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Weekend check-in
Feb. 3rd, 2024 04:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fred_mouseWhat unclutttering have you done recently?
Taken the bins out? Win!
Sorted things into 'keep this' and 'rehome that'? Win!
Actually got stuff out of the house? Win!
fred_mouse
Unclutter check-in
Jan. 30th, 2024 05:48 pmfred_mouseWhat have you achieved in uncluttering recently? Today, this week, this month? The tiniest bit counts!
note: I'm aiming to post check in posts once or twice a week for at least a couple of months. I am not going to aim for any specific day of the week but whenever I'm online and think of it. If other people make check in posts, I'll just skip a few days and then post -- the more people we have doing this the better!
Unclutter check-in
Jan. 26th, 2024 04:31 pmfred_mouseWhat have you achieved in uncluttering recently? Today, this week, this month? The tiniest bit counts!
preparing for the new year
Dec. 28th, 2023 04:50 pmwychwoodWe're coming up towards the traditional season of uncluttering!
I've been doing a little bit of reorganising spaces:
Anyone else using the downtime before New Year to get some decluttering done?
I've been doing a little bit of reorganising spaces:
- Replaced an under-bed storage box that was really hard to get out with a much easier one
- Sorted out the contents of that box and the two next to it and moved some things around
- Pulled out a bunch of travel or mostly-used toiletries from one of them to go ahead and just use up (most of them have been in there since well before I moved into this flat, which is... six years now)
- Put a small storage box on my bedside table for pills etc so I stop knocking everything on the floor while trying to find the correct packet first thing in the morning
Anyone else using the downtime before New Year to get some decluttering done?
Pantry clean out
Dec. 12th, 2023 09:36 pmfred_mouseThe season is warming up, my pantry was a disaster, with things higgledy piggledy and the shelf papers all stained and torn.
So, Saturday, we started at the top and worked down. This year, anything I put back last year with a 'surely I'll use that' but didn't, I binned with malice aforethought.
And now we have enough space to put our bulk food purchases in the top shelves, where I never have to reach (we buy breakfast cereal and soy milk by the carton, because four adults in the household means we go through Lots).
Refrigerator Cleansing
Nov. 12th, 2023 10:49 amthe_broken_towerOut with the old, and in with the new!
I emptied about half the refrigerator's contents in old food.
Old pickles, half-used dried up jams, 'surprise! you don't like these' artichoke hearts, umeboshi and THREE containers of miso from five years ago (they're probably technically still edible, too! D:), and what used to be a bag of brussels sprouts but declined into a bag of mold...
I cleared out similar items from the pantry, too. All those stale sheets of seaweed, old bonito flakes, kombu, and expired Ikea gravy packets - in the trash!
The idea now is to ditch something if it isn't used within a week, and only have one item of each type in there at a time. If a new food is a slump and no one likes it? In the trash, clean the jar, don't buy it again.
I'm debating now whether to restock on the more seldom-used pantry ingredients I got rid of... It would be nice to have more umeboshi and miso, if they actually get used.
- Aa (she/her)
I emptied about half the refrigerator's contents in old food.
Grossness
Old pickles, half-used dried up jams, 'surprise! you don't like these' artichoke hearts, umeboshi and THREE containers of miso from five years ago (they're probably technically still edible, too! D:), and what used to be a bag of brussels sprouts but declined into a bag of mold...
I cleared out similar items from the pantry, too. All those stale sheets of seaweed, old bonito flakes, kombu, and expired Ikea gravy packets - in the trash!
The idea now is to ditch something if it isn't used within a week, and only have one item of each type in there at a time. If a new food is a slump and no one likes it? In the trash, clean the jar, don't buy it again.
I'm debating now whether to restock on the more seldom-used pantry ingredients I got rid of... It would be nice to have more umeboshi and miso, if they actually get used.
