Not quite a horder - decluttering
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Decluttering continues: I tackled more of my office today - cleaned out four drawers and a 48" wide cupboard that had random junk in it. At some point I will tackle my file cabinet.
I'm also decluttering the kids' playroom by attrition. Thinned out DS's piano books (he's on his third set of books, why am I holding on to the old ones??). Little by little I will rid our house of random plastic crap and broken/missing/unused toys...
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Good job Sunshine. I like the idea of getting rid of " random plastic crap!!" I'm finishing up paper tossing in my office this week. Next weeks *tentative* plan is to start the basement. I've been saying that for a long time. Hah!
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Sunshine - don't feel bad. I got rid of my piano maybe 12 years ago. My son is grown & hadn't taken piano lessons since - hmmm - 1979 maybe? But when I got to cleaning out stuff, I still had all of his piano books from 5 or 6 years or lessons. Good work.
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Reader425, sending you good thoughts and motivation as you think about tackling the basement - I've spent the last 3 days doing ours! And it looks P H E N O M E N A L now. We've spent 2.5 years saying we would clean the basement, and I finally decided I had had enough.
There's still quite a bit of going through boxes that is needed, but all the boxes are on shelves against the walls, and I've set up a sitting area with our deck furniture. There's tons of open floor space now - hooray!0 -
I saw this and immediately thought of this bunch. Look…for those who can't get rid of their pianos a way to repurpose it!
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alt="" style="width: 200px; height: 251.479px;">A way to repurpose your unwanted piano.
***Sorry for some reason the picture won't show up.
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Cowgal - I don't see an image or a link. Maybe it's my system.
AH - we were posting at the same time. Happy THursday.
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No, it's either something I am doing wrong or the site. I will have to try again later.
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Cowgal---this? https://www.pinterest.com/marquezski/piano-planters/
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I found a link on the internet that has the same picture of what I was trying to post for a use for unwanted pianos:
https://www.houzz.com/discussions/5636097/musical-...
Hopefully, the link will work.
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Wow - that's amazing. Never would have thought of something like that, but you'd have to have a pretty big house.
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Yes, I have seen that. It would look best with a really large stove.
But the weight, plus the venting system inside. The piano would have to be almost totally gutted.
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From earthquake country it looks really scary. I don't want anything that heavy above my head.
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Yeah, the piano for a stove hood...not really my thing. I wonder if it was a photo shopped picture that someone put on the internet.
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Sunshinelegal I continue to think about the basement. Encourages me you got past thinking about it to doing it. My office is really done-done which is good. I'm also making a longer list of shorter or easier things to do to increase my motivation.
That piano picture is...........scary. 🙂
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Reader, I think you're on to something. What really worked for me was letting it be okay to just tackle one box or corner. It felt overwhelming to think about the *whole* basement, but I found that once I finished organizing the Christmas decorations boxes, I had energy to do the next couple of boxes, and the next, and the next, and so on. Great job with your office!
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I've been decluttering a few items at a time! (but I've been off schedule since my diagnosis a few months ago) I'd go into whichever room was the target, currently the basement, and only deal with 1-3 items per day. Either they go in the trash, the donate pile, or they get put away where they belong elsewhere in the house. Sometimes it feels ridiculous to do it so slowly, but over time it really adds up a LOT of work, especially if I'm consistently doing it every day. There were days where literally all I did was sort a few random screws into jars. But it wasn't long before the entire box of intimidating tool-related junk was gone. I need to get back on the decluttering horse!
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Parakeets - you are exactly right, One closet shelf, one box, one pile of papers, one jar of random screws... and as you said - before long something is sorted & at least that small accumulation of clutter is gone. Well said. While you are back in the throes of actively dealing with BC - maybe you only pick up a book in one room & put it on the shelf in another. Maybe you only fold & put away the clean clothes, or toss out the old leftover food on garbage day or set out a pile of magazines for recycling... Bravo!!
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I agree. Marie Kondo the decluttering expert says for example with clothes to take all of your clothes and throw them in the middle of the floor to start decluttering. It would take me forever to go through them that way and I would be too overwhelmed. I also do not feel well enough to do it in a large chunk like that. Slow and steady definitely works best for me.
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I've never done it, but I think the idea of turning your hangers the wrong way and see which pieces you actually use is a good idea. Right now I have few enough things in my closet that I can see that pretty easily, anyway. Most of the things I keep are still here for a reason. But I'll admit there is a handful that I have because I feel like I *should* wear them.
But really, right now I don't go anywhere! I could honestly get by with about 4 shirts, 3 sweaters, a pair of jeans, and 2 or 3 pairs of knit loungey pants. For warmer weather, add in a couple pairs of shorts and a couple more shirts.
But I do hope that SOMEDAY there will be places to go, things to do, and people to see, and I'll want to have more clothes available then!!
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I loved her books and got a lot of useful tips and strategies from them! But I also never wanted to follow the whole process the exact way she does it. I did do my papers and books her way though. The books was only because I wanted to rearrange my shelves, so they all had to come off. And while I was at it I collected every book from the entire house, and built a giant book mountain in the corner of my living room. But it stayed there for months before I was finally able to go through them all. 😆
(and full disclosure, most of the rejected books never actually left the house, they just got moved to a guest bedroom, tee hee)
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Yesterday I created an 8'x12' workout area in our basement, and I finally set up my new rowing machine (that's been sitting in its box for 9 months). I also decluttered all the kids' books in the house, and have about 150 books leaving the house, headed to a donation box.
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Wow, sunshinegal, good job!
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That is quite impressive sunshinegal!
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Good work Sunshine!! Happy rowing.
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I am listening to an audiobook about "unstuffing" your life. One of the things it talks about is that we hold on to things because it belonged to someone we loved. It says that we need to realize that "memories" and "stuff" are two different things.
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Cowgal - that is sooooo true!!!
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I tackled our paper clutter today - which was in the form of a nearly-full 4-drawer lateral file cabinet. I was surprised at how quickly I was able to move through it - Oh, I don't need the renter's insurance documents from 2002! - and within about 2 hours I had gotten through everything, and got it down to 1.5 drawers of things we need to keep. Woo hoo!
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Wow, sunshinegal, that's fantastic! Good work! PLUS, now you know what's there, because you've actually looked at it all.
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That's great sunshinegal. We are working on reorganizing and reassembling the basement since they finally finished the floor installation a few weeks back and the painting as well. It rained yesterday and I blame it on my DH who finally had an ephiphany that the "has too much stuff". He has been sorting and culling because I declared everything had to have a home and if it didn't then it had to leave. I think he was overwhelmed by the amount of "stuff" he has because it was formerly on shelves, not touched for ages and why do we need a dozen of something if we have not used one in the past ten years? So Habitat will benefit from items we had stored in the crawl space, the local teachers organization will benefit from office supplies that they can use for their students and Purple Heart will get some items, too. While reassembling is going slower than anticipated, if it means the outcome is only keeping what we actually need, I will be pleased. The large storage closet actually has some empty shelves (DH permitted to have only 2 since he has other storage options) and once I do get some free time, I will sort through the genealogy bins I have and toss any records that are not my direct lineage. So far I am pleased with the progress we have made but once this is done, the restoration company will then complete the living room, stairwell and foyer. So my work is far from done.
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