Ah, the old dining room table!!! (the dining room in general, IMO, one of the most wasted areas of the house!)
Seems to be the place that’s easy to drop stuff. The stuff that’s on there? Not necessarily stuff that I or someone else doesn’t know where to put - more like, “I am dumping this here cause I don’t WANT to put it away right now!”
The solution for me is to either take the minute or two to put it away - and therefore out of mind. Or to pick once a week to without exception , to get the table totally cleared off!
For papers I create a new binder every year and put dividers in it. Every month I will sort out the paperwork I have and put it in the binder. I have a separate one for my child to keep things like tuition bills, doctors paperwork, and other misc stuff. The binder is a big help during tax time because I file all my important papers in there. I have a separate binder in which I keep all the car stuff. (repair receipts) That tends to stay in the trunk of the car.
I am brutal about incoming mail. I recycle on the spot, pull actual bills out of the envelopes and toss the filler. Most catalogs go straight to recycling. Bills go on a shelf in the kitchen til I take them downstairs to pay.
I set up a tax folder at the beginning of each year. All the donation receipts, itemized lists of clothes, etc that were donated, and acknowledgements go straight in there so I am not running around trying to gather this stuff at the end of the year. As year-end statements and paystubs come in, they go in that folder as well.
I have folders for each month as well, where I put the bills after I pay them and credit card receipts, car repairs, etc. after I load those into Quicken. At the beginning of each month, I pull out that month’s folder and sort through what was in there from that month last year. Most of it gets shredded except for credit card bills and receipts I need to save.
We could save some of the hassle if I got email bills for credit cards, mutual funds, etc., but I still reconcile each month to Quicken and I don’t want to link our Quicken files to the web. Call me a Luddite, but it works for us.
Medical bills have their own 4" three-ring binder because I rack up lots of claims.
Our dining room table is DH’s dumping ground. No winning that battle.
Our biggest challenge is that all of us are visual types who like to SEE where things are. Keys, coats, condiments, papers, shoes, sewing supplies, you name it. Telling S2 his shoes are in his closet doesn’t give him confidence that they are actually there. Tripping over his size 15 shoes enable all of us to tell him immediately and exactly where his shoes are.
re: decluttering your closet- and your hubby’s closet as well
IF you have not worn or used it for more than 3 years- get rid of it.
IF it no longer fits - get rid of it. [ dont “plan” on losing weight- realistically it probably wont happen]
IF you find that when you reach for something, you then think “no, I’m not going to wear this”- get rid of it.
GET rid off all old shoes that need repair, if you’re not going to get them fixed.
Get rid of all old shoes that now hurt your feet- just like tummies, feet stretch in both width and length as we age.
^ also get rid of the old when you buy the new. For example I just bought a new pair of black knit pants, so the 2 pair I already had went into the donation bag.
I have a filing box I start at the beginning of each year. I have things in it like a tax file, a quarterly file for bank deposit receipts and other non-tax deductible receipts, invoices and check stubs/deposit receipts for my small business, health insurance files for the year, and credit card statements. Reconciled bank statements go in it at well. At the end of the year I add copies of my tax returns, cull out stuff I don’t need to keep, and add a flash drive with copies of relevant computer files from the previous year (Quicken backup, Quickbooks backup, notes from how things were handled on tax returns, etc). Then I label the box, and go on to the next year. At the end of 7 years I pitch/shred the contents. The boxes can be locked if necessary.
This is one way I avoid paper piles and keep organized for year end. I started this out of necessity several years ago when I had 14 tax returns to file in one year for various entities/people. :o
I do what I parent does, though with more categories, which reflects being self-employed. At the end of the year, when things reconciled on quicken, I can toss the utilities etc. I save major household repairs and purchases forever. My plastic file box gets reduced by half. After 7 years, most items discarded.
I’m also careful to shred adult patient files after 7 years.
I admit I have a hard time getting rid of jackets and boots, even though I don’t wear them often. I had my fergamo boots resoled, as it was cheaper than buying a new pair for the occasional cool days.
A friend of mine had this insight: “a lot of what I consider superfluous would make someone else quite happy.” I try not to have too much “extra” stuff. For example, if I have more than three pairs of running pants, I don’t wear pair #4, ever. So that pair goes off to Value Village or Goodwill.
I have questions I ask myself:
Clothing: Does it fit? Do I look good in it? Does it make me feel attractive? All clothing must be yes to all three.
Household goods: will I ever use this again?
Anything: is it chipped, stained, broken, not repairable, annoying to have around, require too much maintenance, replaceable with something that would better serve my needs? (I recently replaced two saute pans with nonstick ceramic pans. Love them! The old ones–off to VV.)
When I had the interior of my house painted last year, they asked if I wanted the to paint inside the closets. Sure, I told them. Resulting in a flurry of late night closet sorting/purging on a deadline. It got done… and turned out to be a big benefit in decluttering.