- Aa (she/her)
tanaquiJennifer at Simply + Fiercely has written a great blog post with 5 "non-standard" approaches to decluttering. It's a really fun post with some interesting ideas. (She also discusses why "standard" approaches don't work for her.)
https://www.simplyfiercely.com/decluttering-methods/
https://www.simplyfiercely.com/decluttering-methods/
decluttering wrapping paper etc
Nov. 4th, 2023 01:45 pmwychwoodI hardly ever use wrapping paper any more, and had accidentally ended up with far too much (thought I had lots of regular paper but was out of Christmas, bought more Christmas, discovered that it was actually the other way around...). So I asked my friend who works at the local foodbank, and she says they have a "help yourself" table for things that they're not giving out but which people might still want, and I'm donating five rolls of Christmas paper to her for that. Probably also some gift bags, since I never use them.
I thought I'd mention it on here in case anyone else has too many gift supplies! Obviously they need to be as-new, good condition, etc. And foodbanks don't want lots of things sitting around, so it needs to be seasonally appropriate - this feels to me like a good time to be offering Christmas materials, but in January it'll just be clutter for them...
If you don't have any personal connections, in the UK The Trussell Trust have a website where you can find foodbanks local to you who might be willing to accept them.
I thought I'd mention it on here in case anyone else has too many gift supplies! Obviously they need to be as-new, good condition, etc. And foodbanks don't want lots of things sitting around, so it needs to be seasonally appropriate - this feels to me like a good time to be offering Christmas materials, but in January it'll just be clutter for them...
If you don't have any personal connections, in the UK The Trussell Trust have a website where you can find foodbanks local to you who might be willing to accept them.
weekend check-in
Nov. 4th, 2023 09:39 amrmc28Hi all, it's the weekend and it's time for me to declutter. One of my current challenges is that the two rooms I most want to work on (living room, study) are also the two rooms where other people in my household like to hang out, and decluttering can get in the way of what they're trying to do. So I am seizing the moment while no-one else is in the living room, putting on some women's ice hockey from earlier today to keep me company, and seeing how far I can get.
Share your challenges, successes, tactics and strategies in the comments!
Small but definite progress!
Oct. 27th, 2023 09:28 amvysilaI finally got motivated to pack up and mail something to my son that had been taking up space in my basement for several years. It was a giant Yeti cooler, a retirement gift from my employer. Since my son and his family love camping and I do not, it made sense to give it to them. But still, it took me two years to get around to it, LOL! But it is now gone and that feels good.
Also, I decided, since pretty much everything I purchase as gifts for loved ones is done online and sent directly to the recipient, I could let go of my gift wrapping supplies. Gift boxes, gift bags, papers, ribbons and bows - and my next door neighbor snapped it up as she is in charge of wrapping up the gifts for disadvantaged children this holiday season. What a good cause, I was so pleased.
And finally, I contacted the local Habitat for Humanity charity to see if they would take a couple of large curio cabinets for their ReStore, and they will! They are coming tomorrow to pick up the furniture, so that will be two very large items out of the house.
It's taken me a long time to get to this point, but having the motivation to sell my house and move to something much smaller (and closer to my family) is really helping.
Also, I decided, since pretty much everything I purchase as gifts for loved ones is done online and sent directly to the recipient, I could let go of my gift wrapping supplies. Gift boxes, gift bags, papers, ribbons and bows - and my next door neighbor snapped it up as she is in charge of wrapping up the gifts for disadvantaged children this holiday season. What a good cause, I was so pleased.
And finally, I contacted the local Habitat for Humanity charity to see if they would take a couple of large curio cabinets for their ReStore, and they will! They are coming tomorrow to pick up the furniture, so that will be two very large items out of the house.
It's taken me a long time to get to this point, but having the motivation to sell my house and move to something much smaller (and closer to my family) is really helping.
weekend check-in
Oct. 27th, 2023 09:34 amrmc28It's Friday, it's the weekend for me, and I've probably definitely got too many goals for it, but here's some themes and a check-in for everyone.
