March's Dynamic Declutter

Share your decluttering activities and ideas.
User avatar
Harriet
Moderator
Posts: 16506
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:48 am
Location: The Carolinas

March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby Harriet » Mon Mar 01, 2010 12:04 am

You'd be surprised at how much you can accomplish in fifteen minutes of focused work, and that does tend to accumulate quickly as the days and weeks pass.

Plus, you get the enormous added benefit of staying close to your work, so that your comfort with it grows, it begins to appear less demanding and menacing, and your mind continues to chew on the problems even as you are occupied with other things.

Large, ambitious projects can induce procrastination and guilt. By committing to a small amount of work each day, with absolutely no pressure to do more than the minimum, steady progress can be made. - Andrew Utter in BizNik, Dec 2009


Don't you love the highlighted part of that quote! It has often seemed to me that "keeping my hand in" the declutter work of a particular area, with regular declutter appointments, keeps me from dreading it because I am "making it my own". Looked at from afar, clutter DOES seem demanding and menacing (eeek!). But from daily, no-pressure time spent right in the midst of it, the path out seems clear.

What steady declutter progress are you making - what progress do you hope to make in March? We have 31 days ahead of us to make change and improve the calmness of our lives!

sherinjoy
Member
Posts: 1117
Joined: Thu Jul 10, 2008 12:46 am
Location: Sonoma County, Northern California

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby sherinjoy » Mon Mar 01, 2010 2:04 pm

Hi Harriet - thanks for starting this thread, and I love the quote too!

I decided to start posting my daily decluttering again in a Word document. I missed the motivation it created by typing something on the list everyday. But to not get overwhelmed, I titled it 31 Days of decluttering, I can do it for a month and see if that kickstarts me. I may post in here too, if that helps me stay committed.

My first task today is to finish packing my Christmas/New year's card paraphnelia into the bin and store it back in the garage for next year. It's been sitting in the TV room - out of sight, out of mind - and I keep meaning to "get a round to it".

User avatar
Harriet
Moderator
Posts: 16506
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:48 am
Location: The Carolinas

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby Harriet » Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:36 pm

Hi, sherinjoy - speaking of C Cards I realized I packed away a sweet note from a church member with them, thanking dd11 for her solo. I want to get that out and file correctly, so dd will have the memory.

Great that you are recording every day in Word and keeping track for yourself. You do well with routine. Yes, post here on any schedule that fits and helps you.

Right now I am going through a box at my parents' that amounts to being a giant stash-and-dash box I had to make when my ddad wanted to sleep in the spare bedroom a while last year, thinking that bed might be better for him. The box was available, it fit under the bed, so I tossed papers into it fast!!! :roll: I'm sorting now into early-this-decade stacks of ddad's med; dmom's med; and financial. Also there is estate of my dgm. My dgm's estate papers fit into a shirt box gift box I had available. It's easy to store, so I think I will just tape that up, label well, and consider that part done. Estate papers for a previous-previous generation definitely fit into the category of save, I think, if only for family history value in the future. There are antiquated farm income records, etc., that my grandchildren will appreciate someday.

User avatar
Nancy
Member
Posts: 23444
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:52 pm
Location: Washington state in the Pacific Northwestern part of the USA.
Contact:

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby Nancy » Mon Mar 08, 2010 5:57 pm

Cheering you gal's on!
Did you see american pickers?
I like it better than hoarders.
Forgot to load and deliver the books I had set aside to donate. oops!

User avatar
bittersweet
Member
Posts: 1432
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 8:59 pm
Location: Central Alberta
Contact:

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby bittersweet » Sun Mar 21, 2010 11:09 pm

Wow! This sure is a quiet thread this month! Today, I dropped off two diaper boxes of DGS's toys that he's outgrown. Yesterday, I tossed out several boxes from the basement. I have this awful habit of holding onto small, sturdy boxes (from shoes, Christmas oranges, etc) "in case" of something or other. After heaven knows how many years of holding onto these silly empty boxes, I realized that if I actually NEED a small, sturdy box, I can go get one from almost any store. I do NOT need to store a dozen or more of them in my house!!

Assuming I can find a 15 minute spot or two in tomorrow's schedule, I'm going to go down and find some more stuff that needs to be tossed/donated/stored more efficiently. At the moment, the basement is in very sad shape...it looks almost like something you'd see in Hoarders - stacks of boxes here, there, and everywhere..no one knows what's in them, papers, milk crates full of who knows what, books, stuff stacked all over the dresser *sigh*. It's definitely NOT going to be done in the next week or two!
"Write it on your heart that every day is the best day of the year." Ralph Waldo Emerson

User avatar
Nancy
Member
Posts: 23444
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:52 pm
Location: Washington state in the Pacific Northwestern part of the USA.
Contact:

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby Nancy » Mon Mar 22, 2010 11:11 am

I've been in recovery mode, gardening,
and that's kept me busy this mo.
the declutter action I'm counting all the leaves we hauled off!

