Find Lost Treasure

I have been bugging my teen boys for weeks (months) to clean out their room. It wasn't until I was at the end of my rope that I realized that they have absolutely no interest whatsoever in cleaning out their room. And when they started telling me that I needed to buy them more black socks because they no longer had any did I decide to take over their room. I couldn't imagine where all of their black socks had gone. I took matters into my own hands.

I went in their room with a mission to find the 20 pairs of black socks that I knew lurked in there. I also was going to find shorts that they told me they no longer have as well. After all, clothes don't just walk away.

My approach was fairly straightforward and would work in just about any bedroom. I worked on the closet first and then moved to the bed area and then the TV area. Closet was the biggest challenge because kids notoriously do not organize or purge their clothes. I am sure there are exceptions but at least this rule is alive in my house. I start by pulling all of the clothes out of the closet. We make a few piles: one to give away, one to keep, and one to pass down to their youngest brother. The boys were a part of the process and as I held up the item we decided which pile it goes into. The decisions have to be quick and kids usually know which of their clothes no longer fit or is no longer in style. We went through the belts, shoes, and baskets. Every keeper got hung back up on the rod in an organized fashion grouped by type (shirts, pants, tshirts, etc). To my kids' surprise the baskets which contained shorts and t-shirts were crammed with shorts that still had the tags on and ended up buried at the bottom. What we also found were several pairs of black socks. I struggled to contain myself so as not to relish in what I knew all along (that the socks and shorts didn't just walk away).

When the closet was finished I moved on to the drawers under their beds. This is where they keep their underwear, pjs, and socks (which they say they no longer have any of). What I found hidden beneath the underwear were more socks! We sorted through these drawers and paired up all the socks, folded up all the underwear and threw everything out that no longer fit or was wearable.

While I was at the bed area I decided to take a look under the bed. I figured that surely I would find treasure there and I was not disappointed. More socks!

We moved on to their end table that they somehow has become a total junk drawer. I emptied the whole thing out much to their horror. The whining tone didn't sway me. We were not going to do a partial purge. Everything was emptied out of that drawer onto the floor. We went through old papers, candy wrappers, and overall junk that just needed to be trashed. I did find a few surprises that came from that drawer..money and gift cards that totalled $75 in value.

Only essential items were put back into the end table drawer and on that happy note we were finished with the purge. Lost treasure totalled $75 + the cost of black socks and striped shorts. Overall the mission was a success.