Less is More

When we were packing to come to France, I wanted to bring what we needed and not more.  But that is a hard decision to make.  We all know that we should go through our homes on a regular basis and get rid of the things which we no longer use.  Yet every time I struggle through my “spring cleaning.” So as our trip became closer and closer, I started to think more and more about what would we most need while in France.

To prepare the house for our tenants was an interesting exercise.  I went through all of our clothing and made lots of donations to different organizations.  I went through our cooking accessories, our books, our board games, all with an eye to which ones we no longer used, enjoyed, etc.  But it was tricky because, with Noah four years younger than Micah, it was a bit hard to predict.  But pare down I did.  Space now existed for the tenants belongings.

The next interesting decision was, once I had selected which items were worth our coming back to, deciding what another family would want for their year in our home.  They have two very young children, so I left a number of toys and books for the very young set.  Things I might have donated had they not been moving in.  But it is again interesting to think about which of your coveted or favorite items will be appreciated by another.  And how do choose which items are too special to leave for another?

On the other side of the ocean we are living with the things that we brought with us, the few extra things that we sent in Ed’s work boxes and the even fewer items that we have bought here to keep us going.  A ball for Noah, a piano keyboard (gasp!) for Julian.  But we’ve also worked to find things to keep us busy through the day, like a sports camp for Micah and Julian, a hike each weekend, the museums, the concerts, the community pool. 

And each boy has found a way to make his own fun.  Noah is all over the creative ball games.  He kicks, throws, catches, scores, but always with a VERY definite set of rules that, in true four-year-old fashion, always have him winning.  He has also become the king of testing out all of the paper airplanes that we’ve made, and re-made, and re-made. 

Speaking of reigning, Micah is the king of cardboard and other re-used items.  He made a telephone for himself and Noah from our cell-phone box.  He made an Ipad for Noah that has extra cardboard pieces to hide the apps once pressed, and extra buttons and games to play.  We are saving all of our toilet paper rolls for a marble maze, and corks for, well, I don’t know what for. 

Julian has taken the game-making to another level.  He has recreated an Aixois version of Candyland, with all of the cards to go with it.  Along the way one visits the petite marche, the cathedral, the boulangerie (with Monsieur Baguette), Chez Grand-Mere and other sites of interest.  All three boys have had a lot of fun playing Julian’s version, and the younger two have taken on the task of creating their own games now, too.  Julian is also the expert plane-maker, the Bombardier of our family’s airplanes.  The Dart 2000 is an especially coveted plane. 

Ed has gone back to telling some of his fabulous Lego-Man stories, with Lego-Man finding creative ways to cross the Atlantic to help Chief back in Toronto.  And the congratulatory pizzas at the end of the story are now served with a bit of saucisson!

And as for me, well, I decided not to bring any cookbooks with me, and so far I am loving the day-to-day shopping for what looks best and freshest.  We have been eating more fresh fruit every day than I could have imagined possible, all local from Provence.  And it is so much more fun to stand in the market and imagine my next meal than to open the fridge and see what foods limit my next meal.  Every day brings a new meal.  The one thing that may lead me back to a cookbook is baking.  I have made several fruit crisps so that I can enjoy the local fruits as well.  But, having just found that baking soda is kept in the pharmaceutical aisles, I am now ready to try something with a little leavening. 

The end result of living with less, at least for us right now, is a greater creativity.  We are all five of us looking at the things that we do have with different eyes.  Because we only have a few toys, the boys are more likely to share because they want to use someone else’s items as well.  (Mind you, this particular effect will take a bit longer to take full effect, I think!)  But I think all of us are looking at our world through a slightly different lens, and I think we are all becoming the richer for it.