Van Cleanse

Earlier this week I decided that I would start to do some weekly chores regularly. Like vacuum the house or clean the bathrooms. Two of the things I wanted to do on Saturday were to work in the garden :) and vacuum the van. Well, to vacuum the van you need to clean it out. Usually only B and I travel in it. Two of the kids have their own cars, take the other two with them and rarely travel with B and me anymore except on trips. So, it shouldn't be too much of a problem, right? Oh, yeah? You should have seen what I took out of that van! You would have thought I was going to set up a traveling pharmacy. Take a look. A good look, because that is the last you're going to see such a collection from MY van! I found oodles of trash--a given, five heat curlers, deodorant, toothpaste--given to T for our trip to Carolina in May, hand sanitizer, a de-icer for the windshield, three plastic forks, flora-life for the flowers, two hair elastics, two bottles of hand cream, three pacs of dental floss, hair conditioner, hair defrizzer (we all have long hair-but no hairbrushes or combs), hair clip, five books, a Bible and a hymn book, five fold-up maps, three book maps--two local and one continent, one pop-up map of Vancouver, dozens of pens, three small notebooks, two notepads, a starbucks cup from the holidays, a water bottle, an M&M chocolate peanut, a Smartie, one lost grape now found, a pair of scissors, one sewing kit, a spool of white thread with two threaded needles, two necklaces (home-made, must not have been good enough to wear), three pacs of soy sauce, four packets of sugar, cargo net--impossible to use, tire chains--to be removed now that it is summer, hockey mask, baseball glove, one pair of socks, two and a half pairs of shoes--(she better find the other one--they're her good pair!), a camera for taking pictures of car accidents, a large black bag for pop cans, key to the front door of our old house (we've been here over a year), CPR mask, dozens of napkins--stash from various restaurants, one half of a clothes pin (??? I don't even use clothespins!), Ron and Tami's memory card from Burbank (to be given to them at W2), a package of pamphlets--to be given to Sam at W2), a kid's stencil, an eraser, dozens of pens, a remote garage door clip, Ace bandage clips (2), letters and b-day cards from the kids' friends, two tire pressure gauges, wrapper from a Subway sandwich, box of chalk (??I thought they were done with that stuff 10 years ago!), four bandannas, LJ's immunization record, gospel tracts, red poppy from Remembrance Day (Veterans' Day--November 11), ear buds for a hand free phone, garbage Tag for the city of Richmond--useless for us, but worth $2 or$4, change purse--with money!!!, cassette tapes of all the meetings at Carolina Conference, eight music CDs, two vests, an umbrella, one only of a pair of earplugs, a finger messager (it's that round blue spiral thingy at the bottom of the pic--gotten on Granville Island on our anniversary last month from a street vendor) and four brass rings.

My plan of attack is to bar the kids from the van forever--well, maybe til our next trip.