Do you have the creep?
 

My mother lives with me and we both have several hobbies and tend to collect or accumulate a lot of stuff. My bachelor brother came to visit and mentioned that Mom & I have the worst case of creep he has ever seen. I said,"What do you mean?", and he replied that if there is ever any empty space, she & I creep into it. We've laughed about that several times since - is it a disease? is there a cure?

Empty space is suppose to be filled, I think there is a rule about that hee hee :p

I so agree!

It's my family's tradition :)

stuff expands to fill available space

We are not to blame! Nature abhors a vacuum, so we have no chance of fighting nature.

My husband is a hoarder and I fight this battle constantly. We have a very large basement and two storage sheds in the back yard. He never puts stuff back where it belongs, and as a result has at least two tool boxes! It makes me crazy!!

I just call it clutter and gave up fighting it years ago. If my house dosen't meet your standards, oh well I live in my home. As long as it isn't dirty, i'm good with it. SO yes we have the creep to.

I too have "quilt creep" in the worst way!

I have had the creep all my life. No flat surface is allowed to remain uncluttered. No laundry basket is ever empty. If there is more than the minimum empty space necessary to move from door to door to couch/bed/chair in any room, it won't be empty long.

My hubby is a hoarder! Every little space is filled with his stuff to the point that MY stuff is everywhere in the house. I have a 24 x 24 foot shed and if I put anything in it my hubby puts something on top of on in front of it. Our closet is full of HIS stuff so My stuff is on the floor in front of my dresser! No room in the inn. I grew up in a house with two parents and an older brother that was only 26 x 26 foot! But my mother didn't have any hobbies either. I need a shed of my own for my quilting and all my hobby stuff so I will be able to find it so I can use it with a lock on the door and me having the only key. I need to reclaim my house so when we have company it doesn't take me a week to find the bed in the spare room.

I am going to use that word in the future. I know lots of people that have creep.
DH and I have been getting rid of clutter and stuff for the past year or so. I want to thin out this house so I don't feel so overwhelmed about what will happen to all of this stuff if something happens to us. I don't want my adult children to have to go through this. (I do worry about my 2 sewing rooms full of fabric and notions and machines, etc.etc. DH has promised to do the right thing with it. There are some people I don't want near it.) We really don't have creep, we just have too much stuff organized into their own spaces. Plenty of room to walk around and everything in its place. Just so much stuff we don't need or use anymore.

I have some creep. We moved 3200 miles and couldn't bring all the creep with us, but somehow there seems to be creep here, also. It's inherited. My dad had 5 metal buildings (not sheds, buildings) filled with creep. He was a depression era kid and kept everything. Now we are getting rid of it. It's an awful feeling. Take care of your creep so others don't have to do it. Not fun.

quilting creeps into every room in the house....

We have the creep also. The weather has been too cold to be outside so hubby stays in the house all day. Every thing the he touches creeps someplace it doesn't belong. LOL

Guilty here of having the creep also. In the past year we have donated several times to the local resale shop (filled our van each time) and it hasn't even made a dent in the clutter caused by creep.

It must be contagious, because I have it also. LOL!!

yes, I agree. It's like the ying & yang, there should be no empty space. I must have it too.

Have you seen your brother's home lately? I have a bachelor brother and he accumulates stuff pretty well too. Not much empty space in his apartment. LOL

an empty space is a vacuum which of course has to be filled!

I LOVE that expression. Especially since I have a bad case of "the creep"!

Now I know what I have. J J

My dad had close to a dozen tool boxes--he was a former construction superintendent--and he knew what was in every one of them. One year we got a baby gosling that he intended to train as a "watch goose", as in a "watch dog". It grew very rapidly but learned its duties not at all. When he was on some kind of building project, he would place the tool boxes he would be using out on the driveway. One day he came in the house and acccused my mom of borrowing one of his tools and not returning it. She protested she had done no such thing. The same thing occurred on several following days. Then Mom looked out the kitchen window and saw the thief, none other than our goose which would go over to a tool box, pick up a tool and transport it over to a grassy area and hide it in the grass. Lucy Goosie's days with us were numbered from then on. But that's a whole different story!

I'm glad someone finally came up with a word for this condition. I've been complaining about an "ooze" in my basement. The "stuff" just seems to ooze out from the walls. Whenever anyone takes something else down there - ie. college stuff not being used anymore, but should disappear once the owner finishes the next degree and finds a job, or the stuff not wearable, but not ready for the Salvation Army shipment-- it oozes into the open area - which encroaches on my sewing table and space. Right now there isn't an open carpeted area to lay a queen size quilt. Of course, my "stuff" has oozed in appropriate areas and nobody better touch it!!!

When I complain about my creeping hobbies, my DH tells me that it is just the two of us and we LIVE here so it is supposed to happen. Love him dearly. :) :) :)

It really can be a problem. Once it creeps in, it's hard to get it to creep back. lol.