- ongoing decluttering - I actually filled our general waste bin last weekend, but it got emptied yesterday morning so I am free to declutter some more!
- getting things out of the house - I've built up several bags of donations now, so the trick is to get to the charity shop today before the usual weekend rush means they have to close to donations
- seasonal clothing - the seasons are definitely changing in this corner of England, and my clothing storage is ... not a full-on mess, but definitely showing entropy. So I'm going to do a little tidying and straightening and repacking, one area at a time (to keep from getting out of hand), and make it easier to find the warm layers now the mornings are colder.
weekend check-in
Oct. 20th, 2023 09:17 pmrmc28Welcome to a weekend check-in. I have some tedious paperwork to complete, and I said jokingly to my sibling on the phone "I will probably end up tidying half the house rather than do this paperwork". Only it turns out I need a specific document, and I have lost it ~somewhere~ in this house, and that's not actually a joke any more.
I'll ramble a little in the comments like I usually do, but please check in with your challenges and successes and surprises, and let's cheer each other on a bit.
weekend check-in
Oct. 6th, 2023 07:32 pmrmc28Hi all, it's been a while. Today's check in is brought to you by me finally finally doing a reorganisation of the living room furniture that I've had in mind for literal years. This was not strictly a decluttering exercise but I ended up doing some along the way. (Because I am a nerd who has done too many projects, there were many cries of "NO SCOPE CREEP" as I made myself stop sorting out a shelf that wasn't on the critical path.) And now I have things I should try to move out the house over the weekend.
I'll ramble in more detail in the comments, please join in with your own goals for the weekend, large or small!
(no subject)
Aug. 14th, 2023 09:28 pmtrudyI just wanted to post about my progress because I've made a lot the last few weeks.
I caught COVID for the first time and was out for a week. I don't know if it was something about COVID, but ever since then, I've been on an organizing spree.
I've given away a lot of stuff, including a sewing machine I hadn't touched in more than a few years at this point. Some of the craft stuff I gave away was acknowledging that though these were hobbies I enjoyed, I no longer had the motivation to continue with them. It hurt a little, giving up that part of my life, but I also felt really good about gifting these things to people who would actually use them.
Went through the pantry and tossed anything shelf-stable that was overly expired. Tossed some of my older spices. Gave away a ton of books and comic books. Have some books I'm going to bring to HPB this week to try and sell for money to buy ebook copies of some of the books I'm purging. It's not that I don't like them -- it's that I have so many books and prefer reading in ebook format anyway (except for things like cookbooks or artbooks). I gave away my big Billy bookshelves and have a much smaller bookshelf (which I need to build), but I'm worried I'm still going to have too many books. I'm trying not to stress over it for now!
I also have fun tasks like gathering my stickers and putting them into one of those sticker books where you can peel the stickers off for use later. I have so many stickers and they're all over the place, so I'm relieved to have a place to put them all now. On the topic of that, I ordered some card holders so all my cards are neatly organized instead of inside of cardboard boxes. They're coming in tomorrow, along with some cute pastel rainbow hampers I'm going to use for my excess of plush toys.
I overcame the executive dysfunction I had over getting the vacuum storage bags and made a lot of room packing away my extra couch cover and an oversized sleeping bag. It's so nice seeing them neatly stacked in the laundry closet. I also got those drawer organizers where you can fold up your underwear and socks into neat little sections and my god, those drawers look so much better.
To-Do for This Week
☆ Get prints into Itoya folios
☆ Build new bookshelf
☆ Put books on said new bookshelf
☆ Bring books I'm purging to HPB
☆ Bring things I'm donating to Value Village
☆ Put up more prints/posters/pin boards now that there's more wallspace because of the smaller bookshelf.
☆ Set up figures on new bookshelf.
What has everyone been doing to get organized? I know it's been awhile. What are your goals for this week?
I caught COVID for the first time and was out for a week. I don't know if it was something about COVID, but ever since then, I've been on an organizing spree.
