Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Clothing Swap

So last Sunday I participated in one of the coolest things ever-a Clothing Swap. It is so neat-you go through your closet and pull out all the clothes/shoes/jewlrey/bags/purses/hair products/etc. that you normally would take to a second hand store or put in your garage sale. You invite your friends to do the same and then you all bring your items together for the Swap. You make different piles around the room for the different items (i.e. shirts, blouses, jeans, dress pants, skirts, sweaters, workout clothes, etc.) Make sure to have a room or two where people can try on the different items, etc. Give everyone a labeling mechanism (we used different colored sticky notes). Let everyone puruse the items, try them on, etc. and then if they like/want something, they label it with their identifying mechanism and stick it out in a designated area in the middle of the room. These items can also be tried on and marked by others interested. At the end of the time, the organizers distribute to the new owners all the singlely marked items. They then put the names in a hat to draw for the items desired by multiple attendees. It is great, as you go home with some fun new things for your wardrobe and you get to clean out your closet. All the remaining items that nobody was interested in are then taken to be donated at the location of your choice.

I had a great time and really enjoyed just having some fun with the other ladies there. I am still pondering, however, the reality that we all seemed to experience when we were there. We all had this unusual emotional attachment to our clothing items. There were many items there that we could tell a story about where we wore it/how we got it, etc. It was so interesting. Why do we attach so much to something so simple as our clothes. Is that really an identifying point for us or do we just connect memories to all the different sensory aspects of the event? Hmmm...

1 comment:

  1. I would never had done that before becoming a mother but now that I am a mom and don't often buy for myself and many of my clothes were pre baby, during pregnancy, or post baby and are then related to those times connected to my children. So maybe it sounds vain or superficial but really I think it is so much deeper than that. And this comes from someone who doesn't tend to keep things just because of sentimental reasons.

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