^^I am surprised no one has mentioned this recent best seller. She advocates letting it go if you don’ t love it and has me rolling all the laundry before putting it away in drawers. I now have the very neatest drawers. Works of art. A good friend was already inspiring me to make every cabinet, closet, drawer a sort of artistic vignette, so this was just up my alley. Yes, we have lots of time on our hands. We go out to lunch and discuss books and beautifying closets. We raise our eyebrows at mutual acquaintances who just don’t get it.
And yet another vote for fly lady. She helped me clean out my house, attic to cellar, when my kids left for college. I really like this “good enough” approach to cleaning and the idea of doing a bit at a time and not pulling out more than you can get through and put away.
Overall, I live with clean surfaces, dining room table included. But as an empty nester, I have pretty much total control of my environment. Husband’s office is a bit messy, but upstairs, and I just shut the door if need be. That is his space and a work space. Clean surfaces are an impossibility.
kindle has changed my life. I used to take a stack of books to the local library every month. The downside is not having books to trade with friends. When we moved from the “big” house in which we raised the kids, we got rid of so many books and spent a long time deciding what to keep for the permanent home library. I don’t want to add much to that collection. We are big readers, but I don’t like to look at bookshelves in my main living space. Unless the books are all beautifully bound in matching bindings. And I am not there - yet. (joke - not really going to happen probably)
I bought a desk for the parlor with drawers large and deep enough to hold all the current reading material.
I bought a desk for the entrance hall that has a drawer dedicated to my husband: keys, whatever comes out of his pockets that needs to be kept for a while at least, gloves, etc. One drawer. That is the clutter drawer.
^both the above desks have bookcases attached on top. (very tall antique secretaries) One holds a beautifully bound antique set of a favorite author. Part of our permanent library. The other has solid wood doors and that is where I keep stick current books after they are read and before they go to a new home.
Those desks help me control my clutter so I am still kind of on topic here.
When H and I downsized into our 850 sq ft apartment, we made a rule - everything that came into the house had to be beautiful as well as functional. It really makes me be discerning when buying something for the house. We also try to buy furniture and accessories that do double duty and include storage (nightstands and coffee tables with drawers, ottomans with storage, etc.) I prefer closed storage - drawers and boxes with lids, rather than open shelves and baskets. Also, I try not to let anything accumulate - papers, clothes, etc. Constant purging. But I must admit, it is much easier without children living at home.
Some great suggestions here. The simpler the better for me. I do have baskets to put mail in -a small one for regular mail, and a larger one for magazines and catalogs. They sit on the dining room table. But somehow, over time, things start accumulating there.ni have folded it down (it’s a drop leaf table) so there’s not as a big a space to put junk on.
I would reconsider the baskets. They are begging for you to put stuff in them.
Instead, take care of your mail immediately upon receipt. Recycle junk. File important stuff. Put magazines and catalogs where you will deal with them in the near future. Then recycle them.
Basket system works well for me. On some nights, I come home at 9 pm. By the time I fix dinner and feed Mr., it is time to go to bed. I would fall off the wagon if I had to touch the mail and sort it every night. My Saturdays are free and leisurely - most of the time.
I open my mail while sitting on the couch, near the trash can. Much of the mail goes directly there after being opened, bills are paid immediately by phone, and then they and everything else I want to save is put on time of my file box in my desk for filing when I feel like it. It’s still out of sight and doesn’t bother me but is ready for filing. Yes, I could file it immediately but my system works fine for me. We have the dining room chairs up (seats on the table), so that the robotic vacuum cleaner can go under it and works to keep us from adding clutter to the table. When we want to use the table, it’s easy to just put the chairs down and wipe down the table. (Mostly we eat in the kitchen at the counter on bar stools.)
IMHO - it’s a process. Because I don’t have a day job, I can sort my mail as soon as it arrives. I don’t keep catalogues. I only keep the most recent magazines. The Sunday paper goes into the kindling box on Monday morning. No cups or plates are lying around. The laundry is folded (excuse me, rolled) and put away as soon as it is dry. I did not always live like this. Recently we went to a dinner party at the home of a friend whose 10 month old grandson was visiting, along with his parents, and we had to move toys off the sofa to sit for drinks before the meal. I foresee my future.
In our empty nesting house, we eat all our meals in the dining room. So the table is not a work space or a storage space. I deliberately did not design an eat-in kitchen, or a breakfast room area. One sitting room. One eating room. One closet, though kind of large. Less is easier to keep clutter free. imho.
Several sets of friends have dining room/libraries. Walls are lined with bookcases. 90% of the time, their dining room table is a desk. That is a good use of space for them.
^^What I hate about that concept (“dining room/libraries”) is that most often, the dining room is in the middle of the traffic flow of the house - I don’t want to walk by that stuff several times a day!!!
A good friend was already inspiring me to make every cabinet, closet, drawer a sort of artistic vignette, so this was just up my alley. Yes, we have lots of time on our hands. 
We go out to lunch and discuss books and beautifying closets. We raise our eyebrows at mutual acquaintances who just don’t get it.