January's Dynamic Declutter, 2014

[Harriet]

Happy 2014! Happy blank and forgiving calendar, a clean slate!

Clarity, optimism, organization – these are the possibilities that meet us at the beginning of the new year!

Nancy mentioned dynamic decluttering yesterday - it was the title for all our 2010 declutter threads and a great way of thinking about clutter.

Are we ready to be Dynamic? To look at our homes and believe we will have a really important effect? Decluttering is not just “keeping up”. Decluttering is a DYNAMIC process that makes a real difference.

In this thread, we encourage each other to strive for at least 15 minutes a day toward making our homes clear and calm. But whatever your particular ideas or schedules for decluttering are (marathon sessions, counting square feet freed up, certain days for declutter, counting pounds or bags tossed), we are delighted to hear about the plans – let us know!

The benefits are less stress, a calmer life, fewer time-drains, a happier environment, space again for our own dreams, and the rewards of seeing the effect of our lovely home (actually available for living) on those we love.

It’s worth it! Welcome, and please join us!

What successes do you have to report for 2013? They will inspire more than you think.

What goals will you set for 2014? You will find encouragement and partners here.

How are you RECORDING your progress? How are you SCHEDULING? Your idea may help someone else.

Never feel alone, even with a tough clutter problem – we here can relate! Many among us have needed a search party to come find us in our clutter! Clutter is picking a fight with ALL of us. We are with you.

[Harriet]

Some of us schedule decluttering with Focus cleaning, by decluttering for a week in the area we will clean the next week. That way surfaces are recently cleared, and a deep cleaning easier.

What's the Focus cleaning plan? It was designed by our own Indiana before we came to this board, and carried on here, in our Organization and Simplification Tools Forum. The Focus plan divides a household into 9 rooms or areas for cleaning and gives one thread to each area. Each thread rotates, coming up in the Focus forum 3 times a year, and then just before Thanksgiving, Focus goes over to maintenance threads during the holidays. Focus cleaning is adaptable, of course, so even those following it drift in and out of different rooms as needed.

For anyone who would like some "company" decluttering "where" others are that week, here are the rooms where you will find some company this coming month:

Week of.........you'll find some of us

12/30/2014 Decluttering Porch and Entry while we chat in the Focus thread about Getting Ready for Focus 2014
1/6/2014 Decluttering the bedrooms as we Focus Clean Porch and Entry
1/13/2014 Decluttering the bathrooms as we Focus Clean the bedrooms
1/20/2014 Decluttering the office/other room as we Focus Clean closets
1/27/2014 Decluttering closets as we Focus Clean the laundry area

[Ivy]

I sorted and recycled junk mail today and dumped the trash from waste baskets from other rooms. I sorted a stack of computer print-out crochet patterns, put them into files they belonged in specific to what they were and filed them.

The porch and entry didn't get Christmas decorations up in them/on them this year, we don't lay anything out of the ordinary on the entry way bench, so it's pretty much decluttered already. DH decluttered and cleaned the entry china cabinet right before Thanksgiving, too. All I need to do is have DH vacuum it, me dust it, and perhaps redecorate a few items or move them around so they'll look new.

Also, I was going to declutter and tidy up our walk-in closet tonight or tomorrow, but since I see it listed on focus for 1/20/2014, I'll do it once again then, too.

Also, I need to declutter my office, tidy it up, dust it, dust mop it, etc... I need it for "calm" as I write. I notice it being done the same week as Focus Clean closets, so I'll re-do it again, that week, too. Our bedroom needs decluttering, but it's not bad and I decluttered the top of the tall dresser today, too, and put some things away. It's nice to know I'm on the right track, but my dates are a bit different than the scheduled ones. I do a lot of things, when they need to be done, so when the Focus Clean comes around, I'll just do them again, so I can slowly get into the "groove" of this, because it's all so NEW to me!

Does declutter mean organizing what you already have because you need/want it? OR does it mean to get it OUT of the house completely?

[Nancy]

I decluttered the top of the fridge and some of the stuff on the work space on the counter in the laundry room. That felt fantastic.

[Harmony]

Ivy, I've asked that same question about what decuttering means. We had differing opinions. I tend to think it's organizing and tossing. I think clutter is not always useless junk that needs thrown away. I have a perpetual clutter problem in my kitchen, it's always papers that sift their way out from the office and remain in piles. I couldn't throw all that away because most of them are useful. Some I throw away, some I organize into the spots they need to be in, files, drawers, wall pocket, etc. But some of us here think decluttering means throwing stuff away. However we deal with our "stuff", if it leaves us with more organized spaces, I think that's the right answer!

[Harriet]

Decluttering, to me, is stopping clutter. It doesn't have to disappear to be stopped - it can take a useful form and it's not clutter any more. You can keep clutter from being clutter by disappearing it (tossing, donating, giving away) or by organizing it correctly. If one person looks at clutter and tosses every bit instantly and starts over, that's decluttering and saves time. But if another person looks at the same clutter and takes time storing some of the items until repair, re-purposing usefully, organizing into groups until the value of the group is greater than the parts, maybe finding something of value that wasn't even known to be underneath, like a bit of money, an important paper, etc., that's decluttering, too, and saves value. Both are worthwhile.

Ivy, when an area is bothering you, sometimes it just can't wait until its week, can it? My refrigerator is literally messy (with mess, not clutter) and can't wait until the Focus clean for Kitchen, so I'll work on it soon. My dd33 pointed out to me that my desk surface can't wait much longer, either, to be freed from some clutter, so I'll work on that some before my declutter schedule calls for it. But the schedule really does help me keep up a rotation and generally "know where I've been" through the year.

[Nancy]

For me clutter can be unhung coats, or laundry needed to be put away or taken to the basement.

I have delivered donations yea for that progress.

[Ivy]

I decluttered a Big Bag Zip Loc, which a mouse had chewed a hole in, put buttons and bird seed in the bottom of it, with my yarn, to start hibernating or raising a family! I sorted a purged junk mail and/or envelopes no longer needed.

[Nancy]

I am working my way around the creativity room.
I have loaded mags. In the car trunk with a basket or two and various other items and tossed some as well.

[Ivy]

I dumped all the trash from all room waste baskets because tomorrow is garbage pick-up day.

As far as clutter goes: Well, I had tons of totes and plastic bags full of yarns, I had smaller bins, too. DH bought me three matching grey bottom 27-gallon bins with industrial-looking yellow-gold tops. I filled up the 3 bins, got rid of all the plastic bags, hung empty totes around hangers in the bunny room closet, did some lifting of bins I shouldn't have, so back's sore, then pushed all 3 stacked bins into a better position, so there is less of a "clutter-look" in the bunny room now! I have a bin of yarn, a bag, too, which I'm working into a granny stripe afghan. When that yarn's all used up, I'll go back to the bunny room for more. It's amazing what 3 matching 27-gallon bins can do for a room. Yes, by somebody else' standards, this may be clutter, but to ME, it's all tidy and under control, to compare the before and after looks. When I empty out the yarns from the walk-in closet, I'll start on the top bunny room bin, working my way down, as I use up my stash. After the stash is used up, I'll put 1 bin inside another empty bin, laying the lids inside the top empty bin-- OR go to a good yarn sale and start anew- however, with much less yarn. Also, I can store completed afghans in the bins, too.