mirror and think how good you look and step out the door with confidence? These shirts were the opposite. When I put them on, I thought about how wrong they looked, how they were too short or too baggy. I looked in the mirror and felt old and dumpy.

Maybe most people would’ve gotten rid of shirts like these long ago, but I have that little voice in my head that tells me I mustn’t get rid of anything practical. For instance, one of these shirts was a plain red t-shirt. I remember wearing it about 3 years ago and feeling great about how I looked. But now it has one of those mysterious stains on the front (that’s the shirt itself in the picture on that post). Also, it is kind of short and boxy, which I think makes it look dated.

“But it’s a plain red t-shirt! It goes with so many things! It’s so practical, you can’t get rid of it!” says the little voice in my head.

I am learning to silence that little voice by reminding myself that there is no reason for me to walk around feeling ugly. I am not poor enough that I will miss that shirt, and not having it around taking up space and making me feel guilty for owning clothes I don’t even wear anymore will make me feel better every time I open the closet door.

The sentimental shirts were maybe a little easier to get rid of. With the passing of time, my definition of what’s worth keeping changes. I no longer felt so attached to my SF Giants jersey or my St. Philip’s Cathedral polo shirt. I have good memories of going to Giants games with my sister and the friends I made at St. Philip’s, but I don’t need the shirts in order to hold on to those memories.

So seven shirts were put in a box and taken to the Salvation Army, never to be seen again. Unless, of course, I happen to come across one while shopping.