Oh, how I love Craigslist!

I spent much of today painting, running errands and driving through traffic, so I don't have much interesting to report. (This is an ongoing excuse, but I hope I am almost to the end!)

However, yesterday we got rid of a large piece of furniture that we eliminated from my daughter's room, and it makes me so happy! I am happy to have the furniture out of her room, I am happy to have the furniture out of my garage, and I am most happy to have given this large piece of furniture to a good home.

Several years ago my husband built a freestanding window seat for my daughter. She loves Romantic fiction, Jane Eyre and The Secret Garden and other things like that, and she had developed a desire for a window seat so she could sit in her room, reading her book and looking out at the garden while hidden from the world. However, she has outgrown the window seat, and it did not make the cut for her new bedroom decor.

A window seat would probably not find a home if donated to Goodwill. Instead, we advertised it on Craigslist, and now other little girls have a secret hideout/princess tower as part of their bedroom decor. I am so happy to be able to make other little girls happy, and I am happy that the effort my husband put into this structure is being kept out of the landfill.

That's the beauty of Craigslist. I can post something and leave it available until someone comes along who really needs what I have; I can keep checking Craigslist until I find what I'm looking for. I don't need to go to the store, and I certainly don't have to create pollution and a negative working environment in order to get what I want. I just have to wait for the community to come to my aid.

I love knowing that someone else, and actual person, is taking advantage in the changes in my life, and I can take advantage of the changes in someone else's. If my baby grows out of her clothes, someone else's babies are growing out of theirs and I can find the community that will allow everyone to shift their clothes down to the next size, and absorb someone else's growth spurt. If I buy a ceiling fan or bathroom sink that I didn't actually need, someone is happy to get them at bargain prices.

And I can take advantage of the same system in my turn. So I no longer need to keep something "just in case." I can let my bookcase or sink or extra tent go into the world, and I will get someone else's when the time comes. It's sharing and community, simplified.