How's your uncluttering going?

[tanaqui]

I realised it's been a while since we had a general "check in" post where we can pat ourselves on the back about our successes, talk about the challenges and struggles we're wrestling with, and motivate ourselves by sharing our plans.

And, of course, cheer on others and provide suggestions for those who ask for help.

So here's that post!

(I'm planning to make more posts like this, but I'm absolutely not committing to doing that on any kind of regular schedule — and would be more than happy for other people to put up "check in" posts when they feel the urge!)

Comments

[tanaqui]

Successes: I have got the "paper" down to only the stuff that I need to hold on to for now. That includes a lot of work/tax/financial related paperwork that I'll be able to cull each year. As I've pretty much retired, I won't really be adding new stuff, especially as most of my personal finances are paper-free these days.

I've dealt with a backlog of recycling, including recycling a bunch of packaging, that built up when the local council removed the really convenient recycling banks while building work was happening. (It's now 5 months since they said they'd do a health and safety inspection to see if they can put them back....)

And I've made some good progress on "uncluttering" the garden, despite extremely unhelpful weather.

Challenges: Taking some stuff in the garage to the tip/dump. That's not happened thanks to a combination of scheduling, weather and oomph. (But is now annoying me enough I may get the oomph to schedule it and do it....)

My pile of to-be-read magazines has grown. I enjoy reading them ‐ but reading a little each day fell out of my daily schedule, so I need to put that back in.

Plans: more work on the garden, the magazines.

[brigid]

There used to be an app that you could subscribe to and you got ALL the magazines and I'd read them on the kindle and it was GREAT. It no longer exists and I mourn it. I got a subscription to one of the magazines I used to read regularly and it just sat around unopened because it was less convenient.

[trudy]

Stealing tanaqui's formatting!

Success: I started putting my CDs in a CD case and tossing the cases themselves to make more room. I know it's small, but it's something I've been putting off forever.

Challenges: I really need to figure out how to organize my art supplies. Once I have a way of organizing them, it'll make it easier to purge what I'm not going to use.

Goals: Start going through books to donate. I've been slowly buying a lot of my favorite books digitally to clear up some space, so it's time to start getting rid of the things I don't need anymore and keep the stuff that can't be found digitally or was signed. My hope is to gift my big Billy bookshelves and get something smaller so I can put up more art on the walls.

Go through my dog's toys and decide which need to be retired; launder the rest.

Finish CD project.

I have off this week, so hoping I can make progress on all of them.

[brigid]

Selling/donating/discarding books has made such a positive difference in my life and my storage space. I still have an entire book case of books and my kid's book case is overflowing. But it's only ONE book case in the living room and I have room for board games and photobooks and binders of CDs/DVDs, and we can hang things on the walls. I'm very glad that so many books are being sold without DRM and I can easily store them on an external hard drive as well as have access to them only phone/tablet/computer.

[trudy]

I didn't realize how much space it took up until I really took a look at it. It was always my dream to have a big library, but that was part of a fantasy where I wasn't living in a 1300 square foot condo, haha.

[tanaqui]

That's a good set of goals. :-) I hope you're able to make some satisfactory progress this week.

Re: the art supplies — you might want to consider starting by doing a quick purge of the "easy stuff" i.e. anything that's unusable because it's used up/out of date/dried out/just not in good enough condition to use. (This is following the advice of one of my favourite decluttering bloggers, Dana at https://www.aslobcomesclean.com, who points out that spaces/stuff start organising themselves if you just take away things that shouldn't be there.) It may also help you get an overall sense of what you have before you put a lot of effort into organising things that you then decide not to keep.

[trudy]

Good advice! I'm going to see what I can do this week. Would really like to get at least some of it purged/donated at the very least.

[brigid]

Success: I have a plan to tackle a specific area of the house and have been talking to my husband about the best way to do it. It involves storing things in a room that we actively use so coordinating and planning is vital. "But that's not decluttering!" Eh, it's part of An Issue with our kitchen's structural integrity.

Challenges: I came home after errands today and fell asleep for four hours, which isn't conducive to Getting Stuff Done.

Goals: Get the dining room cleared out and the kitchen functional so I can make and serve Thanksgiving Dinner. Four adults and one teenager. All of our pots, our pans, our bake/cookware, and much of our canned & drygoods are in the dining room.

If worst comes to worst we can move the table into the living room, I suppose.

[trudy]

Organizing the kitchen is so difficult for me. Hope you're able to get your kitchen in order soon.

[tanaqui]

Oof, sorry to hear you're having issues with the kitchen that are making life more difficult than it should be. Sending good thoughts your way that you'll be able to get the dining room and kitchen ready for a great Thanksgiving — and that there'll be fewer accidental four-hour naps in your future!