Reorganizing Our Home

We have had some microfiber fabric couches for about fifteen years. With three children, you can imagine that they have seen their share of spills and grime. It has been possible to clean them with some alcohol and microfiber cloths. For the most part, this works. But you'll never mistake them for new couches. We had decided to get rid of them earlier this year. But our attempts to sell them never pan out. People call and make an offer. But they never show up. So we finally decided to move the couches outside to the front porch like classy people do.

When we made the decision to get rid of the couches, it was with the intent to open up floor space. Specifically, we wanted to turn our living room into an office. We are not the type of family who likes to entertain. With mostly grown children, it no longer makes sense to have a full living room set. We think that having workspaces for everybody would be a better use of the space. The idea is work together, play together.

We have a relatively small home. Our living room area transitions into our dining room wherever we put the imaginary line. In other words, it's one large room with areas arranged as living and dining areas. So our dining room will also be affected. We are officially designating half the space as office space. The intent is to be able to deduct a portion of our home expenses from our taxes through the home office deduction.

We have not quite figured out how to arrange the dining area. We are thinking of also getting rid of our dining table and chairs to replace them with a Japanese style dining table. Instead of chairs we would sit on cushions or maybe line the floor with a tatami mat. This would free up floor space.

Moving the couches outside started a cascade of rearranging. Our office area is taking definition. Even our master bedroom is being affected by having a designated office space. Going along with the theme of Japanese style seating, I have started thinking about doing the same with my personal office space. I'm inclined to try sitting on the floor and using the coffee table as my desk. I'll need to purchase some soft floor tiles.

At nearly 50 years of age, I recognize that spending all day on the floor will not be an easy transition. However, I think that I may be able to loosen up my joints and muscles with sufficient time. I think that working on the floor has the distinct advantage that it allows me to spread out my work. The whole floor would be my extended desk.

Mrs. Mata and I still need to work out how we want to make all of this work. Over the years, we have accumulated a bunch of things that we may very easily do without. So, along with reconfiguring, there will be a bunch of purging in the near future. We'll get back to it tomorrow.