Feb 24, 2013

Lots of Movies

I don't know why, but we have hundreds of movies at our house! It didn't seem like an obsession. I was in high school when the first VCRs came out. We were fascinated with the idea that we could choose a movie we really liked, plunk down $3 for the movie and $5 to rent the VCR and then take the whole thing home and plug it into our TVs. It was amazing!

It was pretty expensive for everyday use, remember it was the early 80s, but for a party or even a date it wasn't too bad. We didn't have a VCR of our own until we lived in Logan in 1987 and then they were still very expensive. I'm sure my sweetie would disagree, but I'm thinking we paid three or four hundred dollars for our first one.

One of the first movies we owned was a copy of my graduation from the University of Utah. My sister made it for me and we didn't even have a VCR at the time to watch it. If I were really talented I'd figure out how to share a little footage with you. Maybe Bossy can do that.

Anyway, that was 25 years ago and now we have so many movies we don't know what to do with them all! And we have donated boxes full in the past. I just don't know what to do with all of these old VHS movies. The kids don't want to part with the Disney Princess movies because even though we have replaced many of them with DVDs, quite honestly a DVD doesn't have a very long shelf-life at my house. Half a dozen times in the DVD player and they are scratched beyond use.

Then there is the cupboard full of movies that we have only watched once. I don't know why we keep them. My sweetie says we paid too much for them to just get rid of them so they fill the cupboard and spill out onto the shelves. We just boxed up two large Tupperware boxes full of VHS movies to put in the storage room until we can bear to part with them.

 How do you deal with this problem?

5 comments:

Susan said...

I donated mine to my local library. I got a nice tax write off and if I want to watch them again I know where they are. Be sure to get a letter from the library for your donation to put with your tax papers.

Unknown said...

I like the library donation idea. I'd never though of that! Anyway, we don't have any VHS tapes... that I know about. We do have plenty of DVDs though and storage is a problem.

LOVE MELISSA:) said...

We have so many movies too! I should donate some as well! Storage is always a problem!

Natalie Ockey said...

I believe that this is the biggest rip-off one can fall prey to. My wife and I don't buy movies unless we plan to watch them at least 10 times. This counts a few Disney movies for the kids and the occasional "must have."

The best thing to do is not buy movies!

~R

mommeeof10 said...

We threw many of our vhs tapes away. We are trying to get rid of clutter, so they can nuke the house to get rid of the roaches that came home from work? They got into the tapes them selves...

I borrow many dvds from the library, and occasionally buy them used from press start games at $20 for 8 movies. I know they will get messed up and hate to pay for new ones. Rosalie, almost 4, loves the Muppet movies, The original one and The Muppets take Manhattan. We bought those new and may replace them if they get scratched.