I've given away a lot of stuff, including a sewing machine I hadn't touched in more than a few years at this point. Some of the craft stuff I gave away was acknowledging that though these were hobbies I enjoyed, I no longer had the motivation to continue with them. It hurt a little, giving up that part of my life, but I also felt really good about gifting these things to people who would actually use them.
Went through the pantry and tossed anything shelf-stable that was overly expired. Tossed some of my older spices. Gave away a ton of books and comic books. Have some books I'm going to bring to HPB this week to try and sell for money to buy ebook copies of some of the books I'm purging. It's not that I don't like them -- it's that I have so many books and prefer reading in ebook format anyway (except for things like cookbooks or artbooks). I gave away my big Billy bookshelves and have a much smaller bookshelf (which I need to build), but I'm worried I'm still going to have too many books. I'm trying not to stress over it for now!
I also have fun tasks like gathering my stickers and putting them into one of those sticker books where you can peel the stickers off for use later. I have so many stickers and they're all over the place, so I'm relieved to have a place to put them all now. On the topic of that, I ordered some card holders so all my cards are neatly organized instead of inside of cardboard boxes. They're coming in tomorrow, along with some cute pastel rainbow hampers I'm going to use for my excess of plush toys.
I overcame the executive dysfunction I had over getting the vacuum storage bags and made a lot of room packing away my extra couch cover and an oversized sleeping bag. It's so nice seeing them neatly stacked in the laundry closet. I also got those drawer organizers where you can fold up your underwear and socks into neat little sections and my god, those drawers look so much better.
To-Do for This Week
☆ Get prints into Itoya folios
☆ Build new bookshelf
☆ Put books on said new bookshelf
☆ Bring books I'm purging to HPB
☆ Bring things I'm donating to Value Village
☆ Put up more prints/posters/pin boards now that there's more wallspace because of the smaller bookshelf.
☆ Set up figures on new bookshelf.
What has everyone been doing to get organized? I know it's been awhile. What are your goals for this week?
Free online decluttering workshops
Jul. 10th, 2023 08:18 pmtanaquiJennifer at Simply + Fiercely is running a series of free zoom-based decluttering workshops later this month.
More details are available at https://workshop.simplyfiercely.com/prepschool/
Jennifer's really good at asking questions that help you dig into the reasons why you struggle with clutter and let you figure out how to change your behaviour towards "stuff", and I've always found her free content to have a lot of value. And although she calls herself a minimalist, she's definitely not a stark-white-walls-no-possessions kind of person or at all judgmental.
(And FWIW, she's not particularly pushy about selling her paid courses if you're on her mailing list. Even her more sales-oriented emails tend to come with a bit of insightful commentary or advice, and I love her blog articles.)
And if you can't make the live workshops but sign up, you'll get links for the recordings of the workshops.
More details are available at https://workshop.simplyfiercely.com/prepschool/
Jennifer's really good at asking questions that help you dig into the reasons why you struggle with clutter and let you figure out how to change your behaviour towards "stuff", and I've always found her free content to have a lot of value. And although she calls herself a minimalist, she's definitely not a stark-white-walls-no-possessions kind of person or at all judgmental.
(And FWIW, she's not particularly pushy about selling her paid courses if you're on her mailing list. Even her more sales-oriented emails tend to come with a bit of insightful commentary or advice, and I love her blog articles.)
And if you can't make the live workshops but sign up, you'll get links for the recordings of the workshops.
weekend check-in
May. 28th, 2023 01:10 pmrmc28Hi all and welcome to the weekend check-in. Last week I set myself an ambitious to-do list and er, managed three of them. But that's three more than none!
This week, in a flashback to January, I have tested positive from covid, am isolating from my family in my room, don't have any symptoms, and am considering applying the Dana K. White 5-step decluttering to the places I didn't get to in January. (For one room that I didn't think was that messy, I didn't get around all of it in January, and I pulled out a LOT of rubbish / recycling from the places I did tackle.)