User avatar
Harriet
Moderator
Posts: 16506
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:48 am
Location: The Carolinas

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby Harriet » Mon Mar 22, 2010 12:37 pm

Nancy, taking care of those leaves - that's sticking with the sensible plan of "visible clutter first"! Yes, HRH likes "Pickers". I am disappointed that the Hoarders season is over, but have found a couple Clean House episodes that were a little bit about cleaning, at least. I'm convinced the world is ready for a real cleaning rather than decorating show again, but tv producers don't seem to agree with me.

bittersweet, I hope you get some real satisfaction out of plugging away at the basement. You're right that I got quiet about declutter. I've had to turn so much more attention to my parents' health this month and haven't had my usual time for clutter there. Here, it's had to be just maintenance level.

I did get the top of the big hall closet decluttered and cleaned, and cleaned its 2 louvered doors, which swing out from the center to open. The only thing marked "save" from the declutter of that big shelf (1.5' x 5' maybe) is my mother's small collection of vintage dolls, which I believe I can fit into a small storage box that will protect from dust, etc.

The newly decluttered space is very tall - about 30 inches to the ceiling. So I'm thinking I can best use it for my ddad's trophies. Because the doors open toward a right angle foyer as well as the hallway they front on, the trophies would be at least partially view-able for interested visitors by opening the doors. They won't all fit there, but maybe I can place the favorites around the house sparingly. It's better than having them all in those big cardboard boxes in the dining room. (What the professional cleaners did after the furnace problem several years back.) Those things have GOT to go.

User avatar
Harmony
Member
Posts: 11417
Joined: Mon Jul 14, 2008 3:56 pm
Location: Florida

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby Harmony » Mon Mar 22, 2010 1:47 pm

Well I am frustrated beyong belief. Keeping up with dailies and weeklies is all I can manage now. Focus stuff is not getting done. My porches are awful, furniture included.

And I've been needing to declutter and straighten up my master bedroom closet since January. I put that off till I had tax stuff done, then there was the family wedding...and then I fell.

I have boxes all over the place. Clothes need to be tried on and decisions made. Stuff is no longer even all hung up. I got a couple new pairs of shoes for Christmas and I bought new shoe boxes for those and others that didn't have homes and those remain undone.

I'm not used to living like this. I keep that closet fairly neat. I wish I could do this. Even my stack of boxes that house my gift wrapping supplies are in disarray because it is too difficult to reach them up with this arm.

I don't feel like it is the sort of job I can do 5 minutes at a time either. AK!

User avatar
Nancy
Member
Posts: 23444
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:52 pm
Location: Washington state in the Pacific Northwestern part of the USA.
Contact:

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby Nancy » Mon Mar 22, 2010 5:27 pm

On Larry King the other day I caught some of a show with Peter Walsh on with some of the clips from hoarders on and a guest or two from that show plus a psychologist he was interviewing.

I found a home for my low carb cook books a gal's dad moved into one of their guest cabins and is a diabetic that dd knows and was excited to get those for her.

User avatar
bittersweet
Member
Posts: 1432
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 8:59 pm
Location: Central Alberta
Contact:

Re: March's Dynamic Declutter

Postby bittersweet » Sat Mar 27, 2010 3:11 am

Three boxes and a small bag went to Goodwill today. Yes, I'm supposed to be taking it easy, but it's so satisfying for me to get unwanted clutter out of my house, that I don't see it as bothering my blood pressure any to be puttering downstairs :lol: The moving out of a huge box full of smaller boxes, plus a box of trash didn't hurt things any, either.

There's at least one more box going to Goodwill tomorrow, and several more of those "I'll use them someday for......" smaller boxes to be tossed tomorrow. Along with a trip to the bottle depot (FOUR big garbage bags full of bottles and cans), freecycling one of DGS's strollers, and the putting away of some stuff that DD dragged out while going through her stuff down there..well..it should start making a difference.

I've also started organizing some of the big boxes (stacked willy-nilly on the futon) of craft stuff into smaller pretty storage boxes that can be labelled and neatly stacked on the shelves, so I might actually be able to FIND things!
"Write it on your heart that every day is the best day of the year." Ralph Waldo Emerson


Return to “The Decluttered Home”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 23 guests