One thing I have managed to keep up since January is keeping the places I decluttered free of new accumulating rubbish. I do a little pick up in here most days, usually when I get an hourly movement reminder from my fitbit. But there are plenty of shelves and stacks to go through still.
Share your challenges and successes in the comments!
weekend check-in
May. 21st, 2023 09:11 amrmc28Hello hello, how are we doing?
Last weekend I did the first-pass of the last remaining boxes of my mother's things, allowing me to return six empty storage boxes to my stepfather on the Monday. Lots of the contents went straight to the bin/paper recycling, but now I have to deal with what's left. And I'm still trying to get things to leave the house. This weekend is more challenging for getting anything done: spouse is away for a week at a conference, so I'm doing all the childcare and housework on top of my job, plus I have an aunt visiting town for a course. So I'm going to scrabble together a to-do list here and hope to get through it.
- Bag of books to the Little Free Library (can hopefully do this on my way to meet aunt this morning)
- Bag of things to the charity shop (this afternoon when I get back from town, unless they're already full by then)
- Parcel up the baby things to my sister-out-law for her niece, and send (this afternoon when I get back, because then I can get it collected hopefully tomorrow)
- Parcel up the box of papers for my youngest brother, and send (as above)
- Photograph the things for probable-giveaway, and circulate to brothers to see if they want anything before listing it (today, and ask them to tell me by next weekend at latest)
- If the box of things to giveaway at the end of the road has still not gone at the end of today, give up and put in the bin tonight (it's had 3 days, in very good weather, with a lot of passing foot traffic, if it's not gone now it won't)
Stretch goal: we've had a Christmas tree up for nearly 18 months, it was kind of a joke all last year that I was too busy to take it down but the joke isn't funny any more. I'm actually embarrassed about it. Maybe if I'm on a productive roll this afternoon I'll finally take it down. (And I will not be the one putting it back up in December this year - if the others in the house want it, they can do it.)
weekend check-in
May. 13th, 2023 11:22 amrmc28Hello! Today is another weekend where I'm trying to work on decluttering. My theme this weekend is "getting things to leave the house", and I seem to have discovered a side-theme of "timewarp".
First: five bags of my mother's things that I sorted out for giveaway last August and left in the garage awaiting carriage to the nearby charity shop. This morning I finally labelled them, realised I couldn't carry all the bags on foot at once, and loaded them into the cargo bike instead. I got in before the rush at the charity shop, so they are all GONE. That's a huge relief.
( further adventures in things that have been waiting to leave for a long time )
How are you all getting on? Share your success, failures, aims in the comments.
weekend check-in
May. 7th, 2023 11:10 amrmc28Hello all, I fell off the uncluttering wagon in, er, January. But I have a surprise! free! Sunday today so I thought I'd try to get back on it, and check in with the community while I'm at it.
My theme for today is "getting stuff to actually leave". So far I have
( done more than I thought actually )
Nothing has actually left the house yet, but a bunch of things are a lot closer to doing so. Progress! Now I'm taking a break, further adventures will be added in the comments.
How are you all doing this weekend?
weekend check-in
Apr. 2nd, 2023 06:03 pmwychwoodI did another charity shop trip with my friend yesterday! A bag of assorted clothing and bits, and several bin sacks of books - the rest of the non-fic (I had so many books about sailing that I never read!) and the first few shelves of fiction. I'd finished re-reading a couple of books to see whether I wanted to keep them, and subsequently cleared out my whole remaining collections by those authors, too.
I'm feeling a bit ruthless right now, but if I ever have a really desperate need to re-read Alistair MacLean I feel sure there will be a secondhand paperback out there somewhere. And given how much of a slog I found what used to be my favourite, we're probably good...
How's everyone else getting on? Done anything much?
I'm feeling a bit ruthless right now, but if I ever have a really desperate need to re-read Alistair MacLean I feel sure there will be a secondhand paperback out there somewhere. And given how much of a slog I found what used to be my favourite, we're probably good...
How's everyone else getting on? Done anything much?
